Lightning Email Templates
A Lightning Email Template is a reusable email layout built in Lightning Experience and saved as an EmailTemplate record.
Definition
A Lightning Email Template is a reusable email layout built in Lightning Experience and saved as an EmailTemplate record. You design it either in the drag-and-drop Email Template Builder or in an HTML editor, then reuse it anywhere Salesforce sends mail. Each template can carry merge fields, images, and styled content, so a rep clicks once and the recipient's name, account, and case details fill in automatically.
Lightning Email Templates are the modern alternative to Classic Email Templates. Both produce EmailTemplate records and both ride the same email infrastructure, but the Lightning ones use a newer authoring surface and the Folders and Enhanced Sharing model for access control. The two systems run side by side. Most orgs keep older Classic templates for established processes and build anything new in Lightning.
How Lightning Email Templates fit together
Two ways to author a template
Lightning gives you two editors, and the one you pick is recorded on the template. The Email Template Builder is a drag-and-drop canvas. You drop in content components, rich text, images, and buttons, and Salesforce assembles the responsive HTML for you. It starts from a basic layout with default content, so you can send it as-is or shape it into something branded. This builder is the right tool for admins and marketers who do not want to touch markup. The same builder powers templates in the Account Engagement (Pardot) Lightning app, so the skill carries across products. The second option is the HTML editor. You compose directly in the HTML Value area, paste or write your own markup, and use the Merge button to insert merge fields. Choose this path when you are migrating hand-coded email, when a designer hands you a tested HTML file, or when you need control the visual builder does not expose. Both editors save to the same EmailTemplate object, so downstream sending channels treat the output identically.
Folders and Enhanced Sharing
Lightning Email Templates use Folders and Enhanced Sharing, which an admin enables once from Setup. This is a different access model from the old Classic folders, and it behaves much like the sharing on Reports and Dashboards. Until you turn it on, every template you create stays private to you. After it is enabled, you organize templates into folders and share each folder with users, public groups, or roles. Sharing happens at defined access levels. Viewer access lets a user send a template. Editor access lets them change its content. Manager access lets them control who else gets in. That layering matters at scale, because you usually want a small team owning the source content while a wide audience simply sends. You can also keep a template private or make it public to the whole org. A common pattern is a locked-down folder of approved corporate templates that everyone can view and send, alongside personal folders where individuals draft their own. Plan the folder structure before you create dozens of templates, since moving and resharing later is tedious.
Merge fields and dynamic content
Merge fields are the reason templates feel personal. A guided merge picker inserts a placeholder, such as the recipient first name or the related Account name, and the platform swaps in real values at send time. In the Email Template Builder you select fields through the interface. In the HTML editor you click Merge and place the token where you want it. You can also type merge fields directly into the subject line so the subject personalizes too. What a template can merge depends on its related entity. When you create the template you choose the object it relates to, for example Contact, Lead, or Case, and that choice sets which fields the picker offers, including fields from related records. Conditional content, supported in the builder, lets one template show or hide a block based on data, so a single template can greet a Customer and a Prospect differently without two separate files. Always preview a template against a real record before you trust the merge. A field that is blank on the record sends as blank, and a relationship that does not exist for that record can leave an awkward gap.
Where Lightning templates actually send
A template is only useful where it can be selected, and Lightning Email Templates surface across several channels. The Email composer on a record uses them for one-to-one mail, so a rep replying to a Contact picks a template and edits before sending. List Email uses them to send an individual, personalized copy to each Contact, Lead, or campaign member in a list view, which suits announcements and small campaigns. The Send Email action in Flow references a template by its record, letting automation send the right mail at the right step. On the developer side, Apex can send through Messaging.SingleEmailMessage by setting the template Id, which keeps the body centralized instead of hard-coded in code. Email Alerts, fired from Flow or older Workflow Rules, also pull from a template. Each channel has its own setup and its own quirks, and not every channel exposes every template feature the same way. The honest practice is to test a template in the exact channel that will send it, because a layout that looks perfect in the builder preview can behave differently inside List Email or an Email Alert.
