12x12 is a good standard bedroom size.

12x10 I consider a minimum - they are tight with anything but a twin size bed, but a full and a desk fits, but not much else.

12x14 is what I had in previous houses and I personally thought that was a perfect size. It fit a CA King, a dresser, and a desk. Didn't have a kid then - was a guest room. It would be plenty big for a kid to have play space and toy storage and then as they became older grow into it with a larger bed, some seating and TV area if you would allow.

Our guest room is 11'8" x 13'4" and fits a queen bed, dresser, etc.

IMO a desk is something not usually used much at all so you can forego that but 12 x12 to me is the min. and if girls they need a walkin closet for sure so take that into consideration.

In our new build we have two kids rooms for each of our kids. Our new place isn’t cavernous (but is large given our location). We wanted efficient usage of space. We toured other condos while we were searching for our new home and the primary bedrooms were excessively large. Wasted space, IMO. When I was growing up I shared a room with my sister and never had anything larger than a twin until I graduated from college.

Each room is about 10x11. They each have a very generously sized walk in closet which will help ease the need for excessive furniture in the bedrooms. If I’m paying as much as I am per square foot, I want each square foot to be hard-working.

If not a walk-in, a double doored wide closet is great, too.

If I was a kid again, I'd prefer a twin bed, so I could have more room for stuff, like a cool beanbag chair, a lava lamp and a blacklight to illuminate my posters, but to each his own. That being said, we have a 12x10 guest room with a queen bed in it and there is not much room for anything else, okay for a temporary visitor, but not so much for a boy and his toys.

To narrow down room sizes in our new build plan, I sketched out different sizes and orientations then measured out furniture and layout. I put these sketches into a home design program, toured model homes with the sizes, and chose 11'x13' room sizes for the two secondary bedrooms.

Our old house had two 12'x14' and they were ginormous! One room had a queen bed, dresser, two bookshelves, and two bungee chairs. The other had a twin with a bookshelf headboard, a wide mirror dresser, and a tall dresser. Both had huge clearances around everything. (one wall had 3 doors <entry, bath, closet> and the wall across had 2 windows leaving 2 blank parallel walls)

We decided to save 50 sqft after seeing two 13x11 rooms in each orientation of a queen bed on along the 13' wall and another along the 11' wall with two nightstands on either side. In our layout, the queen beds are against the 11' wall leaving about 30" of pathway on either side and about 45" between the footboard and 20" depth dresser. But our kids are 3 & 6 so twin beds for the next few years!

We have an only child. A girl with lots of stuff. My preference if I were building a house would be a second smaller master suite with a walk in closet. The bedroom itself could be 15x20ish with a 8x8 closet and a nice size bathroom with shower tub combo and larger vanity. This would allow her and her stuff to be self-contained from todler to young adult. I would modify that if I were planning a playroom or separate homework/computer space elsewhere.

Whatever size, I would plan all rooms in your house to accommodate queen sized beds. When your children grow up, move out, and marry you will have an appropriate sized guest room to host them. Or if you don't plan on staying there that long, the next person will appreciate a room where they can do the same. Growing up I had a room that was 9'x12' with an alcove for a window seat and an alcove for a desk. So all in all, it was just slightly smaller than 12x12. The room worked well with a twin sized bed, but now it's tight with a queen bed with headboard and foot board.

I know everyone's families and lifestyles are different, but I lean more toward not giving children massive rooms and massive closets and letting them have tons of stuff. 6-8' of linear closet space is plenty for boys or girls, and if the room is too big or well appointed you will never see your children. Plus, how are they going to cope when they head off to college and have to share a small room or apartment and fir all of their stuff in a 3' wide wardrobe?

Patricia, why no desk? I would consider that mandatory. I use them to this day.

Our guest room is 9'-0" x 11'-3" and fits a queen bed and two guests.

11 or 12 x 12 to 15 gives plenty of room
for a kid, or a guest room. Daughter's first bedroom was 11 x 13 something, with reachin closets across the 11. plenty of room for crib, then bed, small dresser, then bigger. and toys. Until she was a preteen, I actually used half the closet for storage.

We never allowed computers in her bedroom, so homework was usually done at the kitchen counter, or family room.
my guests never complained about a 10 x 11.5 guest room, with a queen bed. yes, kind of spartan, but, room for a weekend , or a week or two. Guest rooms in the new home are larger, but not grand. I want them to be comfortable, but I'm not looking for roommates, either.

