Terraria has always boasted of combat-oriented, but having the best Terraria house design ideas for you and your NPCs is always welcome. I was also guilty of just piling up some dirt blocks and walls and slapping a door on it, but it’s never enough. Here are some designs that I have personally used in my Terraria adventures!
Best Terraria House Design Ideas for 1.4.4.9
| Why This House? | House Link |
|---|---|
| Best Living Space | Basic Wood and Stone House |
| Most Aesthetic | Hallowed Hideout |
| Easiest Build | Refurbished Underground Cabin |
| Hardest Build | Underworld Sailboat |
Version 1.4 introduced us to the NPC Happiness system that added the Pylon mechanic. This allows you to warp between biomes as long as there are enough “Happy” NPCs living in it. This is why it’s necessary to build houses in almost all biomes in the world.
For housing to be suitable, it will need to have a door, table, chair, lights, manmade walls, and ample space. We’ve included some ideal house designs for all biomes so you won’t have to settle for dirtboxes for all of them.
Basic Wood and Stone House
- Cheap, easy, and accessible
- Great for the Forest, Cavern, and Underground biomes
- Difficulty – 1 out of 5
This build relies on materials that anyone can get very early in the game. This is a perfect house example for people who want to build a house near your spawn point. The house centers around materials that you can find easily near the beginning of the game. These are one of the very first designs I’ve ever used in game.
The chests are easy to get and you can gather them around the surface so you shouldn’t have to craft any. The only “rare” material in this build are the books since you’d need to be lucky with your surface Dungeon generation. The room on the top right is valid since Beds are considered Chairs.
The Underground Bunker
- Provides protection from Overworld boss fights
- Great for any non-evil underground areas
- Difficulty – 2 out of 5
This build follows the previous basic housing structure with the only difference of being underground. Some NPCs like the Demolitionist prefer to be a few feet underground, thus being required for a Cavern Pylon. I highly recommend using this if you’re creating an underground base.
Do note that this has to be below the Surface level to register as an underground house. The house provides salvation from Blood Moons, so make sure to rush to your underground bunker if you’re underprepared or just want to skip it.
Sky Castle
- A fancy schmancy for a bougie Terrarian like you
- No real benefit aside from being dazzling
- Difficulty – 4 out of 5 (needs a Fallen Star farm)
This is one of the best Terraria house designs if you want to transform pre-existing Floating Islands. The castle can be upscaled to whatever size you wish, with the only downside that you’ll need to have an abundance of Fallen Stars to craft Sunplate Blocks.
If you’re lucky to have multiple floating islands nearby, you can build an entire sky kingdom so long as you have the materials for it. I found it very useful to have these bases set up since it creates opportunities for Fallen Star, Harpy, and Wyvern farms.
Tree House
- Very aesthetically pleasing
- Provides decent protection from horde events
- A similar design can be used for fishing lakes
- Difficulty – 3 out of 5
This design idea revolves around the use of living trees as a “hanging area” for your build. In our example, we made use of Wood, Living Wood Walls, and Red Dynasty Shingles (can be substituted for other materials if unlucky with Traveling Merchant)
This design does not necessarily need to be on treetops and can be used above Desert Oasis and other giant bodies of water. This is due to the middle entryway being a viable fishing spot since fishing rods can go through platforms. I’ve used the design countless times for Goblin, Pirate, and Martian invasions since the elevation and walls are an organic form of defense.
Refurbished Underground Cabin
- Making use of what’s already there
- Ideal for house flippers
- Difficulty – 1 out of 5
If you’ve journeyed enough underground, you may have come across an underground cabin or two. If you’re lucky, you can get one with enough size and minimal damage to convert it into a suitable living space. Since Underground Cabins are mostly intact, you’ll need very minimal materials to fix it.
Refurbishing a cabin is easy, the harder part is finding a suitable one to even bother fixing. Some things you should look out for are location, depth, and space. These bases are considered a “last resort” kind of deal. I mostly use them if I can’t house NPCs in waiting, mostly as a temporary home.
Jungle Bungalow
- The perfect house for the Witch Doctor
- Live your life in the Terrarian tropics
- Difficulty – 1 out of 5
This design makes heavy use of the Rich Mahogany which is abundant in the Jungle biome. This is a very basic build since you may only need to build a house for the Witch Doctor in this biome. If you do plan on having a Jungle Pylon, this house is basic enough to make multiple of. Personally, I have only ever used it for the Witch Doctor.
You may want to build these houses before you even get into Hardmode since the mobs that spawn then are highly deadly. The leaves on top of the build are made using the Rich Mahogany Wood Wand so you’d need to find it underground.
Beach Hut
- If you like Piña Coladas, this is the house for you
- Great for fishing!
- Difficulty – 1 out of 5
The Beach Hut is our dedicated build for housing the Angler NPC for multiple reasons. First, it keeps him away from any combat we may do since the only Ocean fight is Duke Fishron (which can be done in the opposite ocean). Second, most players hate the Angler for his arduous fishing quests.
If you do want to house NPCs in the Ocean biome (e.g. Pirate, Stylist, and Angler), you can copy-paste this across the platforms towards the water to simulate a pier. The materials needed for this are easy to find and the work needed is insignificant. This is not so much of a house as it is a fishing spot.
Icy Igloo
- Built for those who like to chill
- Heater not included
- Difficulty – 2 out of 5
This igloo build is a fairly simple yet very spacious design. This can house up to four NPCs on its own with proper wall placement. Gathering the materials needed for this requires you to find an Ice Machine, which is found in Frozen Chests (note Ice Chests) in the Ice biome (note: Snow biome is the surface, Ice biome is underground).
Once you’ve obtained the Ice Machine, the only thing left to do is gather snow and ice blocks to craft all the furniture you see in the photo above. I made this as a place to chill and relax. While it’s all cool to look at, the toilet seat does not heat up. *ba-dum-tiss*
Hallowed Hideout
- Remake those transformed Forest tunnels
- Sparkly and Shiny everywhere.
- Difficulty – 4 out of 5
The Hallowed Hideout is one of the best Terraria house design ideas in terms of looks alone. This build, while very pretty, requires an absurd amount of patience to craft. The build requires you to farm a massive amount of Crystal Shards which grow deep in the Underground Hallowed biome.
Farming the shards is one thing, fighting off every hallowed enemy that can swarm you is another. I didn’t need to worry about monsters spawning since I was able to move at least one NPC in. NPC houses are able to reduce mob spawns in non-evil biomes.
Underworld Sailboat
- Purely crafted for bragging rights
- There’s no need to build in the Underworld, but it’s cool
- Difficulty – 5 out of 5 (requires post-Moon Lord materials)
This build is just ridiculous. Not only did it require us to drain part of the lava ocean, but it also required some Heavenforge Brick Walls as well. This Underworld Sailboat is completely unnecessary as there’s no real reason to make NPC housing in the Underworld since it will still only count under the Cavern Pylon.
To make things easy, we recommend gathering as many Dry Rockets as you can from the Cyborg NPC. This way, you can just “sponge” the lava out with a rocket launcher and refill it with Lava Rockets made from Dry Rockets and lava. I don’t even know why I bothered building this.
It’s not easy to squeeze out the best Terraria house design ideas, especially if you don’t consider yourself the artistic type. This is why we’ve only placed “simple” design ideas and nothing too fancy.
Have your design that you want to showcase? Feel free to link it in the comments below!
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