Vocabulary at home

50+ English House Vocabulary Words: From the Bedroom to the Kitchen and Beyond

By Elisabeth Cook Last updated: December 28, 2022

Your home is made up of so many things. How can you start naming them all?

Learning the English words for all the different rooms and items in your house is a challenge.

But getting started is easy!

Below, we’ll look at basic vocabulary for talking about your house and the things in it.

Contents

• 50+ Must-Know English House Vocabulary Words
• • English Vocabulary for the Different Parts of a House
  • English Bathroom Vocabulary
  • • Bathroom Furniture and Fixtures
    • Bathroom Items
  • English Bedroom Vocabulary
  • • Bedroom Furniture and Fixtures
    • Bedroom Items
  • English Den or Living Room Vocabulary
  • • Den or Living Room Furniture and Fixtures
    • Den or Living Room Items
  • English Dining Room Vocabulary
  • • Dining Room Furniture and Fixtures
    • Dining Room Items
  • English Kitchen Vocabulary
  • • Kitchen Furniture and Fixtures
    • Kitchen Items

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50+ Must-Know English House Vocabulary Words

English Vocabulary for the Different Parts of a House

First, let’s look at some of the main rooms and parts of a house.

Rooms and houses can be a little different depending on where you live. These are parts of a typical American house that you’ll also find in a lot of other places.

Attic — A room at the highest part of a house, below the roof (see below).

Bathroom — Any room with a toilet and sink.

It’s weird, but not all bathrooms have a place where you can take a bath! A bathroom might also be called a restroom or washroom.

Basement — A level below the ground level of a house.

The basement is the whole underground space. It might be one big room or a group of smaller rooms.

Bedroom — Where the bed is, of course!

In a lot of houses, bedrooms are upstairs (on a level above the ground floor).

Den — A room with comfortable furniture for relaxing.

A den is like a living room (see below), but less fancy and more private.

Dining room — The room where meals are eaten.

Driveway — The short “road” next to a house where you can park a car or drive it into the garage.

Garage — The building where you keep a car.

You can use the word garage whether or not this building connects to the house.

Hall — A hall or hallway is the narrow (small, thin) space that connects rooms.

Kitchen — The room where you store and prepare food.

Living room — A living room is a room for relaxing or entertaining guests.

In English-speaking countries, this room is often located toward the front of the house. In the U.K., it’s sometimes called the sitting room.

Porch — A covered outdoor space.

A porch can be at the front, back or side of a house.

Sometimes porches will be less like open spaces and more like rooms with lots of screened windows (that let air in but keep bugs out!).

Roof — The covering on the top of a house.

Roofs come in different shapes and styles, but the most common kind in the U.S. and the U.K. (and a lot of other places) is a gable roof. A gable roof has two flat surfaces that tilt up and come together, making a triangle. The space under the roof in this triangle area is usually where the attic is.

Stairs/stairway — The set of steps that connect different levels of a house.

Yard — The outdoor area at the front, back or side of a house.

In the U.K., people call a yard a garden. In the U.S., a garden is a part of a yard for growing plants, like flowers or vegetables.

As you can see, many parts of the house have two different names. For example, a yard can be a garden. A living room can be a den.

English Bathroom Vocabulary

Now that we know what the different parts of a house are, let’s look at some furniture and objects you might find in the most common rooms of a house.

Bathroom Furniture and Fixtures

By the way, furniture usually means bigger objects around a house that you might sit on, lie on or put things on.

But in some rooms, like the bathroom, the furniture you find might be more like a part of the room (something attached to the wall or floor). A piece of furniture like this is called a fixture.

Bathtub — The large container you fill with water to take a bath.

Most bathtubs have a faucet or tap (where water comes out) and a shower head that sprays water from above.

Counter — Almost any raised, fixed surface that you use while standing.

Since you usually find counters in kitchens and bathrooms, they’re made of material that’s easy to clean.

Mirror — The glass surface where you can see yourself (your reflection).

Shower — A shower stall, or a small room where you can shower.

Shower can mean a shower head, a shower stall or a shower that you take.

You might say to someone, “Can I use your shower? Because I really need a shower!”

Sink — The basin or bowl fixture where you wash your hands.