Images, rendering, and the inbox reality
Email rendering is the part teams underestimate. The Email Template Builder produces HTML meant to display well across modern clients, but the inbox is not a browser. Outlook, Gmail, Apple Mail, and mobile apps each interpret HTML and CSS differently, and an image-heavy layout that looks crisp in Salesforce can break in a recipient mailbox. Images you add are referenced by URL in the sent message, and external clients vary in whether they load remote images by default, so a critical message should never live only inside a picture. Treat the preview as a starting point, not proof. Send test messages to real addresses on the clients your audience uses, then check desktop and mobile. Keep important wording as actual text rather than baked into graphics, both for clients that block images and for accessibility. Watch total message size, since oversized HTML and large attachments can trip spam filters or get clipped. None of this is unique to Salesforce, but the builder makes it easy to assemble something that renders inconsistently, so the testing discipline is on you.
Deployment, packaging, and lifecycle
Lightning Email Templates are metadata, which means they move between orgs through the normal tooling. They can be distributed with change sets and with packaging, and they migrate through the Metadata API and Salesforce DXC source projects. The template body, its merge field references, and its folder placement travel together, so a sandbox-built template can be promoted to production as part of a release rather than rebuilt by hand. That makes templates a first-class part of a governed deployment process instead of a manual copy-paste chore. Lifecycle management still needs ownership. Decide who can create templates versus who can only send, usually controlled through the folder sharing levels and the relevant user permissions. Review templates periodically, because merge fields break when the underlying field is renamed or removed, and branding drifts over time. Keep the source content reviewed alongside the technical metadata during a deployment, since the body is what a customer actually reads. A clean naming convention and a small set of maintained corporate folders beat a sprawl of near-duplicate personal templates every time.
Create a Lightning Email Template
Create a Lightning Email Template in the Email Template Builder so admins and reps can reuse a branded, mergeable layout. Folders and Enhanced Sharing should already be enabled if you want to file and share the template.
- Open the Email Templates app
In Lightning Experience, go to the App Launcher and open Email Templates, then click New Email Template. Templates you create start out private to you.
- Name it and set the related object
Enter a clear name, add a subject (you can type merge fields into the subject), and choose the Related Entity Type, such as Contact or Case. That choice sets which merge fields the picker offers.
- Pick a folder
If Folders and Enhanced Sharing is enabled, assign the template to a folder so it can be shared. Leave it unfiled to keep it private to yourself.
- Build the body
Use the Email Template Builder to drag in content components, rich text, images, and buttons, and insert merge fields through the picker. Or switch to the HTML editor and compose in the HTML Value area, using the Merge button for fields.
- Preview, save, and share
Preview against a real record to confirm merge values render, then save. Share the folder with users, groups, or roles at Viewer, Editor, or Manager access, or make the template public.
A human-readable label that helps senders find the right template in a list.
The email subject line; it can include merge fields so the subject personalizes per recipient.
The object the template relates to (for example Contact, Lead, or Case), which determines the available merge fields.
The template content itself, built in the Email Template Builder canvas or written in the HTML Value editor.
- New templates are private by default; nobody else sees them until you file them in a shared folder or make them public.
- Folders and Enhanced Sharing must be enabled in Setup before you can create template folders and share them.
- The Related Entity Type locks in your merge field options; choosing the wrong object means the fields you need are not in the picker.
- The builder preview is not the inbox. Send real test messages to Outlook, Gmail, and mobile before you trust the layout.
Prefer this walkthrough as its own page? How to Lightning Email Templates in Salesforce, step by step
Trust & references
Cross-checked against the following references.
Straight from the source - Salesforce's reference material on Lightning Email Templates.
Hands-on resources to go deeper on Lightning Email Templates.
About the Author
Dipojjal Chakrabarti is a B2C Solution Architect with 29 Salesforce certifications and over 13 years in the Salesforce ecosystem. He runs salesforcedictionary.com to help admins, developers, architects, and cert/interview candidates sharpen their fundamentals. More about Dipojjal.
Test your knowledge
Q1. How do Lightning Email Templates differ from legacy Classic email templates?
Q2. What sharing model do Lightning Email Templates use, unlike the legacy folder model?
Q3. What feature do Lightning Email Templates support for showing different content to different recipient types?
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