Notion changes how you think about and store ideas, knowledge and documents. One fine example is its template functionality; effectively letting you save any page as a template, for later use anywhere in your Notion workspace.

If you're still getting the hang of Notion, 'databases', 'synced blocks', 'relations' and 'templates' can sound a little intimidating... I get it. Not to worry though--saving pages as templates really only takes a couple of specific steps, and once you have it down you'll be glad to have a new skill in your Notion toolkit.

In this article, I'll walk through how you can turn any page (or multiple pages) into a database template in Notion.

So that you can turn even complex Notion workspaces like this Notion-made Client Portal into a re-usable template.

I'll also cover how you can create template buttons using the Advanced Template Block from the commands list.

Read along if that's best, or, use the Scribe walk-through above which shows a more detailed step-by-step replay of where to click and exactly what to do.

How to save a page (or multiple pages) as a template in Notion

There are two ways to save a page as a template in Notion:

1. By adding it as a template in a database; or
2. By creating a Template button.

Both of these have their specific use cases, so we'll walk through how to do each.

How to create database templates in Notion

For a tutorial going into more depth on this topic, you can check out the video below 👇

1. Navigate to the Notion page that you want to save as a template, and copy the entire page to your clipboard. Be sure the page contains all the content that you want to include in your new template;

2. Navigate to the database where you want to save this template. Alternatively, create a new database that you'd like to store the template in;

3. Click into or create a new empty item in the database;

4. Select 'create a new template' from the grey guidance text in the empty page;

5. Paste the Notion page from your clipboard that you copied in Step 1;

6. Hit 'back', test out the new template button and voila! Now, whenever you add a new item to this database, you'll have the option to start from your new template.

For a neat example of Notion database templates in action, take a look at the Contacts database in this Notion CRM setup or the Expenses and Revenue databases in this Notion Budget & Finances Hub.

How to create template buttons in Notion

1. Navigate to the Notion page (or pages) that you want to save as a template.

2. Type '/template' into an empty line and search for the Advanced block 'Template button', then hit 'Enter'

3. Configure the template button by giving it a name;

4. Then, drag the full Notion page (or section) that you'd like to use in your template button into the lower section of the configurable template block;

5. Hit 'close' and that's it! Now, whenever you hit the '+' icon you will be able to rapidly generate copies of whatever you've stored inside.

You can watch a full video tutorial covering more details about Notion Template buttons above!

And, for a nice example of creating more complex template buttons, take a look at the '+ New Project View' in this Notion Project Management system.

Quick Notion Vocabulary Refresh

Page: Pages in Notion are the main interface. They are where you can type, add tables, images, videos, headings, dividers and more. It's important to note that you can also add pages within pages. This is important to understand, since the structure of your Notion pages will define what gets added to you Notion template.

The rule? -> Everything that 'lives on a Notion page' will be saved part of your new template.

Database: A Notion database is a just a storehouse of information. You can think of it like an Excel sheet, only more powerful and customizable (in some ways). Notion databases can store anything from a list of books to read, to a gallery of images or a calendar of events.

Database Items: Databases have items. These items are the various pieces of information that make up that database. In a to-do list database, for example, the tasks that you list would be the items of that database.

Note: When you create a database template, what you're really doing is saying, 'whenever I create a new item in this database, I'd like the option to start from this particular template'.

Database Template: This is the Notion page (or pages) that you want to use as a starting point for every new item you create in a particular database. The template can be as simple or complex as you like, and can contain anything that you could normally add to any other Notion Page.

Next Steps

Start saving your own pages as templates in Notion by following the steps above. And if you'd like some inspiration for your next Notion setup, dashboard or system; I'd recommend checking out our Notion Business OS models.

Happy templatizing :)