Variables for project templates

[lpb]

@Dr_Williams,

You can vote for this feature here:

Variables for project templates

I would love to see {variables} for project templates! This would allow for automated project creation. The key question here is what would populate those variables. If it were possible to have those variables be read by Zapier, than that question is solved. This would be a massive, massive time saver for our organization. Right now, we have many project templates for different uses, but the problem is that there is always a deep level of customization that has to happen to each template. If tho…

Would you be ok with my merging this topic into that one?

Until/if that’s implemented, two workarounds:

The simplest, which I recognize doesn’t solve the problem in the way you are asking, is to consider toggling on the display of the “Project” field in List view projects. Then, in any project’s list view where someone is looking at “Create G-Suite Account” they’ll also see next to it “David Onboarding.”

To achieve what you want, you could accomplish it without a task template but instead with a rule in the project template utilizing a variable to change all task titles. Add Onboardee as a text custom field in the project template but which you set only in the project after creation with one multi-select of all tasks to the Onboardee’s name. The project template rule would be: When Onboardee is changed, Do this Set task title to [task name] - [Onboardee].

Thanks,

Larry

[Dr_Williams]

Sure. Please merge

[Dr_Williams]

And your suggestion should work! Thanks!

[Dr_Williams]

@lpb Actually, the custom field option for fill in the blank custom field, isn’t showing up under my rules section. I wonder if for a rule, it needs to be where you set in selections?

[lpb]

@Dr_Williams

I wonder if for a rule, it needs to be where you set in selections?

So sorry about that; you’re right! “When” in the rule trigger can’t be a text custom field (you can see I was conjuring this up without actually testing it).

Rather than your suggested workaround, which would work, I think it will be easier to make a different workaround:

In the project template, and one more custom field: A single-select called “Action” with a single value “Add onboardee name” and leave it unset for every task in the template.

Change the rule as follows:

• When Action is changed; Check if Action is set to Add onboardee name
• In Do this: add another action: Unset Action [just to clean up]

In the project, multi-select and first set the Onboardee name for all tasks. Then still multi-selected with all tasks, set the Action. That should do it.

Thanks,

Larry

[David_Lievense1]

Agreed this is critical functionality should be able to do something like create a milestone that is:

{{Project Name}} 30 Day Notification

[Jackie_Matuza]

Hello, I would love to be able to make use of the variables in a template project. Specifically I would like to be able to add [PROJECT NAME] to the task name.

I just created a project board (RESOURCE MANAGEMENT) for a team and was able to use variables through rules, and loved it. I was hoping to do something similar with a template project (X-DEPT PROJECT TEMPLATE) but it seems they only work with rules. My use cases are below:

RESOURCE MANAGEMENT Rule
When due date is approaching (30 days), check custom field for (Reviewer type=Sales); create a task “Sales Reviewer for [Task Name]” (with description @Task). The task name and task url/@mention are added using variables and refer back to the task that triggered the creation of the new task, for example “Sales Team SOP”
This creates a new task called “Sales Reviewer for [Sales Team SOP]” with the “Sales Team SOP” task linked in the description of this new task.
This has a couple of benefits for us. First, one person might be assigned to several of these auto-populated tasks. Let’s say I am assigned
“Sales Reviewer for [Sales Team SOP]”
“Sales Reviewer for [January Meeting Deck]”
“Sales Reviewer for [2025 Strategic Plan]”
Including the relevant name helps visually track what is what. Secondly, these tasks are assigned to many different teams and those teams have various boards where they like to see what colleagues are working on. So “Sales Reviewer for [Sales Team SOP]” can be in RESOURCE MANAGEMENT as well as SALES TEAM WORK. Again, indicating what specifically the work is makes it easy to understand with a quick glance vs seeing 3 tasks that all say “Sales Reviewer”.
Beautiful, works perfectly, I love it!

X-DEPT PROJECT TEMPLATE
We have a template that we use for all x-departmental projects. The template includes tasks for each team member along the lines of
“Sales team member” - assigned to Sales team rep
“Program team member” - assigned to Program team rep
“Operations team member” = assigned to Operations team rep

(As an aside, I know there are other Asana functionalities that may be better suited to indicating who is working on what but at present this is the company’s preference for organizing this information)

I was hoping that I could edit the project template to have each of those tasks include the project name for the same reasons I listed above. For example,
“Sales team member [Toolkit Workgroup]”
“Program team member [Partner Approach Workgroup]”
“Operations team member [Design Learning Project]”

But for the moment we have to do that manually once the board is created, which is not a huge deal but feels like something that could be automated. Very open to any other suggestions or workarounds people might have!
Thanks

[Jeremy_Long]

Hi @Jackie_Matuza, I have merged your post with an existing thread on this topic. Please be sure to scroll to the top and click the purple vote button!

Best,

Jeremy

[Jackie_Matuza]

Thanks! I am talking about project templates so I wonder if it would fit better with Variables for project templates

[Martine_Holston]

I would love this feature. For example, I have a project template for grant reports so that we follow the same workflow each time we write a report. In the tasks throughout the project, I’ve put “DONOR” to identify the donor this report belongs to, and after we use the template someone has to manually go through and update the name of the donor throughout the project. It feels needless when this is something that could be automated.

[LisiWisi]

I voted… then I thought, I’m SURE there’s a workaround. And I did it , thinking to myself the whole time, “rabbit hole alert” – and figured out a workaround!!

Whew, it was not a rabbit hole but a treasure trove.

