PRD Templates
- Priank Ravichandar
- Oct 7, 2024
- 4 min read
Updated: Sep 18
How to write Product Requirements Documents (PRDs) faster using templates and AI.
Key Takeaways
Strong PRDs give teams clarity, allowing them to execute faster and deliver better outputs.
Templates give product managers more time to focus on what matters most—understanding users, setting direction, and making better decisions.
While AI tools can accelerate drafting, iteration, and review, human judgment is still necessary to ensure PRDs are aligned with the specific customer and business goals.
What Is A PRD
A Product Requirements Document (PRD) outlines the “what” and “why” of a product or feature. While formats differ across companies, most PRDs include product vision, user needs, functional requirements, success metrics, and constraints. A well-written PRD serves as a single source of truth, helping product, design, engineering, and business stakeholders move in the same direction. Product managers use PRDs to get everyone on the same page about what work must be done, how it will be done, and why it matters.
Best Practices For Writing PRDs
Lead with the problem: Define the customer problem, desired outcome, and evidence before discussing solutions.
Set success criteria: Use clear metrics, baselines, and guardrails tied to business and user value.
Define scope: State assumptions, constraints, dependencies, and what’s in vs. out of scope.
Map user flows: Capture end-to-end journeys, edge cases, and key features.
Cover non-functional needs: Include performance, security, accessibility, and platform requirements.
Align stakeholders: Record owners, decisions, approvals, and open questions in one place.
Be clear and concise: Use plain language, minimize jargon, and add links to research, designs, artifacts, dashboards, etc.
Update often: Update PRDs as the product, process, and organization evolve.
Why Use Templates?
Templates give product managers the structure necessary to capture insights, decisions, and trade-offs without having to reinvent the wheel. Starting from scratch is time-consuming. A consistent format also makes it easier for stakeholders to review PRDs and provide feedback. As development work gets faster, product management work will likely increasingly become the bottleneck. The best way to accelerate the PRD creation process is to use AI to generate initial PRD drafts. PMs can upload templates to an LLM (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc.) to generate, adapt, or refine PRDs.
How To Use Templates
Use directly as starting points for creating PRDs.
Upload them to an LLM (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc.) and modify them as required.
PRD Templates
Other Product Templates
How To Generate PRDs With AI Tools
AI can accelerate every stage of writing a PRD. Here are a few practical examples:
Generate a first draft.
Upload a PRD template and prompt the AI to generate a PRD. Provide AI with inputs such as the target persona, user pain points, and business goals.
Paste any additional context (user research notes, support ticket data, etc.)
Refine the AI-generated PRD.
Manually edit the PRD based on your specific context.
Prompt the LLM to update the PRD (by providing specific feedback, additional context, etc.).
Review PRDs.
Ask the LLM to verify that the PRD meets the initial requirements.
Compare two versions of a PRD and have AI highlight the differences.
Context To Include In Prompts
Product and audience: problem area, personas, JTBD.
Business goals and constraints: OKRs, time horizon, budget/tech constraints.
Evidence: key insights, data baselines, research quotes, support tickets.
Scope: in/out of scope, dependencies, platforms (web/iOS/Android/backend).
Success: target metrics, guardrails, evaluation plan.
Rollout: phases, exit criteria, operational checklists.
Stakeholders: owners, approvers, reviewers.
Example Prompt
Draft a PRD using the template provided for the following feature: Contractor Auto-Onboarding in Acme Payroll.
- Product & Audience: SMB payroll app. Users = small business owners + accountants. JTBD = quickly onboard/pay contractors without errors.
- Business Goals/Constraints: Reduce onboarding errors by 40% this quarter. Launch MVP in 2 quarters. One squad, limited budget.
- Evidence: 200+ support tickets in 6 months, current error rate 8.5%. Surveys show onboarding takes 25 mins avg. Target = 10 mins.
- Scope: In = Guided onboarding (web + iOS)
- Success: Reduce onboarding time 60%, cut support tickets by 50%. Guardrails: no payroll latency increase.
- Rollout: Phase 1 internal pilot → Phase 2 limited rollout → Phase 3 GA. Exit: <2% escalation rate.
- Stakeholders: PM = Jane Doe. Approvers = VP Product, Head of Compliance. Reviewers = Eng, Design, Support leads.
Thoughts On Frameworks
Frameworks can bring a lot of structure and clarity, but only when implemented well.
Templates provide a framework to structure PRDs. Frameworks distill the best practices and best thinking from experienced professionals, teams, and organizations. They establish a standard way for setting goals, assessing progress, and evaluating success. This gives teams the structure they need to coordinate their efforts and stay on the same page, so they can work together to build great solutions. However, frameworks should support, not replace, insightful thinking. We still have to evaluate their relevance and adapt them to their specific needs.
There are a lot of great PRD templates out there, but finding the right template will not solve all our problems. They enforce certain frameworks in hopes of improving clarity, focus, and productivity. However, not all teams can successfully implement a framework. Teams must thoroughly understand a framework and its underlying principles to effectively use it. If they can’t figure out when, where, how, and why to apply a framework, forcing them to use it is pointless. The right organizational mechanisms also need to be in place to support framework adoption.
