How to Duplicate a Notion Template (Step by Step)

Duplicating a Notion template is one of the first things new Notion users need to do, and it is simpler than it looks. Here is how it works for every type of template you will encounter.

Duplicating a Template from the Notion Template Gallery

Notion has a built-in template gallery accessible from your sidebar:

1. In your Notion sidebar, click Templates (near the bottom)
2. Browse or search for the template you want
3. Click on a template to preview it
4. Click Use this template in the top right
5. The template is instantly duplicated into your workspace as a new page

Duplicating a Template Shared by Link

Most community-made templates (including the ones on this site) are shared as public Notion pages. Here is how to duplicate them:

1. Open the template link in your browser
2. You will see the template page with a Duplicate button in the top right corner
3. Click Duplicate
4. If you are not logged in, you will be prompted to log in or create an account first
5. Choose which workspace to duplicate it into (if you have multiple workspaces)
6. The template appears as a new page in your sidebar

The duplicate is a completely independent copy — changes you make do not affect the original template, and changes the template creator makes do not affect your copy.

Duplicating a Page Within Your Own Workspace

You can also duplicate any page you have already created:

1. Hover over the page in your sidebar
2. Click the three-dot menu (…) that appears
3. Select Duplicate
4. A copy named “Copy of [page name]” appears in your sidebar

What Gets Duplicated

When you duplicate a Notion template, you get:

• All pages and sub-pages
• All database structure (properties, views, filters)
• All content including text, images, and embedded content
• All formatting and layout

You do not get: any data the template creator added as examples (in most cases this is included, but you can delete it), connections to external integrations, or the original creator’s workspace settings.

After Duplicating: What to Do First

• Rename the page to something meaningful to you
• Move it to the right location in your sidebar (drag and drop)
• Delete any example data you do not need
• Customize properties and views to match how you work

Ready to find a template to duplicate? Browse our free and premium Notion templates for productivity, business, finance, and more.

Getting the Most From a Note-Taking and Knowledge System

Effective note-taking is less about capturing everything and more about capturing the right things in a way that makes them useful later. The most comprehensive notes are worthless if they’re never referenced again, which is the fate of the majority of notes taken in traditional linear notebooks and undifferentiated digital archives. Useful notes are organized around the purpose they’ll serve: project notes organized by project, reference notes organized by topic, and fleeting notes (quick captures of ideas and observations) processed regularly into their permanent location rather than accumulating as undifferentiated chaos. This structure requires slightly more discipline than unrestricted capture but produces dramatically more value over time.

The concept of evergreen or permanent notes — notes written in your own words that synthesize understanding rather than transcribing source material — is central to building a personal knowledge base that compounds in value over time. When you write a note about a concept in your own words, you process it more deeply than when you copy it verbatim, and the resulting note is more useful in future contexts because it reflects how the concept connects to your existing understanding. Linking notes to related concepts creates a network of ideas that surfaces unexpected connections and makes retrieval far more intuitive than a folder hierarchy or tag system alone.

Template design for recurring use cases — meeting notes, project kickoffs, weekly reviews, book notes — is where the time investment in a note-taking system most directly pays off. A well-designed meeting notes template that captures attendees, agenda items, decisions made, and action items with owners and due dates takes seconds to populate during a meeting and produces a record that remains useful months later. A book notes template that captures key ideas, notable quotes, and your personal response creates a knowledge asset rather than a to-read list entry. The goal of templates is to make the right behavior the easy behavior — to ensure that important information gets captured in a consistent structure without requiring effort to decide how to organize it each time.

Regular review and maintenance are what keep a personal knowledge system active rather than becoming a digital archive that nobody visits. A weekly review — scanning recent notes, processing any fleeting captures into permanent form, and checking on active project notes — takes 20 to 30 minutes and ensures the system remains current. A monthly review of the broader knowledge base surfaces connections between notes added over the past month and older reference material, and identifies areas of the system that have become outdated. Users who build these review habits into their weekly and monthly routines consistently report higher satisfaction with their systems than those who treat note-taking as a capture-only activity without a corresponding review practice.