Key takeaways
- Room fit: In a 10 × 10 ft room with the daybed against one wall, opening the bed leaves roughly 54 inches to the far wall — comfortable. In a 9-ft-deep room you are left with about 42 inches, which works only if nothing sits opposite.
- Clearance: The pull-out travels straight forward, so you need about 70 inches of unobstructed floor in front during conversion, but almost no extra space at the sides.
- Seat height: With two stacked mattresses the seat lands around 22–24 inches — several inches above a normal sofa’s 17–18 inches. Shorter guests’ feet will dangle; treat it as a lounge piece, not a true sofa substitute.
- Wall placement: The ~33-inch back panel sits below most window sills, which gives flexibility on where it can anchor a wall.
What's inside
The IKEA Hemnes daybed frame with 3 drawers is the rare small-room piece that genuinely replaces two furniture items — a chest of drawers and a guest bed — but it only works if your room can spare about 66 inches of depth when the pull-out is open and you accept that the drawers are locked away whenever the bed is extended. It is best suited to multipurpose rooms (office by day, guest room on weekends) rather than dedicated bedrooms or nightly two-adult sleeping.
Exact Dimensions and What They Mean in a Real Room
The frame’s footprint changes dramatically between its two modes, and that swing is the single most important spec to plan around.
| Measurement | Closed (sofa mode) | Open (bed mode) |
|---|---|---|
| Length along wall | ≈ 82 in (209 cm) | ≈ 82 in (unchanged) |
| Depth from wall | ≈ 35 in (89 cm) | ≈ 66 in (168 cm) |
| Back height | ≈ 33 in (83 cm) | |
| Sleeping surface | One twin (stacked) | ≈ 76 × 75 in (two twins side by side) |
| Seat height w/ two ~5 in mattresses | ≈ 22–24 in | |
A few practical readings of those numbers:
- Room fit: In a 10 × 10 ft room with the daybed against one wall, opening the bed leaves roughly 54 inches to the far wall — comfortable. In a 9-ft-deep room you are left with about 42 inches, which works only if nothing sits opposite.
- Clearance: The pull-out travels straight forward, so you need about 70 inches of unobstructed floor in front during conversion, but almost no extra space at the sides.
- Seat height: With two stacked mattresses the seat lands around 22–24 inches — several inches above a normal sofa’s 17–18 inches. Shorter guests’ feet will dangle; treat it as a lounge piece, not a true sofa substitute.
- Wall placement: The ~33-inch back panel sits below most window sills, which gives flexibility on where it can anchor a wall.
Twin-to-“King” Conversion: What You Actually Get
Marketing copy calls this a twin-to-king conversion. Technically the width matches a king (76 inches), but the length stays at a twin’s 75 inches — so a sleeper over about 6’1″ will have feet at the edge. Think of it as a short king, or a very generous double.
The mechanism is a telescoping slatted base, not a trundle. The front rail pulls out and the slat deck expands with it; you then take the top mattress off the stack and lay it beside the first one. Conversion takes under a minute once you’ve done it a couple of times, but note two consequences:
- Mattress requirement: You need two twin mattresses, ideally foam and roughly 5–8 inches thick so the stacked seat isn’t absurdly tall. IKEA’s own thin foam twins (the Vannareid is a common pairing) are the path of least resistance; two mid-range foam twins typically add $150–$300 to the frame’s usual $350–$450.
- The seam: The sleeping surface is two separate mattresses, so there’s a channel down the middle. A king-size mattress pad or a foam bed bridge largely solves this for guests, but couples using it nightly will notice it.
Drawer Storage: Real Capacity, Real Catch
This is where a daybed frame with 3 drawers like the Hemnes separates itself from trundle-based alternatives. Each drawer interior measures roughly 23 inches wide by 27 inches deep by 7 inches tall — call it about 2.5 cubic feet each, or 7–8 cubic feet total. That’s genuinely the volume of a compact chest of drawers, and it’s enough for:
- A complete spare bedding set (queen duvet, sheets, two pillows) split across two drawers
- 20+ folded sweaters or an entire seasonal kid’s wardrobe
- Board games, gift wrap, or craft supplies in a home office
Two catches matter. First, the drawers are physically blocked whenever the bed is pulled out — the extended base sits directly in front of them. If the bed stays open all weekend for guests, everything stored below is inaccessible all weekend. Second, the 7-inch interior height limits you to soft goods and flat items; bulky bins and tall boxes won’t fit.
