How To Arrange Living Room Furniture With a TV and Fireplace

I always seem to be re-arranging my living room furniture. And knowing these furniture arrangement tips for successful living room layouts definitely helps get the job done. Even in a living room like mine that has a large window, a TV and a fireplace.

No fail ways to arrange your living room even with a fireplace and a TV

I like to think of furniture arranging like a puzzle.

There’s a way that all the pieces will fit together perfectly which makes the room look and feel “right”.

But if you have the pieces put in the wrong way, it just never ends up looking like you want it.

Fortunately, there are a few simple guidelines you can follow to figure out your living room layout.

Which will help the pieces fall into place without too much work.

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1 | Define your traffic flow

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The first thing you need to do before you start arranging furniture is to figure out where people walk when they are going through the room.

Living room traffic flow diagram

The obvious traffic flow paths are between all of the doorways in the room.

But there may be some others, if you have other areas in the room that are a “destination”.

Maybe you have a built-in bar, a wood burning fireplace that needs to be stocked, or some casement windows you like to open.

Make a special note of any of the areas where furniture gets in the way of the traffic flow.

2 | Pick out your main focal point

The second living room layout decision is to figure out what you want the main focal point of the room to be.

This could be your fireplace, the beautiful view out your window, some artwork that you love or even the TV.

If your house is like mine, you may have multiple focal points to choose from. My living room has a large window and a corner fireplace (both of which I love).

Plus there’s a TV. To be totally honest, there are 2 TV’s. (One of them is leftover from my Super Bowl party and may or may not make its way out of the living room at some point.)

In any case, I don’t really want the TV to be the center of attention, but I do want to be able to watch it comfortably.

So what do I use as my focal point?

I actually have a different one for different seasons.

During the summer, my focal point is the view out the window.

During the winter, it is the fireplace.

So that’s totally an option if you don’t mind moving furniture around 🙂

But you do need to have only one focal point at a time.

You’ll want to arrange your furniture so that the focal point can be seen clearly from your seating arrangement.

3 | Draw a living room layout diagram

Okay, you can skip the living room design diagram if you want to.

But I find it’s really helpful to draw out my floor space and how I think the furniture should be arranged before I start moving stuff around.

Ideally, this floor plan is drawn to scale on a piece of graph paper or using a room design app (ie. you measure the length of all your walls and your furniture, and then draw them the right size in the right place so that you know everything fits).

I don’t always do the “to-scale” part. But, even a rough draft helps so you have an idea of what furniture layout you want to try.

4 | Position large furniture first

If you have any furniture that only fits in one or two places in your room, put that furniture in first.

For small living rooms, there may be only one way that your large couch will fit in your room.

Or if you have an open concept living room, there may be only one wall that is big enough to fit your large armoire (or other large piece of furniture).

5 | Figure Out Where The TV Is Going

Living room layout with the TV over the corner fireplace

If you are going to have a TV in your living room, figuring out where it will go is your next furniture placement decision.

You will likely want it to be somewhere in the vicinity of your focal point so that you’ll be able to see both from your seating arrangement.

For best viewing, you don’t want it to be directly across from a window that will cause a lot of reflection on the TV.

And you also don’t want it to be so high up on the wall that it’s uncomfortable to watch. That’s kind of like being in the first row at the movie theater 🙂

Living room arrangements with a fireplace and TV

Since I have a living room with a large window, a fireplace and a TV, I know it can be a bit challenging to come up with a furniture arrangement that works in this scenario. So I thought a few examples might help.

1. TV above the fireplace

Hanging the television set above the fireplace is the easiest way to have a living room layout with a TV that keeps the fireplace as the focal point.

You do need to make sure that the TV is not too high to watch comfortably. The higher it is, the further back your seating will need to be.

It also limits your fireplace decorating options if that’s something you like to do.

2. TV on the wall next to the fireplace

Living room layout with TV on wall perpendicular to the corner fireplace

Putting the TV on the same wall as the fireplace is another option.

This gives you more flexibility on how the TV is housed. It can be wall mounted, put on a TV stand or stored in a larger piece of furniture like a wall unit.

Creating a seating arrangement that can see the fireplace and the TV is also fairly easy with this layout.

And you have more control over the height of the TV so it may be a more functional living room arrangement.

Note: The fireplace doesn’t have to be in the corner like this diagram. This just happens to be how my living room is laid out.

A living room furniture arrangement with the TV beside the fireplace

If you have an open concept room with the fireplace in the middle, you could choose to use it as the divider between the TV watching area and the dining area.