The best part? You can do so much more than insert project title in the task title with this solution. Here goes…

1. Set up a manual rule in project template
2. Whenever duplicating the template, go into the project and manually run the rule
3. How you manually run the rule depends on your business rules / setup. Screenshots below demonstrates the flexibility you have with this workaround.

CAVEAT – I have not tested this with an actual project template yet – I tested it with a live project and successfuly set up the same rule in the template - no bandwith right now to test, iterate, then delete. It SHOULD work!!

SETUP the rule

Manually run the rule in the new project after duplicating the project template - you can opt to manually select and run the rule, OR have it automatically run based on section / other criteria. Lots of ways to structure this bespoke according to your org’s business rules.

RESULT (my rule has it appending project title to task name):

Hope this helps!

[Michal_Bednarczyk1]

I was about to post a similar suggestion when i found this.
My company has been putting the client name in front of every task for years now. It seemed odd at first since the Project field has it, but actually makes finding and viewing tasks much nice for us and we’ve used it consistently across the company.

Problem is, with templates, we can’t have it do that for 100 tasks. It would be nice to set variables like {client_name} and then place that within the title, descriptions, etc, etc. It can be eitehr jut on the template level and you fill it out when using the template, or even variables on a project or team level.

That way my template could be {client_name} // Internal Kick off Meeting
and as i create it i just set the variable to VVC. Not all 100 tasks are created with this and i don’t have to go edit each one individually.

[Seth_Lee]

Hi Asana team!
I’d love to submit a feature request that I think would save a ton of time for teams who rely heavily on templates.

---

1. What I’m Trying to Do

I want the ability to use dynamic variables/placeholders in task titles within template projects — similar to how Asana already allows dynamic assignees (like “Project Owner,” “Designer,” etc.).

For example, when we create a new project from a template, I’d love for Asana to automatically fill in placeholders in task titles such as:

• {{Client Name}}

• {{Year}}

• {{Quarter}}

• {{Project Name}}

• {{Department or Team}}

This would allow consistent naming conventions across hundreds of tasks without manually editing each title.

---

2. What I’ve Tried So Far

We currently use:

• Project templates

• Manually updated task titles

• Custom fields (Quarter, Year, Client Name)

• A mix of Asana rules + AI actions to rename tasks as a workaround

Rules + AI can help, but they aren’t scalable at volume and still require a lot of updates. Some projects contain 50–200+ tasks referencing client name and quarter, so manual renaming becomes extremely inefficient.

---

3. What’s Not Working or Confusing

There’s currently no way to mirror the convenience of dynamic roles in templates when it comes to task titles. This means:

• We must manually update every instance of client name in the template

• Every quarter requires another round of manual renaming

• It increases risk of mistakes or outdated info in task titles

• AI rules are helpful for achieving a similar result, but require set-up time and AI credits

Having native support for dynamic title fields would massively streamline production workflows.

---

Why This Feature Would Help a Lot of Teams

For organizations running recurring cycles (like marketing, accounting, onboarding, construction, seasonal operations, etc.), task titles often follow strict conventions.

Example:

• “{{Client Name}} | Q{{Quarter}} | Monthly Content Review”

• “Q{{Quarter}} Website Audit – {{Client Name}}”

• “{{Year}} Strategic Planning – {{Client Name}}”

Right now, all of that has to be updated manually.
Dynamic placeholders would:

• Reduce repetitive admin work

• Improve accuracy

• Standardize naming conventions

• Speed up onboarding and template activation

• Make Asana’s template system dramatically more powerful

---

Proposed Feature

Add a way to insert variables into task titles inside a template, e.g.:

• {{Client.Name}}

• {{Quarter}}

• {{Year}}

Then allow those to be filled during project creation (the same way dynamic roles are resolved).

Example

If a template task title looked like:

Quarterly Review – {{Client.Name}} – Q{{Quarter}} {{Year}}

Then, when creating a new project from the template and providing the values (e.g.,
Client.Name = “Evergreen Mechanical”, Quarter = 1, Year = 2026)
Asana would automatically generate:

Quarterly Review – Evergreen Mechanical – Q1 2026

---

Would Love the Community’s Input

Is anyone else using large-scale templates where dynamic task titles would help?
Would this benefit your workflow too?

Thanks in advance for taking the time to review this!

[lpb]

@Seth_Lee,

That’s a great writeup for this request and will really help make the case with Asana.

I’ve merged your post into an existing topic where you can click the title to scroll to the top and vote by clicking the Vote button. Existing votes will be merged.

Thanks,

Larry

[Seth_Lee]

@lpb Thank you, and I appreciate you merging my post to this existing topic! Hope this appeal can gain some momentum and come to life soon

[Rachel_Hazen]

Here to add my +1000000 to this! Right now, I have to figure out how to set up rules to rename tasks coming from a template.

@Seth_Lee outlined some great pain points and exactly how I would outline what we need as well.

[jeremy_glover1]

Please!! This would be soooo helpful to our organization.

[Eva_Galanes-Rosenbau]

I wish for this constantly and finally thought to search for it, only to find this thread.

Easy example of a use case: we create a new project for each client we work with. The template has a whole bunch of tasks like, “Do something for [CLIENT NAME]” and I would looooove to be able to enter the value for [CLIENT NAME] once, rather than manually having to change all of those tasks each time I create a new project.

Further, I’d love to use a variable when creating new (unique) tasks in that project going forward, so I don’t have to type out the name every single time—which can be important when assigning to other teammates.