---
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stage: Manage
group: Import
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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).
Projects created from these templates serve as a common starting point.

## Setting up group-level project templates

To use a custom project template for a new project:

1. [Create a `templates` subgroup](subgroups/index.md).
1. [Add repositories (projects) to 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 menu, select **Settings > General**. 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 select **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's a sample group/project structure for project templates, for a hypothetical _Acme Co_:

```plaintext
# 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.
If all enabled [project features](../project/settings/index.md#sharing-and-permissions)
(except for GitLab Pages) are set to **Everyone With Access**, then every project template directly
under the group namespace is available to every signed-in user. However, private projects are
available only if the user is a member of the project. Also note that 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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