Interior Designer

Also known as: Interior Design Consultant, Commercial Interior Designer

Creative & DesignBachelor's DegreeModerate Growth

Transform spaces into functional, beautiful environments for homes, offices, and commercial settings.

Salary Range

Entry Level

$40K

Starting salary

→

Top Level

$300K

Top salary

Principal / Firm Owner

The highest-paid specialization or seniority level for interior designers.

About 1 in 50 reaches this level

About 97,100 interior designers (BLS Employment Projections, SOC 27-1025, 2025); many start firms, but clearing ~$300K+ in owner profit requires sustained high-end clientele — maybe 1,500-2,000 principals.

Salary data based on 2025 BLS, Glassdoor, and industry reports. Actual compensation varies by location, experience, and employer.

How to Become One

This career typically requires a bachelor's degree. Here are the top colleges for it:

Cooper UnionArchitecture

Explore all colleges →

Cost to Qualify

Bachelor's degree (4 years)

4 years after school

$56,454

Tuition and required fees. Living costs are not included

Four years of tuition and required fees runs about $56K at a typical public college in our list (in-state) and about $288K at a typical private one. Both are pricier than the US national averages (about $48K public in-state, $180K private nonprofit, College Board 2025-26) because our 161-college dataset only includes nationally-ranked schools, not every US college. This excludes room and board, which we show separately on each college's page.

↗College Board, Trends in College Pricing and Student Aid 2025 (PDF) - 2025-26 average published tuition and fees: public four-year in-state $11,950, private nonprofit four-year $45,000 (the national averages our note quotes as about $48K and $180K over four years)

Sticker price, not what most people pay — scholarships, aid and in-state status all move it. Room and board is shown separately on each college's page.

AI Risk Assessment

Moderate Risk (Level 3/5)How we score ›

Interior designers plan the inside of homes, offices, shops and hospitals: the layout, lighting, materials, furniture and colors, and how it all meets building codes and safety rules. A good part of the job happens on a computer (floor plans, 3D renderings, mood boards, client presentations), and that is the part AI is reaching. A 2025 Microsoft Research study measured how much of each job's tasks AI chatbots can help with, using 200,000 real conversations. Interior designers came out in the top 30% of 785 jobs, close to industrial designers, whom we also rate 3. Industry leaders are split. When Business of Home asked 22 design industry leaders for their 2026 predictions, one designer predicted the industry would "fully embrace" AI for renderings and client pitches, while another said AI would complement designers rather than replace them. A third predicted that ChatGPT would become the thing that gives homeowners the confidence to take on do-it-yourself projects, which is a quieter risk: some clients may skip hiring a designer.

The physical side of the job keeps it from going higher. Designers visit sites, work with contractors, choose and source real materials, and are responsible for meeting codes and accessibility rules. BLS projects interior designer jobs to grow 3% from 2025 to 2035, about as fast as the average for all jobs, with about 7,700 openings a year, and it expects renovation work, building codes and accessibility standards to help create jobs. That is steady demand, but not enough growth to absorb much of the time AI saves on drawings and visuals, which is the work junior designers usually do. That fits the rubric's "3 Moderate." The Microsoft researchers also warn that a high score does not by itself mean job losses.

What would change this score. If design firms start hiring fewer junior designers because AI does the drafting and rendering, or homeowners increasingly use AI instead of hiring designers, this goes to 4. If AI stays a drawing aid and junior hiring holds steady, 2 becomes possible.