Toilet — A fixture with a bowl, a seat, a lid and a handle for flushing water down the bowl. You know what it’s for!

Bathroom Items

Toilet paper — The soft, rolled paper that you use to clean yourself after using the toilet.

Toothbrush — The small brush you use to clean your teeth.

Towel — A cloth you use to dry yourself.

Hand towels are smaller towels that you use to dry your hands. Bath towels are the large towels you use to dry your whole body.

Soap — Soap can mean hand soap, which is usually foaming (bubbly) stuff in a container that you can use to wash your hands at the sink. It can also mean a bar of soap you use to clean yourself in the bath or shower.

Washcloth — A small cloth for cleaning yourself in the bath or shower.

English Bedroom Vocabulary

Bedroom Furniture and Fixtures

Bed — A mattress (the soft surface where you sleep) in a bed frame (which holds the mattress).

A bed can also just be a mattress on the floor.

Closet — A small room where you can hang clothes.

Dresser — A piece of furniture with drawers where you keep folded clothes.

Wardrobe — A tall piece of furniture with doors that you hang clothes inside.

Bedroom Items

Comforter/quilt/bedspread — A covering that goes on the top of a bed.

Comforters, quilts and bedspreads are all a little different, but a lot of people don’t know the difference!

Lamp — Any light with a lightbulb and cord that plugs into the wall.

Lamps usually sit on furniture or the floor.

Pillow — A pillow on a bed is usually where you put your head when you sleep.

You might also see throw pillows on a bed or elsewhere. These are more for decoration and making areas comfortable.

Sheets — The thin coverings that go over the mattress, but under the top covering (bedspread, quilt, etc.).

A fitted sheet stretches over a mattress, and a top sheet covers a person sleeping in a bed.

English Den or Living Room Vocabulary

Den or Living Room Furniture and Fixtures

Armchair — A large, stuffed chair that has arms, or raised areas where you can rest your arms.

Coffee table — A low table, usually placed in front of a couch.

You can put your coffee (or another drink) here. You might also keep newspapers, magazines and a TV remote here.

Couch — A long, stuffed piece of furniture with arms. Some people might call a couch a sofa.

Side/end table — A side table, or end table, is a table meant to sit next to a couch or an armchair. Like with a coffee table, you can place drinks or other items here.

Den or Living Room Items

Television/TV — Television or TV can refer to the device with the screen you use to watch movies or shows. It can also refer to TV shows in a larger way.

For example, you might say to your friend, “Hey, can we go over to your house and watch TV?” and your friend might say, “Actually, no, because my TV is broken.”

TV remote/remote control — The controller for the TV that lets you turn it off or on and change channels.

Rug — A soft, decorative covering that goes on the floor.

You might find a rug anywhere in a house, but they’re often in dens and living rooms.

Carpet and rug can mean the same thing, but usually carpet means a covering for the whole floor, while a rug is smaller (and might go on top of a carpet).

English Dining Room Vocabulary

A dining room is normally a room that you only eat in—usually, you don’t really do anything else in this room.

Dining Room Furniture and Fixtures

Dining room table — A table meant for eating, usually large enough to fit chairs for at least four people.

Dining Room Items

Cups — Any drinking container made of anything except clear (see-through) glass.

For example, coffee cups or tea cups.

Dish — A dish can be almost any kind of item that you eat food off of or serve food on.

A plate is a flat dish, while bowl is only used to refer to a deep dish for holding soups or stews.

Glass — Any kind of drinking container made of glass.

Napkin — A cloth that you place on your lap while eating or use to wipe your mouth.

Silverware — Utensils (tools) for eating, including forks, spoons and knives.

Silverware might also be called cutlery or flatware.

English Kitchen Vocabulary

Kitchen Furniture and Fixtures

Cabinets — Cabinets are the storage spaces with doors you find in a kitchen, where you might keep food and cooking equipment.

Floor — Every room in a house has a floor that you walk on, because if it didn’t you’d fall into the room below!

But you might talk about the kitchen floor the most, because it usually needs to be cleaned more than other floors.

Oven — The closed space used for baking (making foods like bread by heating them inside an oven).

In most kitchens, the oven is found under the stove.

