How to Draw a Backyard Plan Online, Free

Backyard plan: why draw the design before you dig

A yard is paid for by the square foot and is hard to put right afterwards. A patio poured in the wrong place, a tree planted too close to the property line or a pool that blocks the way through are all expensive to correct. Drawing the backyard design on a plan, to scale, lets you compare several layouts for the price of an eraser.

A plan answers very practical questions. Will an RV get through the gate? Does the patio stay in the sun in the afternoon? How many feet of fence or hedge need buying? Is there room left for a vegetable bed? Each answer is read by measuring, not by guessing by eye on site.

The principle is the same as for a house plan: you draw what is fixed first, then what you add. The differences are the lot lines, the plants, which grow, and the rules on distances and permits, which are imposed on you.

What you need before you start

As with the house, everything starts with measurements. In a yard you take them outdoors, with a long tape or a measuring wheel, and a few stakes to mark reference points.

The method: how to draw a backyard plan in eight steps

1. List what you want

   Patio, pool, shed, vegetable beds, lawn, play area, parking: write the list before you draw, with the sizes you would like. A patio for six people needs about 12 ft by 10 ft, and a parking space for one car about 9 ft by 18 ft.

2. Draw the lot lines in Terrain mode

   In Plan², open Layers and switch to Terrain mode: the lot is not drawn with the Wall tool. The guided flow has four steps, Address, Parcel, House and Around, and each can be skipped. In the United States the boundary is drawn by hand: tap each corner of the lot, in the order of your plat or survey, then tap Finish. Type the length of each side if you want to be exact. Then name the street side, and add the access, the driveway or the gate, where it really is.

3. Place the house at its real distance

   Draw the house, or place the one you already drew, at the correct distance from the lot lines. In Terrain mode Plan² shows the distance from the house to each boundary, so you can read the figure instead of working it out. It is the most useful measurement on the plan, and every setback rule depends on it.

4. Add the fixed points

   Add the gate, the access points, any existing patio, the cleanouts and the hose bib. These fixed points constrain the rest of the drawing.

5. Add the surfaces

   Patio and pool come from the Yard family of the Library at a usual size and resize to the inch. For a lawn, a vegetable bed or a path of free shape, trace a Free room: it takes a name and its area is worked out for you.

6. Check access and parking

   Place a car, a van or an RV at its real size and run it through the gate. A plan shows in two minutes that a turn is too tight.

7. Plant at full-grown size

   Trees and hedges are placed like objects. Give them the spread they will have when mature, not their size on planting day, to see whether two trees crowd each other or one will smother the patio.

8. Check the distances, then export

   Read the distances to the lot lines and compare them with your local rules. Adjust, then choose File, then Export…, to print the plan or save it as a PNG or a PDF at the scale you pick. The Site plan export adds the lot, the street and the distances to the boundaries.

What to check locally before you plant or build

Rules on yards vary widely from one state, county and city to the next, so this guide names none. Check the rules of your own building department, and your homeowners association if you have one, before you decide. Here is what they usually cover.

• Setbacks: many places set a minimum distance between a property line and a building, a pool or a shed, and the distance often depends on the height of the structure. Many cities and homeowners associations also set how close trees and hedges may stand to a property line.
• Height of fences and hedges: a fence facing the street is often limited to a lower height than one at the back, and an association may limit materials and colors.
• Protected trees: some trees, and some neighborhoods, are protected, and removing or heavily pruning a tree needs permission.
• Outbuildings: a shed, a pergola or a detached garage may need a building permit above a certain footprint or height, or if it stands near a property line.
• Pools and ponds: a pool usually needs a permit, a safety barrier with a self-latching gate, and a setback from the property line.
• Overlooking: a raised deck close to a neighbor may need screening.
• Underground utilities: in the United States you can dial 811 a few days before you dig, and the utilities will mark their buried lines for free.

If a rule is unclear, ask your building department in writing. The answer is worth more than a guess.

