Home Designer vs PRO Landscape+

Home Designer is desktop software for DIY home design, remodeling, kitchen and bath projects, and cost estimation. It runs on Windows and macOS and provides 2D floor plans alongside 3D views, cross-sections, elevations, and real-time ray-trace rendering. Automatic design tools generate roofs, floors, foundations, ceilings, and framing as users work. Users can create scaled construction documents and site plans, produce materials lists, assign prices for estimates, and dimension plans manually or automatically. The software also supports customizable smart cabinets, automatic door and window framing, and materials takeoffs. Virtual tour walkthroughs can be recorded, and interactive 3D Viewer models can be exported to Chief Architect’s cloud for mobile sharing. Core, bonus, and manufacturer library items are available; bonus and manufacturer catalogs are free downloads. Home Designer is compatible with Chief Architect software for project sharing. A trial is available, but trial users cannot save, print, export, or record walkthroughs, and Library Browser functions are restricted. The monthly plan is $79 a month; annual subscription is $495 a year.

PRO Landscape+ combines landscape design, presentation, material takeoffs, estimating and proposals in a subscription platform. Users can create before-and-after concepts from property photos using a library of more than 19,000 images, or produce scaled CAD drawings and material takeoffs from an object library. The software generates estimates from photo or CAD plans using the user's prices and tax rate. Scaled CAD drawings can be rendered in 3D, viewed from rotated angles, and turned into walkthrough movies; the listed features also include flyovers and night and holiday lighting designs. Planning tools include terrain modeling, planting plans and irrigation design. CAD files can be imported or exported as DWG, DXF or PDF, and the maker says the CAD tools require no prior CAD knowledge. A Companion app transfers designs between a computer and an iPad or Android tablet. The annual plan costs $75 a month billed annually, for one user, one computer and one tablet. Desktop use requires 64-bit Windows 10 or Windows 11; Mac use through Parallels with Windows is described, but that setup is unsupported.