Mark, the key of course being smart window and door placement. Our childhood rooms are such that the bed has to be placed with the long dimensions running the short direction of the room. A queen bed with no headboard or footboard takes up 80" + about 4" to account for the space at the wall and the thickness of the comforter. Add in the headboard and footboard and you are left with 16-18" to get around the foot of the bed. Doable, but not as nice as it could be.

Some further antidotes on room size: our current house has two guest bedrooms sized 12'x17.5' and 9'x17.5' The first room is really comfortable with a queen sized bed and room for other furniture, while having enough floor space left for play, homework, etc. If it had a twin sized bed it might feel oversized. The second feels plenty large but the proportions are strange for both visual comfort and laying out furniture.

I grew up in a 10x12 bedroom with a reach-in closet that had bypass sliding doors. I shared the home's only bathroom with my parents and any guests. I turned out pretty OK. And at one point I had a king-size waterbed in that bedroom.

Never needed a walk-in closet or my own bathroom or anything...

We’ll be doing no bigger than 12x12. Big enough for a queen bed, end table, dresser, reach in closet. Homework will be done at the kitchen table. I had a desk in my room and it was one more surface for me to collect clothes and other junk.

We prefer no toys in the bedroom and that they be used for dressing and sleeping only. The smaller the better so that square footage can be put in the gathering areas!

We currently have two children under 5 with potential for a third. We will likely have two sharing a room and oldest gets his own and when he moves out the younger two will get their own rooms.

interestingly enough, the plans for the horse barn have stalls that are also 12x12....

When did children's rooms start having a queen size bed in them? When did twin beds fall out of favor? Do children no longer have sleepovers where twin beds are preferable?

My last house (circa 1932) had two 10x10 rooms. We had a queen bed and a big dresser in one without issue, the other had a twin and was downright roomy for the toddler. This house has ~11.5x11.5', kids' rooms and they are about perfect.

When did children's rooms start having a queen size bed in them? When did twin beds fall out of favor?

I'm really awful.

Two of my boys share a full bed; two share a queen; and sometimes, two share a twin (one head at each end, feet cross in the middle).

:-D

Anglo made me laugh. I bought twins for my 3 kids because they like floor space to study/play. Also, I think two are more flexible for various guest situations than one larger size. The rooms are around 11 x 11 and a fine size for their needs. Before kids we had queens in them and I could fit end tables and a dresser.

I know some people end up sleeping with their kids, and want a queen for those nights. I had some recent hotel stays and sleep was difficult when sharing! No thanks.

@anglophilia I plan on doing a twin plus trundle for my kids. I don’t quite understand why a child would ever need a queen bed. Or even a full.

For tall people, extra long twins are available. Queen beds not 100% necessary.

Growing up up I mostly shared a bedroom with my sister. And usually had 1 bathroom for a family of 5. Never had a walk in closet. So i think just having a room is pretty luxurious! Also we don’t want to make it too Cushy. We want the kid to move out someday!

We’re building and the kids rooms are about 12x12 which includes reach in closets. so the non closet portion is more like 10x12 ish. a queen would fit but don’t plan to have one there.

Also window and door placements are important. You need wall

space for things but of course also want windows. So consider design not just size

My last home the secondary bedrooms (my kids rooms) were all 14' X 12". All had full/double beds. With the shallower dept of 12' you could not have a dresser or other piece of furniture on the wall at the foot of the bed without there being tight walk way. For that reason I would have preferred 14 X 14' rooms. That said so much depends on where the doors and windows are in the room. What the layout of entry door, closet doors, bathroom doors are combined with where windows are located determines they furniture layout for the room. If you cant lay out your furniture properly due to the locations of these it doesn't matter if the room is large or small.

One with a really large closet. Seriously, a small room absent the clutter, wouldn't look as small as a large room with a great deal of clutter. If you want children to learn to put their stuff away, give them a good place to put it.

One with a really large closet.

I like this. I currently like the idea of having 12x12 kids' rooms (but 5 of my 6 will share), and love the idea of an entire 12' wall with a reach-in closet.

Make that one large closet per child. If two children share a room, each need their own closet.

