How to Organize a Small Kitchen: 22 Ideas (2024)

Small kitchens still need to do all the work a regular-sized kitchen does, but often with half the space. This means how you organize your small kitchen is crucial to its functionality and feel. An unorganized kitchen can be hard to use and feel cluttered. Keep reading to see 22 of our favorite ideas for how to organize a small kitchen.

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Use Lazy Susans

Have lots of narrow bottles and jars to store? Use lazy Susans to take advantage of all your limited cabinet space. Lazy Susans easily spin back and forth, ensuring that bottles placed even at the back of the cabinet are still easily accessible.
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Keep Necessities on the Counter

Though cabinets are a great way to organize most kitchen gear, keeping one or two things on the counter can be helpful too. Frequently used items like salt and pepper, cutting boards, and a utensil crock can all be carefully stored on the countertop.
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Take Advantage of Under-the-Sink Cabinetry

The space underneath your kitchen sink can easily be a disaster—or a land of opportunity. Use stacking shelves and bins to create a custom storage solution that perfectly fits all the pipes and hardware within the cabinet, and provides ample room for cleaning supplies or home goods too.
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Store Plenty in Deep Drawers

If your kitchen has a few deep drawers, make sure you take advantage of their potential. Thanks to their depth, these types of drawers can fit plenty with the help of a drawer divider or two. Consider storing your daily dishes or pots and pans in these drawers.
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Organize Extra-Small Kitchens

The smaller the kitchen is, the more important organization is. Extra tiny kitchens can be immensely helped by carefully organized cabinets, drawers, and countertops.
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See Also
25 Clever Small Kitchen Organization Ideas You Need to Try Here's How to Organize a Small Kitchen Without a Pantry Small Kitchen? No Problem. These Ideas Will Get Any Sized Space Organized 47 Kitchen Organization Ideas That Declutter Cabinets, Countertops, and More
Add a Pull-Out Rack

Have an empty narrow space in your kitchen that's begging to be put to use? Add a pull-out spice rack. These can fit in even what feels like the tiniest of cabinetry gaps, and it's a great way to store a bulky spice collection.
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Take Control of Your Junk Drawer

It's time to take control of your junk drawer. We all have one, but a junk drawer that's well organized not only allows you to store more, but to store smarter too. Add drawer organizers and dividers to create drop zones, whether they're for junk mail, keys, or tape and scissors.
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Store Extra Supplies

Small kitchen living may not seem like the most realistic lifestyle for the world of bulk home goods and cleaning supplies. But the space underneath your kitchen sink may offer you some forgotten storage space to keep extra bottles of dish soap and paper towels. Use bins and shelves to create space, like Breathing Room Organization did in the under-sink cabinet above.
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Use the Width of Your Drawers

Make sure you're using the full potential of your drawers. This means using the entire width of it for storage, as even a narrow empty space can be the perfect spot for small kitchen tools like measuring cups and tongs.
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Use Drawer Dividers and Bins

Though purchasing drawer dividers and bins may seem more like a luxury item and less like a kitchen necessity, even the smallest of drawers can benefit from the division of space that dividers and bins can provide.
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Hang Pots and Pans

Bulky pots and pans can present quite the storage puzzle in a small kitchen. One option is to hang them above your stovetop or countertop, taking advantage of empty wall space. If you do this, only hang your most used pans—no need to have your once-a-year roasting pan taking up valuable kitchen space.
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See Also
Small Kitchen Organization Ideas: How To Instantly Create More Storage In A Tiny Kitchen | Organize & Declutter
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Add a Wall Shelf Beneath Cabinets

If you have extra wall space between your cabinets and your countertops, try adding a shelf. The shelf can store extra-pretty kitchen items (or frequently used ones) along with decor and cookbooks.
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Use Your Hard-to-Reach Cabinets

Cabinets that reach all the way up to the ceiling are a blessing to those with small kitchens. Use this hard-to-reach storage space to keep less frequently used pots, pans, and kitchen appliances. These upper cabinets are also a great spot for seasonal dishes.
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Take Advantage of Awkward Angles

Open shelving is a stylish storage option for any kitchen. But if you're working with a smaller space and an awkward wall or ceiling angle, make sure your shelving goes all the way to the wall to ensure you've got as much shelf space as possible.
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Keep Items Where They're Used

Consider keeping items near where they are most used. For example, a favorite cutting board can be stored near the countertop and stovetop where they're handy. Mugs can be kept near the coffee machine, and glasses can be kept near the fridge or sink.
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Store Kitchen Items Outside the Kitchen

If you have the space elsewhere in your home, consider storing some items outside the kitchen. This works well for coffee or bar equipment, and frees up space for other kitchen necessities to be stored and organized.
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Use a Small Dish Rack

Dish racks can be bulky and ugly, so look for one with a sleeker footprint for your smaller kitchen. We like ones that can fit inside the sink (like the one Blanco Bungalow has in the kitchen above) or that can easily be stored away when not in use.
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Use All the Space You Can Find

When organizing a small kitchen, it's key to use all the available space you've got. Extra wall space is a great spot for small shelves, and extra drawer or cabinet space can be made all the more efficient with the help of dividers, bins, and stacking shelves.
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Use Dishes as Decor

Small kitchens can easily look cluttered, so it's important to carefully consider what isn't hidden away by a cabinet. If you want to use open shelving to store everyday dishes and glasses, try to source pieces that will stand out and also act as decor for your space.
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Add a Wall Rack

Extra wall space in your small kitchen? Use it for storage. We like how Ashley Montgomery Design installed a wall rack in the kitchen above for organizing plates, bowls, and silverware. You can also hang a drying rack on the wall, which is a great way to avoid taking up extra counter space.
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Store Cookbooks on the Counter

If you have extra counter space but not enough cabinet space, try storing cookbooks, or other items that would normally go in a cabinet, on the countertop. Keep it to a minimum to avoid a cluttered look.
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Use the Top of Your Cabinets

If you have space on the top of your cabinets in your small kitchen, try storing bulky or oversized kitchen equipment, like picnic baskets or giant pots.