The Ultimate Product Roadmap Template and How to Use It

So you’re looking for a product roadmap template? And not just any old template, but THE ULTIMATE product roadmap template. Well, we got you covered. 

No matter if you’re mapping out and communicating a product roadmap for the first time, are unhappy with your current product roadmap format, and want to try something new, or are just sense-checking your approach, we’ve got the product roadmap template to help you. 

Of course, there are a lot of product roadmap templates out there, varying widely from basic slide deck templates 🤮 to fully interactive and detailed templates that help you fully understand best practices. Makes you wonder if you’re using the right one? 

Not all of these roadmaps are going to be super helpful. Some can be nothing more than an outline to fill in, but others are more interactive and allow you to fully understand what you need to do to create a successful product roadmap. 

If you’re looking for the latter, you’ve come to the right place. 

At ProdPad, we have categorically the best product roadmap template available. Now I’m not just saying that through obligation, we genuinely believe our roadmap template is the most useful. If you hear us out as we explain why, we’re sure by the end of it you’re going to agree. 

In this article, we’re going to walk you through the product roadmap template, giving you reasons why you need to use one, why ours is the best choice, and how to use it.

Believe us already? Dive straight into our dynamic, drag-and-drop product roadmap template.

What is a Product Roadmap template? 

A product roadmap template is more than just a fill-in-the-blanks document – it’s a structured framework that helps you plan, communicate, and evolve your product strategy. It outlines key aspects of your chosen roadmap format to help you use it effectively. 

Essentially, a great product roadmap template functions as a how-to guide on using a roadmap properly.

Now most roadmap templates come in a downloadable format, ready to be filled in like you would a workbook at school. We’re not throwing shade at these types of templates. We’re all for a good downloadable resources and have plenty ourselves that help with every aspect of Product Management.

But when it comes to product roadmaps, a static document doesn’t go far enough. Product roadmaps are living, breathing tools, unlike other forms of product documentation. They’re dynamic and evolve constantly alongside your product. If your roadmap is dynamic, your product roadmap template should be too.

That’s exactly what our product roadmap template is. It’s an interactive tool designed to help you fully grasp – and actually use – your roadmap in the way it’s intended. 

Why use a Product Roadmap template? 

Product roadmaps are a huge part of a Product Manager’s day in the life, but that doesn’t mean they’re easy to use. Roadmaps can be complicated, especially if you’re working with an unfamiliar format. Given how much attention they demand, it makes sense to use a template as a structured way to navigate and master them.

Now there are a lot of different product roadmap formats around, so many that we’ve covered them in their own neat article:

With how different they are, it can be jarring to switch from one type to another. Each roadmap type has a learning curve. A roadmap template acts as a blueprint, helping you quickly adapt to and fully engage with a new format.

If you’re using a quality product roadmap template complete with guidance notes and example content, they can demonstrate the gold standard of what that roadmap should look like. They ensure you adopt Product Management best practices, avoid common mistakes, and don’t make any omissions, all to help you create a roadmap that’s clear, effective, and actionable.

Plus, if you get the whole Product Function in your organization to follow the same product roadmap template, you can foster alignment and standardization across your team. With everyone using the roadmap in the same way, this consistency prevents any collaboration issues, making you more effective and synced up. 

If you’re looking to explore a new type of product roadmap – say, moving from a timeline roadmap to Now-Next-Later – a template makes that transition seamless. But why would you want to do that?

I’m glad you asked… 

What is the best product roadmap template to use? 

