These Are The Best Websites For Free Woodworking Plans

Complex woodworking projects often require plans. There are plenty of small, beginner-friendly items that you can make by sketching a few joints and measurements on a legal pad and then cutting and adhering the pieces, but other, more intricate projects require more detailed modes of preparation. A good set of building plans can help you to ensure you get all the materials you need on that first trip to the hardware store, prevent waste by mapping out accurate cuts, and walk you through techniques that you might otherwise be unfamiliar with. 

You can always make your own plans, but not everyone is looking to sit down with a piece of free woodwork design software like SketchUp and create an entire project from scratch. Sometimes you just want something easy. Organizations like the Woodworker's Guild of America sell plans for as little as $2, while sites like Fine Woodworking and Popular Woodworking offer unlimited access to plan libraries for a subscription, but there are also plenty of trustworthy websites where carpenters share free plans that you can browse and download at your leisure.

You'll want to make sure that the plans are reliable, though. Nothing's worse than getting halfway through an expensive and time-consuming project only to realize that the plans you've been working off aren't accurate. I've been building furniture and tackling small-to-midsized construction projects for the better part of the decade, and I've found that several sites offer free plans that you can build from with confidence. Here are a few of the best.

You probably already know that Home Depot has just about all the stuff you need to do most of your woodworking projects, but did you know that the company's website also has a wide variety of free plans, guides, and tutorials available? These resources extend to other DIY fields, such as plumbing and electrical work, but there is a huge range of woodworking projects on offer, such as a DIY workbench, a bookshelf, a modern-style TV console, a chicken coop, and dozens of other projects.

I recently used Home Depot's plans to make a set of cornhole boards for my backyard in preparation for barbecue season. The guide clearly and concisely mapped out all of the materials, cuts, and joinery techniques that were required to complete the project. It even included tips for painting and finishing the boards once they were assembled. Many of these guides feature a whole bunch of helpful videos, photos, and illustrations. This makes the steps easy to follow, even when you're having a hard time picturing what the instructions are attempting to describe.

What's more, these guides don't come from forums or guest posts, but are curated by Home Depot's own editorial staff. "Our guides are designed to help DIYers of every skill level," the site states. "Each step of these DIY projects for the home is explained in easy-to-understand instructions and supporting photos. Many of our how-to guides come with carefully crafted instructional videos to make it easier for you."

Kreg is another well-known name in the woodworking community. The company is a prominent power tool manufacturer, but it's perhaps best known for the production of pocket hole jigs, bits, and screws. In fact, the brand is so synonymous with this joinery technique that many refer to the square-gripped pocket hole fasteners as 'Kreg screws." Some woodworking purists may turn their noses up at this joinery technique, but it's strong, effective, and an easy entry point for beginners.

Kreg also has a whole bunch of free plans available on its website. They're split into 18 different categories, which are primarily based on the area where you would most likely end up using the project piece. Within each of these categories are dozens of printable and downloadable plans that give detailed tool and material lists so you know everything you'll need at the start of the project, cut lists that allow you to get all of your cutting done at once, and detailed directions with accompanying images that make each step very clear. I've personally followed the plans for their DIY Free Little Library and found that the instructions were thorough and easy to understand.

The only thing with Kreg is that the company has a tendency to recommend projects that lean heavily on its own products. This isn't usually an issue if you already enjoy using pocket holes, but you might have to modify some of the plans if you prefer to use different joinery techniques.

Canadian lumber yards are well known for both the quantity and quality of their boards, so it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that our friends in the Great White North have a long-standing tradition of woodworking excellence. Canadian Woodworking and Home Improvement has been around since 1999, and the company claims that it "has evolved from a regional print publication into Canada's most active community of woodworkers and do-it-yourselfers."

Best of all, the publication offers dozens of free plans. These are split into 11 categories — Cabinetry, Furniture, Gifts and Crafts, Home Décor, Home Improvement, Jigs, Outdoor, Shop, Tools, Toys and Puzzles, and Turning, Carving, and Instarsia projects — with each category offering a long list of free projects. You can make a whiskey cabinet, an acoustic guitar, a hidden hinged spice rack, or a backyard firewood holder. These plans offer detailed instructions for beautiful pieces with difficulty levels that range from beginner-friendly to expert level. They rank estimated difficulty, time to completion, and cost on a scale from 1 to 5 while offering detailed images and illustrations that accompany simple text instructions. They also give material lists and hardware lists that show you everything you'll need up front.

One thing to keep in mind with Canadian Woodworking and Home Improvement is that the publication limits the number of plans that it allows you to view for free. Once you've hit your limit, the site will ask you to subscribe in order to continue viewing its plans. For this reason, it's best to browse the available plans and choose a project before clicking on any of the links.

A great resource for woodworkers who are interested in a modern rustic aesthetic is Ana White. This solo creator has been sharing free woodworking plans since 2009 and has since become an established fixture in the community. Her plans are widely known for being simple, accessible, and beginner-friendly. What's more, White builds a lot of her furniture out of construction-grade 2x4s, common boards, and other affordable materials. This is great for woodworkers on a budget, those who are still learning, and anyone who simply doesn't want to have to worry about making mistakes on $1,000 in hardwood.

There are tons of free plans available on the Ana White website. Her primary focus is on indoor and outdoor furniture, but there's plenty of other stuff on offer as well. She has free plans for a DIY barn-style greenhouse, a sand box with built-in seats, and even a tote storage rack that has a configurator built in, so you can customize the design to account for the number and dimensions of your totes to suit your space. White also has a very active YouTube channel where she shares video instructionals as well. These are usually 5-15 minutes in length and break down the process in detail, making it extremely easy to follow for those with a more visual learning style. I've personally built her famous $40 farmhouse coffee table and believe that it, like many of her projects, makes for a great entry point for anyone who's interested in picking up woodworking.

The other woodworking sites mentioned so far are all great options for solid, reliable woodworking plans, but sometimes you might want plans for something that's a little more unique or something that caters to a more niche interest. That's when it's a good idea to look at what Instructables has to offer.

Instructables is a community-driven site where members can share their projects in everything from arts and crafts to DIY home renovations. Unsurprisingly, Instructables also has a massive collection of almost 8,000 free plans and digital guides for woodworking projects. The site doesn't have the same level of editorial oversight as the other resources mentioned so far, but it easily has the widest range of different kinds of projects available. Where else might you find plans for a skateboard rack, a wooden squirrel feeder, a Dune-themed book nook, and a medieval crossbow all in the same place?

That said, there can be a lot of variance in the formatting of the guides found on Instructables because each of them is written by different contributors. This also means that there's far less oversight in terms of the guides' effectiveness and quality. I've followed several guides on Instructables that were top tier and I've also found a few that were confusingly worded and lacked information, so I wouldn't recommend it for anyone to use as their first port of call. That said, it's a great resource to have in the back pocket for any obscure projects that you can't find plans for on other sites. It's also a great site to explore when looking for inspiration, seeking creative projects, and trying to find unique solutions.

I've been a woodworker for nearly a decade. I primarily make furniture, but I've also built several small-to-mid-sized construction projects and home additions. I've used plans from numerous online resources, including several of the options listed above.

In making this list of recommended sites, I started by taking a look at some of the most popular options for free plans that are currently available. I then picked the ones that I have personally used and that I believe to be the best. I primarily chose these sites based on three criteria: the clarity and detail of their instructions, the reliability of the projects to function as designed, and the range of free projects that were available. Some sites might excel in one standard more than the others, but I believe that all of them will prove to be valuable resources for woodworkers.