Building a custom template

Templates define the layout of a screen — where the clock goes, where the announcements ticker runs, which corner shows the menu. You can start from the ready-made gallery (tailored to your industry) or build your own from scratch. Prefer to describe what you want in a sentence? See Designing with AI. Already have designs in Canva or PDF? See Importing designs.

Start from a ready-made template (recommended)

Every ready-made template is a starting point — customizing it creates your own editable copy:

1. Open Templates in the sidebar and browse or filter the gallery.
2. Click a template to preview it full-screen, then click Customize.
3. Edit anything you like in the builder, then click Save to my templates and give your copy a name (e.g. "Main Hallway — Fall").

The original stays pristine in the gallery; your copy lives in your template library.

Anatomy of a template

Every template has:

• Canvas size — defaults to 1920x1080 for landscape displays. Change it for portrait or video-wall installations.
• Background — a solid color, a gradient, or an uploaded image.
• Zones — rectangular regions that each render one widget.

Zones are positioned in percentages (0–100), not pixels, so layouts scale gracefully to any screen resolution.

Adding a zone

1. In the builder, click Add zone in the toolbar.
2. Drag the zone to where you want it. Use the corner handles to resize.
3. From the right-hand panel, pick the widget type for that zone.

Available widget types

• CLOCK, WEATHER, COUNTDOWN, TEXT, RICH_TEXT
• ANNOUNCEMENT, TICKER, BELL_SCHEDULE, LUNCH_MENU, CALENDAR
• STAFF_SPOTLIGHT, IMAGE, IMAGE_CAROUSEL, VIDEO, LOGO
• WEBPAGE, RSS_FEED, SOCIAL_FEED, PLAYLIST

Each widget has its own configuration panel — for example, the Clock widget lets you choose 12/24-hour format, font size, and theme variant.

Layering (zIndex)

Zones can overlap. Use Bring to front / Send to back in the right-click menu, or set zIndex numerically (higher numbers render on top).

Save and save-as-copy

• Click Save (or press <kbd>Ctrl / ⌘ + S</kbd>) to persist your changes. The chip in the toolbar shows Unsaved while you have pending edits and Saved Xs ago after a successful save.
• If you try to close the tab with unsaved edits, the browser warns you before leaving.
• Click Save as copy (<kbd>Ctrl / ⌘ + Shift + S</kbd>) to fork — useful when you want to try a variant without losing the original.

Publishing

Saving doesn't automatically deploy the template to screens. To push it live, create a schedule that uses it (see Scheduling). This lets you preview a work-in-progress template safely without affecting what's currently showing.

Accessibility + design tips

• Keep text at least 48pt for 1080p displays viewed from 10+ feet away.
• Use high-contrast color combinations — our brand indigo on white, or white text on dark gradients.
• Animated tickers should not exceed 40 characters per second of scroll speed.