Free template
Home inventory template
A free spreadsheet template for documenting what you own: Excel and CSV, with example rows and the columns that matter at claim time. No email, no gate, the buttons below are the actual files.
| room | name | quantity | notes | brand | model | serialNumber | currentValue |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Living room | TV | 1 | Wall mounted above the sideboard | Samsung | Q80B | 0A1B2C3D4E5F | 600 |
| Garage | Christmas decorations bin | 1 | Blue 60 L bin, top shelf by the door | 150 | |||
| Home office | Laptop | 1 | AppleCare until June 2026 | Apple | MacBook Air M2 | FVFXC2EXMPL7 | 800 |
| Bedroom | Watch | 1 | Appraisal photographed and kept with the record | Seiko | Presage | 450 |
The columns
What a home inventory needs to record
These are not columns we brainstormed for a blog post. They mirror the CSV export of our own app, Itemlist, minus the eight bookkeeping fields the app fills in automatically (IDs, system fields, timestamps, lent and displaced tracking), plus one room column, because a spreadsheet has no rooms of its own. If you outgrow the spreadsheet, the app's free export uses the same column names, so the structure you learn here is the structure you keep.
The template ships with four filled example rows: a living room TV with brand, model and serial number, a labeled garage bin, a laptop and a watch. Overwrite them with your own things.
room Where the item lives. The one column we added for spreadsheet use; in the app, rooms and containers are the structure itself.
name What the item is. Keep it short and searchable.
quantity How many. Six dining chairs are one row.
notes The detail future-you needs: which bin, which shelf, warranty status.
description A longer description when the name is not enough.
purchasePrice What you paid. With the receipt, the strongest proof of value.
currentValue What it is worth now. This is the number a claim adds up.
weight and weightUnit Optional, but useful when a move is coming.
retailer Where you bought it, for receipt hunting.
brand and model An insurer replaces a Samsung Q80B, not "a TV".
serialNumber The single most important field for insurance and theft reports. Photograph the serial plate too.
currentCondition New, good, worn. Honest is fine.
purchaseDate When you bought it. Age affects payout on many policies.
expirationDate For the few things that expire: warranties, consumables.
The two fields people skip and then regret: serial numbers and values. A serial number turns "a laptop was stolen" into a specific, provable object on a police report and an insurance claim. A current value per item is what makes the spreadsheet add up to a number your contents coverage can be checked against, before you find out the limit is too low the hard way.
Honest limits
When a spreadsheet stops working
A spreadsheet is a genuinely good way to start, and for a small place it may be all you need. It breaks down in three predictable spots. Photos do not fit in cells, so the most valuable part of an insurance record ends up scattered across a camera roll with no link to the rows. Two people cannot maintain one file without emailing versions around. And typing serial numbers by hand is exactly the chore that makes people quit halfway through the garage.
That is the point where the app takes over: Itemlist keeps multiple photos on every item, shares a location with your household with editor and viewer roles on Pro, and its barcode scanner fills serial number fields instead of you typing them. It is organized like a real home, locations, rooms and containers nested in containers, and it is free to start on iPhone and iPad, up to 100 items and 20 containers. Your data stays yours either way: the CSV export is free and uses the columns you already know from this template.
Photos
Do not fit in cells
Sharing
One location, editor and viewer roles
Serial numbers
Barcode scan fills the field
FAQ
Template questions
Is the template really free?
Yes. No email address, no signup, no locked cells. The links on this page point straight at the files. We make a home inventory app, and an honest free template is better marketing for it than a gated PDF.
Should I use the Excel or the CSV version?
They hold the same columns and the same example rows. Take the Excel file if you work in Excel, Numbers or Google Sheets (all three open it). Take the CSV if you prefer a plain file that any tool can read forever.
What should I fill in for insurance?
Prioritize name, brand, model, serial number and current value, and photograph each item and its serial plate separately, because photos do not fit in a spreadsheet. Our home inventory for insurance guide covers what insurers actually ask for at claim time.
Why do the columns look like app export fields?
Because they are. The template mirrors the columns Itemlist exports to CSV, minus the bookkeeping fields the app fills automatically. If you later move from the spreadsheet to the app, the record you kept and the record the app keeps have the same shape.
Keep going
Related reading
Or skip the spreadsheet entirely
Itemlist holds the same record with photos on every item, barcode scanning for serial numbers, and sharing with the people you live with. Free to start on iPhone and iPad, free CSV export whenever you want the spreadsheet back.
Free to start on iPhone and iPad