# Design templates

A template is a design with some of its parts marked editable and the rest locked. It
lets someone who is not a designer produce on-brand work by filling in a form, and it
takes layout review off your plate.

## Save a design as a template

In the design editor, choose **Save as template** and name it. It then appears in the
template picker for everyone who can use it.

Do two things first. They are what separate a useful template from a frustrating one.

### 1. Mark what is editable

Select a layer and turn on **Editable by contributors**. Each editable layer becomes one
field on the contributor's form, and you decide how it behaves:

| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| **Label** | What the contributor sees above the input. |
| **Help text** | Optional guidance. Use it. |
| **Required** | The form will not submit without it. |
| **Character limit** | A guide, not a hard stop: it warns rather than blocking. |
| **Allow multiple lines** | For body copy rather than headlines. |
| **Shrink text to fit the box** | On by default. Set the smallest font size it may shrink to. |
| **Options** | The contributor picks from a list you define and cannot type anything else. |
| **Let them pick any color** / **Brand** | Restrict a color field to your brand palette, or open it up. |
| **Let Contributors reposition & zoom** | For image fields, whether the crop is theirs to choose. |

Anything you do not mark stays locked. Contributors cannot move it, restyle it, or
delete it.

### 2. Link fields that should share an input

**Also fills** points one field at another, typically the same headline on a portrait
and a landscape version of the same design. One input then fills every linked layer, so
a contributor producing five sizes types the headline once.

**Lock layout** on the whole design prevents structural edits outright. Use it on
anything that has been approved.

<Callout type="tip">
	**Make all text editable** marks every text layer in one click, which is the fastest
	way to turn an existing design into a draft template. Set the labels, limits and
	options by hand afterward. The defaults are rarely what you want.
</Callout>

## Fill a template

Go to **Studio → Designs → Templates**, pick a template, and name your design. You get a
form rather than a canvas: the fields the designer marked, in order, with their help
text.

**Preview fill mode** in the editor shows a designer exactly what a contributor will
see. It is the most reliable way to catch a label that does not make sense.

### Write the fields with AI

**Write with AI** takes a one-line brief (*"hiring a weekend shift supervisor in Miami,
friendly tone, apply by June 30"*) and fills the text fields from it.

It writes only the fields on the form. The layout, colors and fonts are untouched, and
you can edit or reset anything afterward.

## Create many designs at once

**Bulk fill from a spreadsheet** produces one design per row.

Copy the header row from the panel, which names the columns using the template's field
keys, paste your spreadsheet beneath it, and the panel previews what will be created.
You choose which field names each design.

The panel reports what it ignored: columns with no matching field, values that were
skipped, and rows that could not be created, each with a reason. A per-run row limit
applies, so split a larger list into batches.

This is where templating pays off: forty locations become forty on-brand posters from a
single paste.

## Who can use a template

Every template carries **Who can use this**. Leave it empty and anyone in the workspace
can fill the template; restrict it to name the roles that should. A common arrangement:

- `Designer`: builds and edits templates
- `Design Contributor`: fills them, and cannot change the layout

See [sharing and access](/guide/admin/sharing-and-access).

## When a contributor sees "Nothing to fill here"

The design has no editable fields, because nobody marked any. Ask whoever built it to mark the
parts you are meant to change.