We’ve said it from the start, our product roadmap template is the best. But why? Well, for starters, our template is focused on the most popular, and most effective, roadmap format there is: Now-Next-Later. 
Now-Next-Later is an agile product roadmap format, meaning that it’s focused on outcomes, not outputs, and allows for adaptability. It does away with strict timelines and deadlines, instead giving you the flexibility to plan your work within broader time horizons, focused on the outcomes you want to drive, not the features you want to deliver. You break your Initiatives into stuff that needs to be done now, things you’re working on next, and priorities for later. Check it out:

Here’s why Now-Next-Later is categorically the best: 

• Simple to understand: A Now-Next-Later roadmap is easy to understand, reducing the potential for confusion or misinterpretation. This makes it a great way to communicate your product strategy and direction, especially with stakeholders or team members who may not be involved in the day-to-day Product Management process.
• Customer-focused: The emphasis on ‘problems to solve’ ensures your product delivers maximum value for your customers, making it a more successful product.
• Happy, empowered teams: By allowing scope for discovery and experimentation within each roadmap item, the team has more autonomy to find the best solutions, making their day jobs more interesting! This, along with less deadline pressure, makes for a happy, productive team.
• Efficient and time-saving: The Now-Next-Later time horizons help Product Teams avoid wasting time planning out detailed schedules that are too far in the future to be accurate, only to have to rework them when deadlines aren’t met or priorities change.
• Strategically aligned: Everything on a Now-Next-Later is linked to a strategic objective, ensuring you are prioritizing based on what will create the most business value. It’s an easy way to align a product roadmap with what is most important to the organization.
• Faster delivery: Because Now-Next-Later does not rely on exact deadlines for its structure, teams aren’t asked to plan schedules ahead of time and commit to exact dates. This means no one is baking in buffer time and things get delivered faster.

Now we know that we’re not the only Belle in this ball. There are a lot of roadmap templates out there, with many others also focusing on Now-Next-Later. But let us tell you why we turn heads. 

If you didn’t know, ProdPad Co-Founders Janna Bastow and Simon Cast invented the Now-Next-Later roadmap. That means that we know this format inside out, like the back of our hand. We’re the originators, the OG. Why would you get a Now-Next-Later roadmap for anybody else? 

If you need more convincing that Now-Next-Later is the most effective product roadmap template, you can learn why ProdPad Co-Founder, Janna Bastow, invented it: 

Another reason why our product roadmap template is the best is because it’s dynamic. It’s not a print-out, it’s a functioning version of ProdPad that you can use and learn from. It’s not one of those templates that you’re going to make a copy of, fill out, and then forget about by this time next week.

Frankly, we’re surprised by how many static product roadmap templates there are out there. Because they’re simply bad. Here’s why using a static document as a product roadmap template is a bad idea: 

• They lock you into a single moment in time: A static roadmap might capture your plan today, but as soon as priorities shift, it’s outdated. You’ll either have to recreate it from scratch or work from an obsolete roadmap.
• They aren’t flexible: A static template forces you into a fixed structure that might not fit your team’s workflow, making it harder to adjust as things change.
• They kill collaboration: A file-based product roadmap template is just a document, not a living tool. Teams can’t update it in real-time, meaning decisions happen elsewhere, and alignment suffers.
• They focus on formatting over function: Using a rigid template often means squeezing plans into predefined boxes rather than thinking strategically about what needs to be communicated.
• They don’t scale: As your product evolves, your roadmap should too. A static template doesn’t grow with your team, leaving you with an outdated or overly simplified view of what’s next.
• They make tracking progress a nightmare: With a static roadmap, there’s no easy way to reflect shifts, updates, or completed work without manually editing or recreating the document.

Here’s another thing. Not all product roadmap templates are created equal. In fact, some straight-up suck. With Now-Next-Later being a popular format, you’re going to find lots of templates masquerading as this style. When choosing a product roadmap template, you need to beware of fakers. 

When is a Now-Next-Later product roadmap template not a Now-Next-Later product roadmap template? 

There are a couple of key components of Now-Next-Later that without them, result in a different style of roadmap. Now-Next-Later is outcome-driven, not output-focused. That’s why you can easily tie OKRs and business goals to each Initiative in the roadmap, alongside framing your roadmap around problems to solve and prioritizing based on the outcomes you want to achieve. Without this outcome-driven focus, you haven’t got a Now-Next-Later roadmap, you have trash. 

