Murphy Beds and Wall Beds: Find the One That Fits Your Room

What is a Murphy bed?

A Murphy bed is any bed that folds away when it is not being slept in, so the floor it occupies goes back to the room. The name comes from William L. Murphy, who patented a folding wall bed in the early 1900s; today it is the umbrella term for the whole category. In practice it means one thing to a buyer: you are trading a permanent bed frame for daytime floor space, and the trade only pays off if the room genuinely has a second job. Ourworth-it breakdownwalks the cases where it does and does not.

The three types

Nearly every bed on the market is one of three mechanisms, and the mechanism — not the brand — decides whether it can go in your room at all.

• Vertical wall bed. The classic. Mounts into studs and folds the mattress up head-first into a full-height cabinet. Uses the least wall width but needs the most ceiling — plan on roughly 82 inches for a twin and more for a queen. See thevertical Murphy bed guide.
• Horizontal wall bed. Same wall mounting, but the mattress swings out sideways from a short, wide cabinet. Needs about 46 inches of height instead of 82, which is what makes attics, dormers, and soffit walls possible. See thehorizontal Murphy bed guide.
• Cabinet bed. Freestanding chest-height furniture with a tri-fold mattress folded inside. No studs, no anchors, no ceiling math — the answer for renters. The tradeoff is the folding mattress. See thecabinet bed guide, or the fullMurphy bed vs wall bed comparison.

Sizes, and what each one costs you in wall

Murphy beds take standard US mattresses, so size is really a question of how much wall and floor you can give up. Every size projects roughly the mattress length into the room when it is down, and every size needs a walkway on top of that.

• Twin (38" × 75"). The smallest real option, and the only size commonly sold in dual-bed cabinets for shared kids' rooms. See thetwin Murphy bed guide.
• Full (54" × 75"). Sleeps one adult comfortably on about six inches less wall than a queen. Often the right answer for a guest room that is also an office. See thefull Murphy bed guide.
• Queen (60" × 80"). The most common size and the only one most couples will accept. It is also the size that catches people out on open projection. See thequeen cabinet bed guide.

Price tiers

There are three broad tiers. Entry-level covers small twin wall beds and basic cabinet beds. The middle tier is where most queen wall beds and full-featured cabinet beds sit. The premium tier is solid-wood furniture-grade builds and wall systems with integrateddesks,sofas, orside storage towers. What moves the number is not size alone — it is whether a mattress is in the box, solid wood versus engineered panels, and how much cabinetry surrounds the bed. We do not quote prices here because they change daily; theprice tier guideexplains what you are paying for at each level.

The measurement people forget

Folded depth is printed on every listing, so buyers check it. Open projection — how far the bed reaches into the room once it is down — usually is not, and it is the number that causes returns. Measure the clear floor depth in front of your wall before anything else, especially in asmall room. And confirm whether amattress is included, because most vertical wall beds ship without one and cap the thickness instead.