3. TV on the wall opposite to the fireplace

Placing the TV on the opposite wall to the fireplace is one way to make sure the TV is not going to detract from the way it looks.

In order for this to work, you need to set up your furniture so you can see both the TV and the fireplace.

Living room layout with TV on opposite wall to the fireplace and perpendicular sofas

For small spaces, this means having the sofas (or loveseats) run perpendicular to the fireplace and TV walls.

Living room layout with TV on opposite wall to the fireplace and back to back sofas

For a larger room, you could have back to back sofas where you sit in one to watch TV and the other to see the fireplace.

Or if you really have a lot of space, go over the top and have back to back chaise lounges 🙂

4. TV at a right angle to the fireplace

Living room furniture arrangement with the TV at a right angle to the fireplace

In this furniture arrangement, the TV and the fireplace are at right angles to each other.

Then there is seating arranged to face both them – two sofas in this case.

However, you could replace one (or both of the sofas) with two armchairs to accomplish the same thing.

This room is quite big with large sofas. But the same idea would work in a smaller room using smaller furniture, like a loveseat instead of the couch or accent chairs instead of armchairs.

If you find a spot that you think would be good for viewing but don’t like the idea of seeing the TV there all the time, you can always use one of these ways to hide the TV.

You can find some ideas on how to layout an L-shaped living room dining room combination HERE.

6 | Create a conversation area

The next step of designing your living room layout is to create conversation areas.

These are groupings of furniture where people can sit and talk.

You will want your main seating area to be oriented around your focal point. And be able to see the TV (if you have one in the room).

The easiest way to do this is to have your sofa facing directly at your focal point.

And then create a U-shaped layout around it.

To make your conversation area feel comfortable, try to group your furniture so people are sitting at a 90 degree angle from each other or across from each other, rather than right beside each other.

Most people do not feel totally comfortable talking to someone sitting directly beside them. Think about an auditorium with a bunch of empty seats, most people will pick a seat that has one or two empty seats around it.

Also, furniture in a conversation area should not be placed more than 8 feet apart.

And everyone should have easy access to a coffee table or side tables where they can put down a drink.

If you have a big room (or a long thin room), you may need to break the room up into multiple conversation areas, rather than making one big one.

Benches are a versatile way to split up a long room, since they don’t take up a lot of space and you can sit on them from either side.

For small rooms, you may want to consider not using a sofa at all.

A grouping of 4 chairs around a table can make a really cozy conversation area that doesn’t take up much room.

7 | Create Straight Path Traffic Flows

Now you’re going to look at the living room furniture arrangement you’ve created and make sure the traffic flow works. Remember those traffic paths you defined above?

You need to make sure that when people are walking through the room along those traffic flow paths, it doesn’t feel like an obstacle course. You know where your guests have to jump over a table, walk around a sofa and trip over the edge of a rug to get to the other side.

For doors on one side of the room

Living room layout with traffic flow behind a conversation area

If you are lucky and the doors to your room are all on one side of the room, you may be able to solve this easily by pulling the furniture away from the wall.

Having a couple of chairs or a sofa that floats in the room also makes the living room feel more interesting.

That creates a walkway behind your seating arrangement that gives people a straight path to their destination.

The pathway should be about 3 feet wide to create a comfortable walkway.

Don’t worry, there aren’t “walk a straight path police” 🙂 If you have the space and want to add something like a console table against the wall to add some interest, that’s totally fine.

For doors on opposite sides of the room

If the doors to your room are on opposite corners, then you have a couple of seating options:

a. Place the furniture in the center of your room so people can walk around the edges of the room to get to where they want to go. This arrangement works well for rooms that are quite large or have patio doors on one side.

Living room layout with traffic flow between 2 conversation areas

b. Arrange your furniture in smaller groupings or zones so that people can walk through the middle of the room without running into obstacles. This arrangement is often necessary in smaller rooms that aren’t big enough to pull all the furniture away from the walls.

Living room layout with 2 conversation groups

You do want to avoid having the walkways go right through the middle of a conversation area if at all possible.

People can sense that it’s a walkway even if no-one is currently walking there and it creates a divide that can make your conversation area feel uncomfortable.

8 | Add Tables, area Rugs, Lamps and other accents

Finally, you want to add in your tables, area rugs, table lamps and other accessories to your living room furniture arrangement.

A few hints:

  • All seats should have a end table close by to put down a drink.
  • Coffee tables should be about 14″ to 18″ away from the edge of the sofa (or chairs).
  • If tables are close to a walkway, consider using round ones instead of square ones. They are less likely to get banged into.
  • Area rugs are great for defining conversation areas. Place at least the front legs of all of the furniture in the grouping on the rug and it immediately ties them all together.
  • For small spaces, ottomans are great multi-functional pieces of furniture, especially if they contain storage. They can double as a coffee table and extra seating depending on how you place them.