And crucially, a proper Now-Next-Later product roadmap template uses a two-step hierarchy. This means that you have your overarching problems to solve, and then within them the possible ideas and experiments you’re going to explore to best solve those problems. 

So, as an example, the first level of your roadmap item would be a problem that needs solving like  “How can we improve user onboarding?” while the second level solution ideas might be “Create a new onboarding flow” or “Test new user onboarding emails”. 

If you’re missing any of these elements, you ain’t got a Now-Next-Later product roadmap template. Beware of imitations. Product roadmap templates that call themselves Now-Next-Later, but that lack the inherent outcome-focused structure, are nothing more than feature boards. 

If you’re looking for a Now-Next-Later product roadmap template, it’s best to go with the O.G. Founded by the creator of Now-Next-Later, ProdPad lives and breathes this format. 

How to use our Product Roadmap template

Our product roadmap template is easy to use. That’s because it’s baked right into our online sandbox, a free-to-access version of ProdPad that you can use today to see how it all works. Your access is unlimited and forever and includes a bunch of different roadmap examples for different industries and product types to help you understand Now-Next-Later in action. 

Now with it being an open sandbox environment, any changes you make won’t be saved. So when you’ve learnt everything from the product roadmap template and it’s time to save and share your own version, you’ll want to start a free trial of ProdPad which will allow you to save your roadmap, create unlimited customized views and share and publish it to all your stakeholders.

To help you fully understand how to use our template, let’s break down all the key elements: 

Time Horizons

In the Now-Next-Later roadmap, time horizons replace traditional fixed timelines. Instead of committing to specific dates, Initiatives are categorized based on their priority and readiness. Now by default, our time horizons are Now, Next, and Later, but you need to define what that means for your team.

This is important because everyone can have different interpretations of what now, next, and later mean. You need to be explicit about how you’re defining these horizons so you’re setting the right expectations with your stakeholders. 

For example, your time horizons could be something like: 

• Now = Well-understood problems with defined solutions and committed development resources. 
• Next = Problems at the design or discovery stage with assumptions that need to be tested. 
• Later = Fuzzy aspirations that are still taking form. 

Alternatively, they can be spit up into fiscal quarters – a good tactic if you’re weaning a team off timeline roadmaps. 

You don’t even have to stick to now, next, and later as your time horizon headings.You can adopt the process and principles of the Now-Next-Later without being tied to those exact terms.

In fact, even in ProdPad, we allow our customers to customize the column headings and call them whatever they want. You might want to be more explicit about the time brackets for each and call them ‘This quarter’, ‘Next quarter’, and ‘The future’.

Using time horizons allows teams to manage uncertainty effectively, providing a structured yet flexible approach to planning. It acknowledges that priorities can shift, enabling teams to adapt without the constraints of rigid timelines.

Objectives

Objectives are the core aims of your product. They’re the overarching goals and you need to be aware of them to then dictate the Initiatives you set to try and achieve them. Your Objectives don’t have to be specific, measurable goals just yet, but they do need to be something that you can focus your roadmap around. 

With your Objectives, you can set them in the Objectives & Key Results tab. Once you have them there, you’re then able to assign them to the relevant Initiatives, so that you’re always clear on what each Initiative card is working towards.

By focusing on objectives rather than just a list of tasks, teams can maintain a strong sense of purpose and adaptability, making sure every effort contributes to meaningful progress.

Initiatives

Initiatives are high-level problems that the Product Team aims to address. These are the particular efforts you want to focus on to deliver value that aligns with the product’s strategic goals. Initiatives should be expressed as problems to solve – that’s very important for Now-Next-Later. 

If the Initiatives on your product roadmap are focused on the problems you want to solve for your customers or your business, then you have the flexibility within each Initiative to explore different solutions and adapt your plans as you learn through discovery and experimentation.

