Many people love getting IKEA kitchen cabinet doors. It’s no surprise because aside from the fact that they have lovely doors, they offer them at really affordable prices. Because of this, there might be a slight risk of having matching kitchens everywhere. For people who like to make their kitchen different from the others, you can upgrade your dream kitchen with a more personalised touch.

Upgrading your kitchen means you have to give a fresh new look to your outdated kitchen cabinets.  But doing an upgrade means spending a lot of money too. There is no need to worry though. If you want to upgrade your kitchen to your dream kitchen but you’re also a little bit short on budget, check out these easy smart hacks. All you need is a small budget and a lot of creativity!

1. Change your door handles.  Doorknobs and door handles are your cabinets’ finishing touches. They are like icing on the cake. Giving your kitchen a new look can be achieved easily by just swapping or upgrading the door handles. You can change your standard knobs with leather handles that you can design yourself for a style upgrade. IKEA has some really lovely and affordable ones so you can have more options to suit your taste. 
2. Use IKEA kitchen cabinet doors with your existing cabinets. If you have old cabinets that are still in good shape but the doors are terrible, you can use IKEA cabinet doors to replace them. This way, you can save a ton of money. IKEA cabinet doors come in various sizes so it is not hard to find items to fit your old cabinets. However, since IKEA cabinet doors have the pre-drilled holes for hinges, you might have to do adjustments on areas where they attach to the cabinet.
3. Cut down IKEA Cabinet doors instead of buying new ones.  If the cabinet doors are too long for your cabinets, you can cut them to the proper size using the appropriate tools. Just be careful not to cut them too much because extending them is harder than trimming them.
4. Paint your IKEA cabinet doors. Painting your IKEA cabinet doors is easy peasy. In fact, you can do it yourself. Most IKEA cabinet doors have a shiny coating so it might be a little difficult for you to paint it. You may use an orbital sander to sand down the shiny coating and roughen up the surface. You don’t need to remove the sealer entirely to bare wood, just enough for the primer to stick to the surface. 
5. Put Wallpapers on your IKEA cabinet doors. If you want to have some pattern in your kitchen and painting your cabinets and cabinet doors are too tiring for you, you can just wallpaper them. You can also just wallpaper the wall and lower cabinets so that the pattern you have will not overwhelm your kitchen.
6. Remove your cabinet doors to create open shelving. If you see small spaces as an opportunity and not as an obstacle, then you can apply it with your kitchen cabinets. You can bring your cabinets to life by adding more versatility. More versatility means removing the cabinet doors. Yes, you’re right, just take your kitchen cabinet doors off. You can give your cabinets a much fresher look by painting or wallpapering the insides. After that, you can fill your cabinets with your nicest crockery and kitchen accessories like ornamental or practical pieces to open up the space beautifully. 
7. Use super-thin, self-adhesive wood cabinet fronts.  If you don’t have the luxury of time to remove your cabinet doors and do some DIY hacks, there’s no need to worry. All you need to do is to get self-adhesive cabinet fronts that are designed to add a bit of personality to your kitchen cabinets. They come in different colours, styles and patterns; and the best part is, they are very easy to install. All you need to do is peel the backing off of the front of your choice and stick it over the surface of your IKEA kitchen cabinet doors. It is a quick, creative and very affordable way of adding personality and character to your kitchen’s overall aesthetics. 
8. Get rid of those pre-drilled holes. For you to use any hardware you want, get rid of those pre-drilled holes. You can use an epoxy putty to do the trick. Once your epoxy putty’s colour is in uniform with that of the cabinet, you can already fill the holes. Use any card to level and scrape off the excess putty. Stain the repair with a wood touch-up marker if necessary. You can also add some graining detail so that the repair will really blend into the cabinet door. After this repair, you can now use any hardware you want giving your kitchen cabinets an upscaled look.
9. Adjust the door hinges. Sometimes your cabinet doors may hit each other whether you close it from the right hand side or the left hand side. It is a common problem that can be easily fixed, not by totally changing your doors, but just by adjusting the door hinges. The first thing you need to do is to identify which door hinge is causing the problem. You can do it by finding the part with a significant gap that’s causing the overlap. After finding out which hinge to adjust, use a Phillips head screwdriver to do the adjustments. Now you can realign the cabinet doors with the actual pantry and that will solve the problem. 
10. Drill the hinge holes. If you need to install hinges and there are no hinge holes on your IKEA cabinet doors, then you can drill it on your own. You can use a jig to mark where the hinges need drilling. You can use a two-millimetre pilot drill bit or a thirty-five-millimetre hinge hole cutter depending on whether you will be drilling a base unit or a wall unit cabinet door.