Find more tips for decorating your living room HERE.

Hopefully you’ve found some inspiration from these living room layouts that will help make your living room furniture arrangement the best it can be.

Other living room Ideas You Might Like


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How to arrange your living room furniture when you have a TV and a fireplace

Have comments or questions on our living room layouts and furniture arrangement tips? Tell us in the section below.

This post was originally published on February 12, 2019 but was updated with new content on February 29, 2024.


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27 Comments

  1. I have arrangement #2 above. However, I also have to work around the front door opening into the arrangement. Part of the problem is the completely open floor plans that have been so popular in recent years. It is frustrating, but we have learned to live with it.

  2. Have you done an article on recliner/sectional decorating? I love your ideas! My husband loves a recliner/sectional (I hate them BTW). Any suggestions on placement and decorating around them?

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Hi Lesli…No, I haven’t done one on sectionals. But I’ll add it to my list and let you know when I get it published.

  3. Thank you for a great article. I have a lovely family room but it seems so thrown together. The only thing that matches are the sofa and love seat. My husband believes that if I place the love seat and the sofa facing each other to have the view of both the fireplace and the tv looks unbalanced. What are your thoughts if I did that type of arrangement do you feel that the sofas should be the same size?

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Hi Jeannene…I don’t think they have to be the same size as long as they are centered on each other. If they do look unbalanced, you can always add smaller end tables on either side of the sofa and bigger ones beside the love seat to even them out.

  4. I have a problem arranging our recliner love seat and two large recliner chairs when our fireplace is in the corner of the small room and the tv with console is beside it and a small square shelf beside the TV. Our furniture is large Lazy Boy leather and we have a large storage ottoman and two end tables. How would you arrange this furniture as we can not afford to update our furniture at present.

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Hi Carole…Assuming you want all of the recliners to be able to see the TV, you probably don’t have that many options. You can have a wide U-shaped seating arrangement with the loveseat in the middle and a chair at an angle on either side. Or an L-shaped arrangement with the two chairs beside each other and the couch at a right angle to them. Then put the ottoman where it makes sense – it could go in front of the fireplace (or TV) or be used on the other side of the L-shaped seating arrangement to balance it out.

  5. Melissa Dalziel says:

    The article is really great! I am really struggling with living room layout. We live in a mobile home that has an a partial open concept with the walk way right through the the middle of the room, not leaving a lot to work with. We have a large window on 1 wall and a corner woodstove that takes up a lot of room. I have a family of 4 and 3 dogs and every layout feels wrong or to tight. Our furniture is a bit big along with 4 bookshelves. The tv is our focal point but it doesn’t seem to fit anywhere except in front of the big window. I love the big window but it always ends up barried. Any help you could give would be greatly appreciated.

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Hi Melissa…Center walkway rooms are definitely a challenge! I would put the bookshelves along the wall opposite the window. Then put the TV in the shelves if you can (if you scroll all the way down to the bottom of this post, you can see what I did with the one in our living room). You could also put it on a TV stand in front of the bookshelves (put stuff behind it that you don’t need to get to very often). Arrange your furniture in a U-shape around the TV. Ideally, I would put two chairs with a small table between them in front of the window (rather than a couch), so you still get the open feeling from it. But depending on your furniture, that may not be the most comfortable TV viewing arrangement. Or if you have enough room, put the couch under the window but pull it away from the wall at least 3 feet, so you force the walkway to go behind the seating arrangement. I hope that helps!

  6. Thank you for these ideas. Our living room is similar to layout 3 with our fireplace across from our tv. I really like it. I can cozy up to the fireplace and sit on the hearth while watching a show. I’m not distracted by flames flickering. If company is over and I want the fireplace to be the focal point the tv can become almost like a picture on the wall. If space allows I prefer this than a tv sitting too high above a fireplace or everything jammed on one wall/corner.

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Thanks, Brenda! I love that layout, too (if it works for the room).

  7. Great article! 10 years in my home, and I STILL struggle with living room layout. We have a fireplace, three doorways, four windows, and one wall is a half-wall. It’s like the original builder didn’t even consider furniture!

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Thanks! It seems like a lot of houses are built this way these days. I’m not sure what they’re thinking when they’re designing the rooms.

