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Timeline Template

Visualise and outline a project using our Timeline Template to view past and future milestones

About the Timeline template

A timeline displays a chronological order of important dates, and scheduled events. Timelines help product managers, project managers, and team members tell visual stories about progress and obstacles. Timelines enable teams to see at a glance what happened before, what progress is happening now, and what needs tackling in the future. 

Projects or products with specific purpose or deliverables should be based on a timeline to be successful. Use the project timeline template as a shared reference for start dates, end dates, and milestones.

Keep reading to learn more about the Timeline template.

What is a timeline? 

A timeline can act as a mini-roadmap for product managers. When labeled clearly, it can help you visualize everything you need to do to deliver your product or project successfully. Timelines can help you communicate new feature developments, bug fixes, and changes around continuous improvement. From a project planning point of view, timelines also help clarify dependencies, resource allocation, workflows, and deadlines. 

When to use a timeline

Timelines are helpful for:

  • Showing teams a visual summary of events or priorities 

  • Offering a time-sensitive agenda or itinerary 

  • Highlighting important milestones or phrases

  • Focus on important dates or details that your team may miss out on

Timelines may be especially useful for busy product managers on a day-to-day basis. They can help prioritize processes and team activities, build and follow through on a roadmap, drive product launches, and shape product awareness across teams. 

Project managers can add project timelines to their presentations, project plans, and proposals. Timelines also have a place in other documents where project details should be shared with your team, clients, or stakeholders. 

Create your own timeline

Making your own timelines is easy. Miro’s whiteboard tool is the perfect canvas to create and share them. Get started by selecting the Timeline template, then take the following steps to make one of your own.

  1. Decide on the story you want to tell. What is your timeline going to communicate? It might be a mini-roadmap, a workflow, a project, or a campaign timeline. Once you decide on the purpose, you’re ready to fill it with meaningful data.

  2. Add, remove, or reorganize key points on the timeline. Choose whether this timeline will show weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly progress. You can edit the text boxes to change key phases or milestones accordingly. 

  3. Collect team feedback to refine dates, action items, and phases on the timeline. Sometimes you may need an expert from another team or a specific team member to review or input details that only they may have access to. Typing @team member notifies a specific team member while @team notifies your entire time all at once. You can follow conversation threads by clicking the Bell icon, and resolve comments once you all agree on decisions. 

  4. Customize the timeline with colors, fonts, icons, and media embeds as needed. The default timeline can extend to include as much context and new information as necessary. Your timeline text can be edited, too. You can also color-code your timeline to show action status at a glance, and insert emojis to add context to milestones completed ahead of (or behind) schedule. You can also link to relevant media like videos or images, or related Miro boards such as a Milestone Chart.

FAQ about the Timeline template

How do you write a timeline for a project?

You can start writing a timeline for a project by first understanding your project's scope. Once you know that, you can divide your project into milestones and estimate the time needed for each task. Then, add your project's tasks to a chronological timeline; you can use Miro's project timeline template to build your timeline. Last but not least, assign the tasks in your timeline and share them with your team.

When should I use the Timeline Template?

Use the Timeline Template to visualize a project with an overview of events. This template is ideal for project planning when trying to jot down important information in a timeline and ensure you do not miss out on any key events.

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