Why you can trust TechRadar
We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test.
Many software packages and services let you design the perfect house, complete with plumbing, electrics, furniture, and more. Some even go further and expand their canvas to allow you to design the surrounding landscape.
Idea Spectrum Realtime Landscaping Pro 2025 does things differently, focussing primarily on the landscape itself, and its features and quite impressive. it’s easily one of the best landscape design software tools around – as long as you own a Windows PC, the only platform it supports.
- You can download Realtime Landscaping Pro from Idea Spectrum by clicking here.
Realtime Landscaping Pro 2025: Pricing and plans
- Far from the cheapest landscaping software out there, but at least you own it outright: no subscription deals, plus you can download a trial version to check it out
Idea Spectrum deserves praise for not treating their software as a service they can let out. Instead, you need to purchase Realtime Landscaping Pro outright – the old fashioned way – for $279. This is quite refreshing in this day and age. Yes, you have to pay more upfront, but that’s one less rental you have to deal with every month.
Additionally, you can upgrade from a previous version: Pro owners of versions 2011 to 2023 can do so for $129, whereas Plus owners from 2011 to 2025 have to pay $149 to get the latest version of Pro.
If you wish to try the software out for yourself, you can also download a free trial which limits some of the features, but will give you a good feel for what’s on offer.
Realtime Landscaping Pro 2025: Interface
- A clean, easy to understand interface, with multiple views and handy wizards to speed up the design process
Realtime Landscaping Pro is designed for you to work in a 3D environment. Should you prefer to focus on a 2D space, Idea Spectrum also offers ‘Realtime Landscaping Photo’ as an alternative.
The interface is very standard: all your tools can be found on a sidebar to the left, with all the objects you can add being located at the top, broken down by category, such as Terrain, Water Features, Utilities, and Building (yes, you can add buildings to your design; you just can’t venture into them). The left side of the interface is your Inspector, showing all of a selected object’s changeable parameters.
Since you can’t explore the inside of the house, you’d be forgiven for thinking the options available for designing the outside might be limited. Although a lot is automated for you, you have a heck of a lot of customisation capabilities. From setting up the structure, to adding windows, guttering, lights, it’s pretty much all there. Plus you can change the types of material, their colour, the wall heights, the pitch of the roof, etc. Everything you need to make a building look great – from the outside. You also have the ability to add ‘window facades’ that make it seem like your house has an interior when looking through the windows.
There are three separate views at your disposal, all accessible via buttons, lower left of the interface: ‘Plan’ is a top-down view – selected by default; ’Perspective’, allows you to see elevation and work in a 3D environment, which we found helped us design better. The third view is called ‘Walkthrough’, and is really there for you to peruse your creation using your mouse and keyboard. As the project is rendered in high quality, there is no way to alter it in that view.
On the whole, the interface is clear, and easy to understand, giving you a large canvas in the centre of the interface to design your project. Should you feel at a loss, Idea Spectrum offers a series of online tutorials to help you familiarise yourself with what’s on offer.
In order to facilitate the design process further, Realtime Landscaping Pro comes with various wizards. One is used for creating houses, as mentioned above, but others are also available to quickly create landscapes, decks, ponds, accents and swimming pools. The concept is very simple: choose a template, place it onto your project and more often than not, you’re done. These templates are fully customisable of course, to help them blend in more perfectly with your landscape.
Realtime Landscaping Pro 2025: Planting
- An unbelievable inventory of plants which you can customise, choose their size, and set their look. You also have control over the time of day, and season. Your customisation options are as impressive as the number of plants available
Software designed to recreate an outdoor environment should be well stocked when it comes to flora, and this is exactly what Realtime Landscaping Pro offers. You have at your disposal over 6,000 plants, subdivided by category such as Annuals, Succulent, Tropical, etc, to make it easier to find what you’re after. But with so many to choose from, you’ll be grateful for that handy search field as well!
But that’s not all: you get to choose plants ideal for the geographical location you’re designing in – or not – the choice is completely up to you, as you add trees and shrubs that can look great together, but might not survive in the real world. You also get to choose each plant’s age, which mostly just alters their height, as well as the season you’re working in. This is set for your overall design, but you can also supersede that choice for each plant individually if you’re looking for an unusual and striking look, such as having plants displaying their spring appearance, next to others in the fall. Essentially, you can be as realistic and accurate as you please, or as fanciful as you desire.
This level of control extends to the weather, time of day, season, and even the phase of the moon. All of this is available through the ‘Settings’ menu.
You’ll find that each category has a ‘Currently Used’ section, which allows you to reuse objects currently in your project, elsewhere. This only works on your current project though. Should you wish to use the same plants in multiple projects, that’s where the ‘Favourites’ section comes in, making it easy to locate items once, and use them again and again in future works.
Realtime Landscaping Pro 2025: Objects, people, and animation
- You also have a large list of materials, objects and people to further refine your design, and bring your creation to life with a few fun animations
Plants are but the start of your designing journey. Realtime Landscaping Pro also contains a generous library of 3D objects, from lawn furniture, to cars, as well as a wealth of materials you can use for your walls, driveways, and more.
But what we particularly enjoyed was how you can bring your design to life through animation. Water can shimmer, and fountains flow, for instance. But people – and even animals – can be animated as well. Some can walk, others jog, and a few even swim. Set a path for them to follow and they’ll repeat their action on a loop. Even those sitting or lying around will have some kind of animation set for them, like a head tilt, or a hand movement. All of these help your creation come to life when exploring it in Walkthrough.
Speaking of Walkthrough, you’re able to create movies meandering through your project, although you don’t actually control the movement through your keyboard and mouse, but rather by setting a path for the camera to follow. You can even connect it to an Oculus Rift.
As it stands, this software is very versatile with a wealth of features. It’s simple enough for casual users to have fun with, yet versatile enough for professional use, creating your dream garden, virtually, complete with seasons, and fun animations.
Should I buy Realtime Landscaping Pro?
Buy it if…
You’re looking for a detailed landscaping tool with a wealth of features to help you design the project of your (or your clients’) dreams.
Don’t buy it if…
You don’t fancy playing with so many features that you can get lost in the minutia, and you find the animations superfluous and creepy.
For more design tools, we’ve reviewed the best architecture software and the best interior design software.
Read the full article here
