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Interior painting price per square foot and per room: what to charge

Price interior painting by the room or by the wall area, and name every surface. Small companies’ own price lists put a bedroom’s walls at a median $574 and a living room’s at $950; painting the whole bedroom with ceiling, trim and doors roughly doubles it. HomeGuide puts painted surface at $1–$3 a square foot.

Calculate a price

Starting point: $2.00 per sq ft. Wall and ceiling surface, per sq ft (US guide): $1.00–$3.00 per square foot of surface. Our midpoint of that range, rounded to cents. Price per square foot of painted wall or ceiling surface. HomeGuide: interior painting costs, checked 2026-10-15.

Extras, travel and minimum

Use wall or paintable surface area, not floor area, unless your rate explicitly uses floor area. State coats, preparation, trim and paint supply in the quote.

Job price before tax—

Enter paintable area (square feet).

Interior painting price list: published rates

Job or unitPublished priceWhat the price coversSource and date
Bedroom (US guide)$350–$850 per roomBedroom painting; preparation and included surfaces affect the total.HomeGuide: interior painting costs · Checked
Bedroom (Angi, US)$300–$750 per roomProfessional painting of one bedroom.Angi: how much does it cost to paint a room · Published · Checked
Bedroom walls, about 12 by 14 ft (Chicago)about $770 per roomMaterials and walls-only painting in the provider’s bedroom example.Bold Coat: Chicago interior painting pricing · Checked
Same bedroom, walls and ceiling (Chicago)about $1,070 per roomMaterials, walls and ceiling in the same bedroom example.Bold Coat: Chicago interior painting pricing · Checked
Living room (US guide)$600–$2,000 per roomLiving-room painting; height, openings and included trim affect the total.HomeGuide: interior painting costs · Checked
Living room (Angi, US)$900–$2,000 per roomProfessional painting of one living room.Angi: how much does it cost to paint a room · Published · Checked
Bathroom (Angi, US)$200–$400 per roomProfessional painting of one bathroom.Angi: how much does it cost to paint a room · Published · Checked
Interior door (US guide)$75–$150 per doorInterior door painting; sides, frame and preparation affect the total.HomeGuide: interior painting costs · Checked
Wall and ceiling surface, per sq ft (US guide)$1–$3 per square foot of surfacePrice per square foot of painted wall or ceiling surface.HomeGuide: interior painting costs · Checked
Whole room, per sq ft of floor (US guide)$3–$7 per square foot of floorBudget per square foot of room floor area.HomeGuide: interior painting costs · Checked
Room, per sq ft of floor (Angi, US)$2–$6 per square foot of floorUpdated July 8, 2026; Angi applies the rate to the room’s floor size.Angi: how much does it cost to paint a room · Published · Checked

Should you price painting by the room or by the square foot?

By the room for standard bedrooms and baths you can price on a walkthrough; by wall area when rooms vary or ceilings are tall. HomeGuide puts painted surface at $1–$3 a square foot of wall and ceiling, and Angi’s July 2026 guide puts a room at $2–$6 per square foot of floor. Keep the two apart: a 12 by 14 bedroom has 168 sq ft of floor and about 400 sq ft of wall at 8 ft.

Home Pros Painting in Kansas City measures walls and ceilings by area, trim by the linear foot and doors by count, then adds them up. Copy that method for odd rooms; per-room prices are faster for everything else.

What should a bedroom and a living room cost?

Walls only, a bedroom runs a median $574 across 17 companies and a living room $950. Several companies publish the parts separately: CertaPro in Northwest Arkansas charges $340 for the walls of an 11 by 11 bedroom, $180 for the ceiling and $170 for baseboards, and Indiana Painting Company $541, $205 and $226 for a 12 by 15 room.

Pricing each surface as its own line lets the customer drop a line instead of asking for a discount, and it shows them what the whole-room price is made of.

How much do ceilings, trim and doors add?

A bedroom ceiling adds a median $205 and a door $115, and painting the whole bedroom with ceiling, trim and doors costs a median 100% more than the walls alone. Bold Coat in Chicago goes from about $770 to $1,570 for the same 12 by 14 room.

Doors cost less when the room is already being painted. Bold Coat charges about $120 a door added to a room and $210 for a door on its own, and Autotelic in Denver drops from $115 a door to $95 for five or more.

What raises the price of an interior job?

Height, cabinets and surface repair. NHV Painters adds 25%, 50% and 75% for 10, 12 and 14 ft ceilings, and Best Buy Painting in Cleveland prices a two-story foyer at $1,500–$3,000. Kitchen cabinets are their own trade: Advanced Painting Services quotes $3,800–$6,500 to spray 30 doors, and CertaPro Renton $2,300–$5,175 for stained wood taken to a color.

Popcorn ceiling removal runs $7–$10 a square foot at Headwaters Painting in Minneapolis. Price repair and removal on their own lines; they take longer than the paint and are where jobs run over.

How do you set your own painting rate?

Start from what an hour of painting costs you, not from a competitor’s room price. The BLS May 2024 median wage for construction and maintenance painters was $23.40 an hour; payroll costs, insurance, paint, travel, estimating time and margin sit on top of it. Three companies that sell a painter by the day charge $700–$825, about $88–$103 an hour over eight hours.

Estimate the hours per room for your own crew, multiply by that hourly cost, add materials, then divide by one minus your margin. Check the result against the published room prices before you send it.

Three worked prices

The first two use published room prices; the third is a published day rate for one painter.

A 12 by 14 bedroom, walls only. Bold Coat’s published price for the walls of a bedroom about 12 by 14 ft, materials included.

Bedroom walls, two coats: 1 room × $770 = $770.

Example total: $770. Rate source: Bold Coat: Chicago interior painting pricing, checked 2026-10-15.

An 11 by 11 bedroom priced surface by surface. CertaPro Northwest Arkansas’s published walls, ceiling and baseboard prices for the same room.

Walls: 1 room × $340 = $340.

Ceiling: 1 room × $180 = $180.

Baseboards: 1 room × $170 = $170.

Example total: $690. Rate source: CertaPro Painters of Northwest Arkansas: Northwest Arkansas, AR prices, checked 2026-10-15.

A day of small jobs. NHV Painters’ price for one painter for up to eight hours, with up to two gallons of paint.

Painter for a day: 1 day × $825 = $825.

Example total: $825. Rate source: NHV Painters: Milford, CT prices, checked 2026-10-15.

Frequently asked questions

Do I charge for moving furniture?

Most room prices include moving furniture away from the walls and covering it; Peek Brothers and CertaPro Austin say so. Emptying a room or moving heavy pieces between rooms is a separate line.

How do I price kitchen cabinets?

By the job or by the door, never by the room. Advanced Painting Services quotes $3,800–$6,500 for 30 sprayed doors, CertaPro Renton $1,150–$3,910 for cabinets already painted, and CertaPro Orange County $150 per cabinet door.

What is a painter-for-a-day price?

One painter for up to eight hours at a set price: $700 at Klappenberger & Son in Maryland, $760 plus materials at Pearl Painters in Portland and $825 with up to two gallons at NHV in Connecticut. It suits a list of small jobs.

Does a pre-1978 house change the job?

Yes, if you disturb old paint. The EPA’s Renovation, Repair and Painting rule requires anyone paid to disturb painted surfaces in homes built before 1978 to be certified and trained in lead-safe work. Ask the build year before you quote sanding or scraping.

Sources