Construction: Solid Pine vs. the Alternatives
The Hemnes is mostly solid pine with fiberboard drawer bottoms and back panels — a step above the all-engineered-wood daybeds that dominate this price bracket, but not indestructible.
| Build type | Typical construction | Strengths | Watch-outs |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hemnes (solid pine) | Pine frame, rails and panels; fiberboard drawer bottoms | Rigid, screw holes survive a reassembly, can be sanded and repainted | Pine dents easily; painted finish chips on armrest edges; drawer bottoms sag if overloaded |
| Engineered wood daybeds | MDF/particleboard with laminate, cam-lock joinery | Cheaper ($200–$350), consistent finish | Swollen edges after spills, cam locks loosen across moves, can’t be refinished |
| Metal daybed + trundle | Steel tube frame, wire deck | Lightweight, visually airy, second separate sleep surface | Squeaks develop, thin gauge bends, zero storage |
Keep each drawer under roughly 30–40 lb and distribute heavy loads (books are the classic killer) across the bottom rather than stacking them in the center — that’s where fiberboard bottoms fail first.
Assembly, Delivery and Moving Realities
Budget a full afternoon. The Hemnes daybed ships in several flat packs totaling in the neighborhood of 200 lb, with the longest piece about 82 inches — it fits through standard 30–32 inch doorways on end, but only in boxes. Assembled, it will not leave the room it was built in without substantial disassembly, so build it where it will live.
- Time: Plan on roughly 3–5 hours with two people. It’s a long build — three drawer boxes plus the telescoping slat mechanism — rather than a hard one.
- Tools: A Phillips screwdriver and the included hex key cover it. A drill/driver on low torque speeds up the dozens of screws, but keep torque gentle in the pine.
- Sequence tip: Install and align the drawer runners before fully tightening the frame, and hang the drawers last — misaligned runners are the most common cause of racking drawers.
- Break-in: Re-tighten all screws and cam fittings after the first month; pine compresses slightly under load and a quick pass eliminates early wobble.
- Wear pattern: What ages first, in order: paint chips on the armrests, drawer-bottom sag under heavy loads, then loosened joints if it’s ever moved while assembled.
Which Rooms It Actually Suits
| Your situation | Verdict |
|---|---|
| Studio or home office needing occasional guest bed | Best fit. Real storage plus a convertible double in one 82-inch wall run. |
| Kids’ room for frequent sleepovers | Consider a trundle daybed instead — the Hemnes opens to one surface, not two separate beds, and a trundle leaves floor pathways clearer. |
| Dedicated guest room used a few weeks a year | Works well; the drawers absorb the room’s linen closet duties. Only skip it if guests are tall or stay weeks at a time. |
| Renters who move every 1–2 years | Be cautious — ~200 lb, requires full disassembly, and fiberboard components degrade across repeated rebuilds. |
| Two adults sleeping nightly | Poor fit — the 75-inch length, center seam and blocked drawers all argue for a standard bed plus dresser instead. |
FAQ
Does the Hemnes daybed need a box spring?
No. The slatted bed base is built into the frame — you only add mattresses.
Can you leave it permanently open as a double bed?
Yes, and many people do. Just accept that the three drawers become inaccessible and the piece stops functioning as a sofa.
Will two regular twin mattresses work?
Any two twins up to roughly 8 inches thick work. Thicker innerspring mattresses push the stacked seat height past 25 inches and make the bed-mode surface noticeably firm-side-up uneven — foam in the 5–7 inch range is the sweet spot.
Is a daybed frame with 3 drawers better than a trundle for storage?
For storage, decisively — a trundle’s under-bed volume is consumed by a second mattress and frame. The trade-off is that a trundle gives you two separate sleeping surfaces instead of one shared one.
The Bottom Line
The Hemnes daybed frame with 3 drawers is a storage-first purchase that happens to convert into a short king — not the other way around. If your room is at least 10 feet deep, your guests are occasional, and you have 7-plus cubic feet of stuff that needs a home, it earns its footprint better than almost anything else at its price. If you need nightly sleeping for two, frequent separate beds for kids, or you’ll move apartments soon, a trundle daybed or a standard frame and dresser will serve you better.