Backyard plan conventions

A few conventions make a backyard plan readable by others. Orient it with north at the top and show north, because the sun guides the position of the patio, the vegetable beds and the trees. The site sheets Plan² exports carry a north arrow, and the view turns with the north rose.

Name every element and every zone: a lawn, a vegetable bed and a path are Free rooms with plain names, which also shows their area. Draw fences and hedges as thin lines, much thinner than the house walls, so they are not mistaken for walls.

Dimension what matters for the rules: the distance from the house to the lot lines, from trees to the property line and from the pool to the fence. In Terrain mode Plan² shows the distances from the house to the lot lines, and the length of every boundary side. For the distance between two other objects, read the position of each in the properties and subtract.

Remember that a wall line is centered on its axis. For a distance to a property line, measure from the face of the wall or the edge of the object, not from its axis.

Worked example: the demonstration backyard

The figure shows the lot around the demonstration house: 83′ 11¾″ by 49′ 2½″, with both dimensions marked. The street is to the north, closed by a hedge with an 11′ 5¾″ sliding gate that leads straight to the garage door. The other three sides are fences, and a hedge of seven shrubs runs along the east fence.

The 13′ 1½″ by 9′ 10″ patio lies against the south wall of the house, under the living room’s sliding patio door, and the 19′ 8¼″ by 9′ 10″ pool stretches across the southeast. Two trees complete the yard, one between the patio and the pool and one east of the pool. A Free room named Yard colors the ground on the south side and shows its area, 1,323 sq ft.

Measure the pool: it sits 2′ 5½″ from the south fence. On a real lot, that distance would be the first thing to check before digging, because many places require more. This is exactly what a plan is for.

Common mistakes in backyard design

• Drawing trees at planting size. A sapling three feet tall becomes a tree many feet wide, so give it its mature spread and its planting distance.
• Ignoring slope and drainage. A 2D plan does not show them: note them beside the plan and place patios and sheds accordingly.
• Forgetting how vehicles, equipment and deliveries get in. Put them on the plan before fixing the widths.
• Trusting a parcel map for the lot lines. Measure on site and, if in doubt, call a licensed surveyor. In France Plan² can import the cadastral parcel, but even there it is a tax drawing and not a survey.
• Neglecting orientation. A patio facing due north stays cold, and a vegetable bed in shade yields little.
• Reading the local rules after buying. Read them before ordering the pool.

Making your backyard plan in Plan²

Plan² draws the house and the lot on the same plan, in 2D, without an account. The moves are those of a house plan, plus Terrain mode and the Yard family of items.

• The lot has its own mode. Terrain mode holds the boundary, the street, the access, the neighbors and the connections to the networks, and the guided flow runs Address, Parcel, House, Around. A project can hold several properties, each with a name, an address and a parcel reference.
• The map is opt-in: a consent card asks first, and nothing is sent before you accept. In France the map shows the IGN aerial photo and the cadastral parcels. Elsewhere, including in the United States, it is an OpenStreetMap-based map, there is no parcel import, and you draw the boundary by hand from your deed, plat or survey.
• A fence or hedge inside the lot can be a thin wall: choose the Partition type (3½ in) and name it. The grid snaps points every 6 in.
• For the outdoors, the Yard family of the Library offers a patio, a pool, a tree, a septic tank, patio furniture, a grill, a planter, a raised vegetable bed, a backyard shed, a swing set and a trampoline. The sliding gate, the car, the van, the RV, the bus and the bicycle are in the Garage and vehicles family. Each item resizes, and rotates to the exact degree.
• There is no hedge item as such: line up trees of the width you want, or draw a thin wall named “Hedge”.
• A Free room, with its four corners and an extra corner where needed, stands for a lawn, a vegetable bed or a path, and shows its area in square feet.
• Does the lot run off the page? The “Expand plan” handles on the edges enlarge it. Arrow keys move the selected item by 1 in, or by 6 in with Shift.
• Export the plan as JSON to reopen it, as a PNG or a PDF to print at a scale of your choice (File, then Export…), or share it as a link: the plan is stored on no server.