Description templates

Introduced in GitLab 8.11.

Description templates allow you to define context-specific templates for issue and merge request description fields for your project.

Overview

By using the description templates, users that create a new issue or merge request can select a description template to help them communicate with other contributors effectively.

Every GitLab project can define its own set of description templates as they are added to the root directory of a GitLab project's repository.

Description templates must be written in Markdown and stored in your project's repository under a directory named .gitlab. Only the templates of the default branch will be taken into account.

Creating issue templates

Create a new Markdown (.md) file inside the .gitlab/issue_templates/ directory in your repository. Commit and push to your default branch.

Creating merge request templates

Similarly to issue templates, create a new Markdown (.md) file inside the .gitlab/merge_request_templates/ directory in your repository. Commit and push to your default branch.

Using the templates

Let's take for example that you've created the file .gitlab/issue_templates/Bug.md. This will enable the Bug dropdown option when creating or editing issues. When Bug is selected, the content from the Bug.md template file will be copied to the issue description field. The 'Reset template' button will discard any changes you made after picking the template and return it to its initial status.