gitlab-org--gitlab-foss/doc/user/group/custom_project_templates.md

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# Custom group-level project templates **(PREMIUM)**

> [Introduced](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/issues/6861) in [GitLab Premium](https://about.gitlab.com/pricing/) 11.6.

Custom project templates are useful for organizations that need to create many similar types of [projects](../project/index.md) and want to start from the same jumping-off point.

## Setting up Group-level Project Templates

To use a custom project template for a new project you need to:

1. [Create a 'templates' subgroup](subgroups/index.md).
1. [Add repositories (projects) to the that new subgroup](index.md#add-projects-to-a-group), as your templates.
1. Edit your group's settings to look to your 'templates' subgroup for templates:
   1. In the left-hand menu, click **{settings}** **Settings > General**.

      NOTE:
      If you don't have access to the group's settings, you may not have sufficient privileges (for example, you may need developer or higher permissions).

   1. Scroll to **Custom project templates** and click **Expand**. If no **Custom project templates** section displays, make sure you've created a subgroup, and added a project (repository) to it.
   1. Select the 'templates' subgroup.

### Example structure

Here is a sample group/project structure for a hypothetical "Acme Co" for project templates:

```txt
# GitLab instance and group
gitlab.com/acmeco/
    # Subgroups
    internal
    tools
    # Subgroup for handling project templates
    websites
        templates
            # Project templates
            client-site-django
            client-site-gatsby
            client-site-hTML

        # Other projects
        client-site-a
        client-site-b
        client-site-c
        ...
```

### Adjust Settings

Users can configure a GitLab group that serves as template
source under a group's **Settings > General > Custom project templates**.

NOTE:
GitLab administrators can
[set project templates for an entire GitLab instance](../admin_area/custom_project_templates.md).

Within this section, you can configure the group where all the custom project
templates are sourced. Every project _template_ directly under the group namespace is
available to every signed-in user, if all enabled [project features](../project/settings/index.md#sharing-and-permissions) are set to **Everyone With Access**.

However, private projects will be available only if the user is a member of the project.

NOTE:
Only direct subgroups can be set as the template source. Projects of nested subgroups of a selected template source cannot be used.

Repository and database information that are copied over to each new project are
identical to the data exported with the [GitLab Project Import/Export](../project/settings/import_export.md).

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