Pantry — A pantry can be a larger cabinet or a whole separate room or closet. It’s wherever you keep your non-perishables, or food that doesn’t go bad easily and doesn’t need to be kept cold.

You might also keep seasonings, spices and other flavorings in your pantry.

Refrigerator — Food that needs to be kept cold is stored in the refrigerator.

Most refrigerators have an attached freezer for keeping food frozen.

Stove — The surface you use for cooking or heating food.

Kitchen Items

Coffeemaker — There are lots of ways to make coffee, but a coffeemaker is the machine you plug in that makes your coffee by dripping it through a filter.

Kettle — A kettle is used for heating water, usually for tea.

This can refer to an electric kettle, which you plug in, or a stovetop kettle, which you use to heat water on the stove.

A kettle is different from a teapot, which is where you make the tea once the water is ready.

Microwave — A small oven that heats food really fast!

You can say microwave or microwave oven.

Pots and pans — A pan can also be called a skillet, and is used for frying things on the stove, like eggs. A pot is a deeper metal container used for heating food on the stove. A saucepan is deep like a pot, but usually has a handle that sticks out.

A lot of people don’t know the difference between a pot and a saucepan, so it’s not that important.

Toaster — A toaster is a machine with slots (small open spaces) for toasting bread.

This is different from a toaster oven, which is really just a small oven you can plug in on your kitchen counter.

This vocabulary only covers a few of the possible rooms and items you might find in a house, but learning it is a great start!

To memorize these words quickly, you should use them as often as you can. Try to immerse yourself in English and make the language part of your daily life. Pretend like you’re living in an English-speaking country, where you’d call all your house items by their English names and you are surrounded by English content.

You can look out for house vocabulary in English media, like movies and podcasts. Immersion language learning programs can also help. One example is FluentU, which uses English videos made for and by native speakers. Each clip has tools like interactive subtitles and quizzes, so that you can understand English vocabulary and how they’re used in context.

The more you make yourself use English for everyday matters like house furniture, the faster you can improve your English skills.

And there’s no place like home to start building your fluency!

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

Elisabeth Cook

Elisabeth Cook is a writer, blogger and translator. You can read her blog at litallover.com.

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English Vocabulary - Home (Rooms and Objects)

Vocabulary - Home (Rooms and Objects)

This is a list of vocabulary items related to home

Rooms and Places in the Home

Bedroom

A room used for sleeping in.

Living room (UK also sitting room, AUSTRALIAN ENGLISH also lounge room)

The room in a house or apartment that is used for relaxing, and entertaining guests, but not usually for eating.

Bathroom

A room with a bath and/or shower and often a toilet.

Hall

The area just inside the main entrance of a house, apartment or other building which leads to other rooms and usually to the stairs.

Utility room

Usually just for washing machine, freezer etc.

Shed

A separated building from the house usually for storing garden tools.

Loft

Space in the roof of the house usually used only for storage.

Attic

Room in the roof space of a house (could be lived in.)

Cellar

Room below ground level without any windows used for storage.

Basement

Room below ground level, with windows, used for living and working.

Landing

Flat area at the top of a staircase.

Hall

Open area as you come into the house.

Porch

Covered area before the entrance door.

Pantry or larder

Large cupboard used, especially in the past, for storing food.

Terrace or patio

Paved area between the house and garden for sitting and eating, etc.

Study

A room for reading, writing, studying in.

Balcony

An area with a wall or bars around it that is joined to the outside wall of a building on an upper level.

Types of houses / Places Where People Live

House

A building which people, usually one family, live in.

Detached house

Describes a house that is not connected to any other building.

Semi detached house

A house that is semi-detached is one that is joined to another similar house on only one side.

Apartment (UK usually flat)

A set of rooms for living in, especially on one floor of a building.

Terraced house

A house that is joined to the houses on either side of it by shared walls.

Cottage

A small house, usually in the countryside.

Bungalow

A house that has only one story/floor.

Bedsit

A rented room which has a bed, table, chairs and somewhere to cook in it.

Villa

A house usually in the countryside or near the sea, particularly in southern Europe, and often one which people can rent for a holiday.

Time share

A holiday house or apartment which is owned by several different people, each of whom is able to use it for a particular period of the year.

Objects of the home

Home vocabulary exercise.