To help you tick off Initiatives, the steps involved are then broken down into smaller tasks or Ideas that can be linked to the cards. More on them in a sec.

In our product roadmap template, you create Initiative cards, which you can then move based on priority and readiness, based on the time horizons you’ve set.

Focusing on Initiatives helps maintain a clear connection between daily activities and overarching strategic objectives, promoting coherence and purpose in the team’s work.

Ideas

Ideas are potential solutions or actions that can be done to achieve the defined Initiatives they’re linked to. They represent the team’s creative responses to the problems identified.

Ideas can emerge from various sources, including team brainstorming sessions, customer feedback, or market research, and should be linked to the Initiative(s) they most relate to.

When adding Ideas to your roadmap, they need to be assessed for feasibility, impact, and alignment with strategic goals before implementation.

Target date

While the Now-Next-Later roadmap emphasizes flexibility over rigid timelines, assigning target dates can be beneficial for planning and accountability. Target dates provide a temporal reference, helping teams manage expectations and coordinate efforts.

These dates are set with an understanding of their tentative nature, allowing for adjustments as priorities evolve. Usually, as Initiatives move across the roadmap right to left from the Later column to Now, this target date will likely get more concrete and not as broad. 

Instead of fiscal quarters and rough monthly estimates, you’ll be using more specific dates as you gain more knowledge on Intitivate.  

Target dates ensure that the roadmap remains dynamic while providing sufficient structure to guide the team’s activities.

With target dates, that’s all the basics of Now-Next-Later covered. Of course, there’s still so much to learn and see. Access our product roadmap template to fully get to grip with this outcome-focused format.

Inside the initiative card

All the above is just what you can change and edit from the roadmap overview display. When you dig into each individual initiative card, you have options to add more details to help you better plan and optimize each item included in your roadmap. For example, when you click on each initiative, you can add extra juicy details like: 

• Target outcomes: These are the goals and metrics you want to hit with this initiative. For example, it could be increasing user retention by 10% or improving feature adoption rate within the first month. Defining the target outcome helps align the initiative with your overall product and business objectives.
• Actual outcomes: The actual results of the initiative once it’s completed. This is where you can compare the planned outcomes with the real impact, helping you measure the success and refine future initiatives. It could include metrics like conversion rates, user satisfaction, or revenue growth.
• Linked ideas: This allows you to connect related Ideas or features that are tied to the initiative. If your initiative is part of a bigger goal, you can reference related Ideas that are driving or influencing it, providing context and showing how the pieces fit together.
• User stories: A description of the user’s perspective on the feature or initiative. User stories define what the user wants to accomplish, why, and the expected benefit. Adding user stories helps keep the focus on delivering value to the user and ensures alignment with their needs.
• Any comments you need to add: This is where you can add additional notes, insights, or clarifications related to the initiative. Whether it’s feedback from stakeholders or adjustments based on new market insights, this section helps keep everyone aligned on any changes or additional context.

If you’re stuck with any of these, our in-built AI Assistant CoPiliot can help you generate descriptions and Ideas. In fact, CoPilot can help automate a lot of the roadmap process. Check out what else CoPilot can do.

Making the switch to Now-Next-Later

Sold on Now-Next-Later? Thought you might be. Now, I know what you’re thinking. You want to switch but don’t know if you can. You feel shackled to timeline roadmaps, trapped by them. You can’t fathom to think about the effort to make the switch and convert everything over – oh the horror! But just like scary films, that horror is not real. 

With ProdPad’s inbuilt AI, you can upload documents – like your old timeline roadmap – and have them automatically transformed into a fully working, fully functional Now-Next-Later roadmap. It’s that easy. 

What we’re saying is that there’s no excuse. Between our product roadmap template and CoPilot, we make it as easy as possible to adopt Now-Next-Later, definitively THE BEST product roadmap format. 

Go and give it a go and transform how you handle your product roadmap.