Great ideas! 12x14 sounds about right. It will work for toddler bed through teenage and queen bed.

someone suggested a large closet. What size walk in closet? I was thinking 5x5? my current master closet is 5x5. Of course in this house I’m planning a 10x12master closet.

The size closet depends on what needs to be stored there. My daughter's closet contained all her clothes, shoes, purses, backpacks, bedding and towels. It was about 5x4 and proved too small with multiple rods and shelves. When they get older, their clothes and shoes just keep getting bigger and longer. Maybe with boys its less. Certainly a kid's closet will need more space than a guest room.

We do big beds because we play musical beds at night.. currently I sleep with toddler and husband sleeps with pre-schooler.

It is quite uncomfortable to share a twin bed with a kid who starfishes..

My two boys (one pre-teen and a teenager) each have rooms that are ~11 x 12’. Pretty small - but we live in an old house and that was the standard then. The good thing is that both rooms are identical, with west-facing windows and decent closets. The kids don’t mind the size of their rooms, they’re cozy and each represents its owner (wall color, decorations). For now, both have twin beds.

Anglophilia

When did children's rooms start having a queen size bed in them? When did twin beds fall out of favor? Do children no longer have sleepovers where twin beds are preferable?

I planned the secondary rooms sizes to accommodate queen size beds for future resale and in anticipation for my middle son growing tall.

The neighbors around our new build are either grandparents or have children in college and have/use their secondary bedrooms as guest rooms or hobby rooms. Our 13x11 size in comparable to theirs.

Our oldest son switched from a twin bed to a queen two years ago when his feet started to hang off the end. I could have gotten him an XL twin but decided to go with a queen because we had the space. He also still is a "starfish" sleeper (great description runnem!) and it fits him well. He's 16, 6' tall, and still growing.

My sons are 6' 5" and 6' 2" and both slept in a double sized bed from about age 9 till adulthood. It is just simply more comfortable to have a wider than twin bed. Plus a full or queen bed looks so much nicer in a room than a single twin bed in a room. Two twin beds look nice but one single twin bed looks like a dorm. As far as bedding, you will find the largest selection of bedding in a queen size.

My 5 year old has my old queen bed left over from when we upgraded to a king because (1) we already owned it, and (2) I sometimes need to lie down with her and boy can she kick. I'll be putting her into an xl twin soon. I also had a queen when I was in mid to late high school. My boyfriend moved in with us, and me in particular, when his mom kicked him out. /shrug. Progressive parents (and the reverse psychology was effective).

In my experience, the bigger the room, the bigger the mess a kid can make ;)

We are in a small 3BR/1BA on the main floor home right now (DH and I are in the basement) temporarily as we await to remodel/add on. Our twin girls share an 11.5 x 14 bedroom with each having their own twin loft bed. It's ridiculous the mess they can make on their floor space. Our oldest son has an 11x14 bedroom with a queen bed, L-shaped computer desk and a nightstand. His floor space is definitely much tighter than the girls but sufficient for a 16yo boy. Our youngest son has a 10x12 bedroom and he has a full bed, dresser, nightstand, and 4x2 cube organizer for his toys and has plenty of floorspace with his bed against a wall. He could definitely use a twin but we had the full bed and mattress already. IMHO, 11x14 or 12x14 is perfect with a queen bed.

We gave our twin girls the master because they have to share and we want this to be our forever home. Even with that space, we will go from two toddler beds to bunk beds to save space for other stuff. Our son is in the next largest room and we are in another smaller room. All our room fits is a corner desk in one corner, a queen bed in the other, a nightstand snuggled in between, and a small dresser, but thats all that is needed. All we do is sleep in there, we figured kids might actually use the extra space of the bigger bedrooms. So we will share the main bathroom with our son and the girls have their own smaller one when they are older. I cant imagine anyone wanting to stay with us so im not at all worried about guest space, lol. We also have a finished basement thats all one large room that we might expand into someday.... Sometimes you have to think outside the box! I grew up in a family of five in a mobile home with 1 bathroom and 4 tiny rooms. You can make almost anything work

Do kids need a full or queen size bed? Absolutely not. But sometimes it makes more sense.

We had planned to do twin beds (what H and I each had growing up) but we already had a full and a Queen when we moved them out of their little toddler beds. It is easier if we have to lay down with them, but also since we don’t have a big enough house for a guest room this means we actually have a place for out of town family to stay.