  8. Loved this article on furniture. My living room is a 20×20 with a fireplace between two openings which expose my beautiful dining room and the other is my kitchen. Also I have two doors on opposite wall which shows off a patio and arbor. I also have TV in a cabinet with shelving in which I place my favorite things no more than three on each shelving. I do not watch TV in this room because I took a small room making this my TV room since I live alone in the passing of my Prince Charming I feel close to him because this room I designed with all of his favorite things. I loved everything you did and am pleased to comment my design is one you spoke of. I know since I subscribed to get information I will make this my favorite.

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Your living room sounds beautiful, Janice! I’m sorry for your loss, but having a special room to remember him by sounds like it would be very comforting.

  9. Morgan Davis says:

    Wanda- great article! My living room is like the living room in number 2. Do you have any other layout suggestions? I find the room to know have many options.
    Thank you ahead of time.

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Hi Morgan…I’m working on a new post for corner fireplace layouts, so I’ll let you know when it’s done!

  10. I read this with keen interest. We have a fireplace, a tv, a piano and a large bay window all in one living room with one door. We are struggling!

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      It does sound like you have a challenge, Karin! I hope you figure out a good layout 🙂

    2. I’d love to know what you decided. We have a rectangle living room with two sets of sliding lass doors on one wall to the outside deck, fireplace in one wall with opening to the kitchen on the left side of the fireplace, a piano that has to sit somewhere. tv on one wall and the other wall is a staircase to go upstairs with an opening to the front door. It’s so hard to figure out furniture!

  11. Beth Keough says:

    Great blog! I am moving and need to move the existing location of the tv which is over the fireplace — if wires can be moved – and relocate it on built in shelves. You refer to the height of the tv – how high is too high?

    Also, love the purple chairs in the first photo – do you have a link for me to look at them more closely?

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Thanks, Beth! For the height of the TV, the most comfortable viewing angle is at or slightly above eye level when you’re sitting. But it does depend somewhat on how far back you’ll be watching it from (the further back your seating is, the higher the TV can go). For the purple chairs, you can take a look at the original designer’s site: https://www.gzid.co.uk/kensignton-luxury-interior-design.

  12. Jill Smitherman says:

    So glad to find your blog. We are in a dilemma with our living area trying to make the seating more comfortable for the two of us as well as when we have family and friends over to watch ball games, etc. The focal point is the fireplace but the mantel is much too high to move the TV there. We even considered remodeling the fire place and mantel but it will still be too high a placement for comfortable TV viewing. Currently our TV is to the right of fireplace on the built in cabinet that is somewhat recessed (which makes the TV hard to view from across the room seating). There is no other wall placement to move the TV so we are limited to either over the fireplace or on the built in. We normally have the couch directly across from the fireplace with a chair on either side of the couch pointing toward the TV but this is not great for visiting. So we are testing a u shape right now which moved the couch perpendicular to the TV (not easy to see the TV from couch but it is doable). The end of the couch is a little too close to the TV though for my liking. We placed 2 chairs directly across from the fireplace and if we keep this arrangement, then I would get matching lounge chairs. There is a fourth chair/ottoman across from the couch. We could get matching loveseats instead if we keep this arrangement but I’m not willing to purchase new furniture unless I am totally sold on this. One idea would be getting a chaise instead to place perpendicular to the TV but what would I get to put across from it? I’m also not sure that a sectional would work in this space. Any thoughts or ideas would be appreciated. Wish I could figure out how to send you a pic.

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Hi Jill…the TV beside the fireplace dilemma is always hard to solve. I have a chaise perpendicular to the TV and I like it a lot. If you want to send a picture, reply to the email and I’ll see if I can come up with more suggestions 🙂

  13. Heather A. DeSalvo says:

    I would love some ideas for a chalet with a fireplace, windows and tv. I hate my living room. There are no walls/doors. Everything is wide open and I know my living room looks like hodgepodge. Feel free to share any ideas. Typically our tv is the focal point.

    1. Wanda Simone says:

      Hi Heather…First I would decide what you want to do in the room in addition to watching TV (eg. create a conversation area, games table, reading nook, dining area, etc.) Then use area rugs to create “mini-rooms” within your room for those functions. Finally, arrange your furniture around the rugs.

      So you might have a large rug in front of the TV with your sofa, chairs and coffee table arranged for the best TV watching. Then have another smaller rug that defines a conversation area elsewhere in the room. And a really small rug with a chair, lamp and side table beside the fireplace for a reading nook.

      Use console tables with lamps (or tall artwork) behind sofas to act as walls. That will create the feel of room dividers without completely blocking the view of the room.

      I hope that helps! Wanda.