All House Upgrades in Animal Crossing New Horizons

Your house in Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the one space completely your own. 

It is from where you will begin each day, and where one can truly express themselves; however, when first beginning the game options are quite limited. Unlike past entries in the series, the house in New Horizons actually begins as a tent, and it must be upgraded from there to turn it into the home of your dreams.

So with that in mind, here is every single house upgrade available in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and how to get them. 

Tent (5,000 Nook Miles)

 

When you first move in you're limited to a tent, and are charged 5,000 Nook Miles. These are points you earn by doing different things in your island, and are accumulated pretty quickly. This upgrade is not an issue at all to pay off as long as players follow the game's tutorial. 

 

The tent is only 4x4 squares, so it offers very little when it comes to customization.

House ( 93,000 Bells)

This is the first actual house upgrade. 

With the first upgrade players are given 6x6 squares to work with, with a door located on the south side in the middle. This will remain the door's location moving forward, and cannot be changed.

 

Unlike with the tent upgrade, this is where New Horizons reverts back to the series' standard "pay Nook his Bells" format, and in this case one will need to give him 93,000 Bells to continue. 

 

This is where we would like to refer you to our How to Make a Lot of Bells Quick Guide, as it is possible to gain enough Bells in a single day to completely pay off your home. Not just the 93,000 Bells.

House Upgrade ( 193,000 Bells)

The second upgrade extends your space to 8x8 squares.

 

This upgrade is actually the max size for the main room, with all future upgrades adding additional rooms instead. It is important to note that the doors leading to other rooms will also be fixed, so one might want to consider where placing furniture to avoid blocking off access to the other parts of the house.

 

Before moving onto the next upgrade however, players must pay 193,000 Bells total. 

 

Back Room (348,000 Bells)

For 348,000 Bells, the next upgrade your back room. 

 

While this does not change the look of your house, it gives you an additional room to place furniture in. The size of this room is 6x6, and cannot be expanded anymore than this. (Unlike in New Leaf.)

West Room (548,000 Bells)

 

Once you have a Back Room, the next upgrade is to add a room to the West for another 548,000 Bells.

 

Once again this is the same size as the Back Room (6x6), but it does make your house look wider on the outside. The shrubs that used to be outside your home will now be replaced with a wall, but thankfully this does not take up anymore space in the world— it is purely cosmetic.

East Room (758,000 Bells)

 

Same as the West Room, except to the East (6x6). The upgrade costs 758,000 Bells and is the final room for your home's main story.

Upstairs (1,248,000 Bells

The next big upgrade to your house is the upstairs. 

Unlike the other additional rooms in the house, the upstairs is a 6x10 rectangle shape. It is also the only room for the second floor, so one does not need to worry about future door placement. 

Unfortunately this upgrade isn't cheap at all (as expected), so players will need to come up with 1,248,000 Bells before moving on to the final room. 

Basement (2,498,000 Bells) 

The Basement is very similar to the upstairs, except it is underground...

Rather than being the size of the main room of the house, it is also a 6x10 rectangle, and players can fully customize it as they see fit. While past Animal Crossing titles featured basements that were purely for "storage," this is not the case in New Horizons. The basement is in fact another "standard" room.

This is the "Final" home upgrade for 2,498,000 Bells, but we actually are not done with the house quite yet. 

Although the basement itself isn't used for storage, obtaining it does increase your maximum item storage to 1,600, so it is one of the more useful upgrades in the game.

External Customization (Free After Pay Off) 

Once you have upgraded most of your house, you gain the option to customize the outside of your house. 

This means you can change your roof, your door, and even the siding and mailbox. This can normally be done at the cost of some Bells, but once you pay off your Basement that fee goes away. 

A fully paid off house can use this service anytime, and it comes completely free! Of course that Basement fee is pretty expensive, so it evens out in the end...

Storage Expansion (2.0 Update)

With the release of the 2.0 update, Tom Nook  now provides additional storage upgrade options. They are as follows:

Storage Expansion 1 (2,400 Spaces) - 500,000 Bells
Storage Expansion 2 (3,200 Spaces) - 700,000 Bells
Storage Expansion 3 (4,000 Spaces) - 900,000 Bells
Storage Expansion 4 (5,000 Spaces) - 1,200,000 Bells

Storage Expansion (3.0 Update)

In January of 2026 Animal Crossing: New Horizon 3.0 update and the Switch 2 Edition will release. Both versions of the game will increase the storage limit up to 9,000, but at this time specifics are currently unknown. 

We will revise this article once the update releases.