To OP, I think the layout of the room (Windows, doors, closet) matters more than the actual size.

My kid's rooms are in the walkout basement. This allowed me to make them as large as possible. My girls each have a 12*14 space which will be more of a living space. Then a built in bed (with and extra foot depth for shelving on one side) and a built in 24*60 desk space including shelving on each side. This is also our forever home, and I will probably later change the space up. But having them each have their own private space was high on my list.

My daughter had a full size platform bed with four drawers underneath on each side. She could have slept in a single, but then it wouldn't have had the storage. It saved floor space that would have been necessary for a dresser. Instead she had an L-shaped desk in the corner.

Kids need a queen bed because grandma and grandpa come to visit and can’t sleep together in a twin bed.

My kids rooms are both 13'x10'. The rooms seem quite big IMO. The master is our place is 17'x14'.

My girls grew up in identical 12x12 rooms with modest closets. It was okay; I'd have been happy to give up a bit of floor space for more closet space. Over the 30 years my family's owned this house, those rooms have supported the following furniture arrangements comfortably:

- two twins with a nightstand between them + a double dresser

- one queen flanked by two nightstands + a double dresser + a chest of drawers (that arrangement was a bit tight)

- one full-sized bed + a double dresser + two large bookshelves

We just moved our youngest into a college apartment, and I spent the night with her last weekend. (I measure everything, by the way.) Her bedroom is 11x13, and she has a full-sized bed + milk crates /boards stacked up for a bookshelf. That room is VERY comfortable because she has a walk-in closet that absorbs most of the stuff, and she doesn't have alllllll her cluttery stuff from home.

A good rule of thumb: Consider the bed you want to place in the room, and allow 3' of walking space on each side. That's a VERY comfortable measurement.

Also, if you expect to stay in this house long-term, consider that -- at some point -- this child may come back to visit ... with a spouse in tow. You'd want to provide a queen-sized bed ... though you could probably count on that bed being near-the-only-thing-in-the-room at that point.

One thought: If you are choosing how you use your space -- such as choosing between three large bedrooms or four smaller ones, consider how the bonus room could be used in the future.

Every home needs a bedroom and full bath downstairs that can be used as a master bedroom suite by empty-nesters.

A fourth bedroom, depending upon the layout, can be very versatile -- it can be a guest room or a children's play room or a home office/study or a hobby/craft room or a game room or even a formal dining room (in addition to having other dining space, such as a breakfast nook or a dining table in a great room or family room.

And then there's this when considering children's rooms: Children -- and, of course, teens -- with large bedrooms are more apt to invite friends into their bedrooms, whereas if there is a bonus room with comfortable chairs but no sofa or bed, that room without a bed might be preferable for some of their entertaining.

What are the thoughts on a 10x16 bedroom- is that too narrow?

Ali 10x16 is okay but 12x16 is better. I really would shoot for more like 12x12. 16 is a long room. My master is 14x14 with a 7x7 reading area and is more than enough for a king bed. I don't think a kids room needs to be that large

@Cheryl Smith i was hoping to create a play space- that’s why I was thinking rectangle vs. square

In our last house, one bedroom was 11x16. My twins shared it most of the time we lived there and it was plenty of space for two twin beds.

In our turn of the century house, the kids room at back is about 6-7 foot wide, by maybe 10 foot long, and there was no closet. Clearly people had lower expectations for bed size and storage. Our middle room is more reasonable and can accommodate a queen bed, I think it must be 11-12 foot square roughly, with a bay window, and there is a single closet over stairs. If you could double or triple the closet I think you’d be pretty good. Linens go in the linen closet. A Captain bed helps with storage, and using dressers as nightstands. When I was a young person my mom took away my room for her own use and put me in a much smaller room, because she cited the less space equals less mess theory, but it just meant as a near adult I had very little space and very little privacy, without appropriate furniture and no curtains on a window that looked directly into our neighbours dining and living area. Needless to say, it was horrible, but it did give me more impetus to move out. Kids toys seem to last only for a blip in time, don’t give up too much space for them, but do consider the possibility they may need some personal time and space in their rooms.

Ali extra play area sounds great. extra space as a teen too. What ever works for your family.... works