Daily standup templates (copy-paste, Slack and Teams)

A daily standup template is a short, fixed set of prompts everyone answers the same way, so the meeting has a shape and nobody has to improvise what to say. The templates below are copy-paste ready for a live standup, a Slack or Teams channel, or an async thread. Pick one, use it unchanged for a fortnight, then adapt. Further down are the seven templates built into TeamRetro, each with a live demo.

One rule before you copy anything: keep it to three prompts, and put blockers first. A longer template feels thorough and quietly trains people to write status reports. The shorter the template, the more likely each line says something the team can act on.

The classic three-question template

The default. Best for a new team that needs structure before it needs nuance.

Yesterday: what I moved forward
Today: what I'm focused on
Blockers: anything slowing me down (and what I need)

It works, with one caveat covered at length in the three standup questions: answered literally it produces a task diary. The “and what I need” on the blockers line is the small edit that keeps it honest.

The blockers-first template

The same three prompts, reordered so the useful part comes while the room is still awake.

🚧 Blocked on: what's stuck + who can help
🎯 Today: my one main focus
✅ Since yesterday: anything that changes your plan

Reordering looks trivial and isn’t. Leading with blockers signals what the meeting is for, and it gets the most actionable item said first instead of last.

The walk-the-board script (facilitator)

For teams past their first few sprints, run the board instead of the people. This is the facilitator’s script, not a per-person template:

1. "Sprint goal: <one sentence>. On track?"
2. Move right → left across in-progress items:
   - "What's this waiting on?"
   - "What does it need to move?"
   - "Anyone able to help push it over the line?"
3. Blockers → assign an owner to each.
4. Parking lot → confirm who stays for what.

The daily standup agenda covers why this beats the per-person format, and how to facilitate it.

Async templates for Slack and Teams

For distributed or timezone-split teams, the standup moves into a channel. Same brevity, one post per person, posted by a set deadline:

*Standup — [date]*
🎯 Focus today:
🚧 Blockers / need help with:
🙌 Anything the team should know:

Keep the main channel to one post each and push every follow-up into a thread, or the channel becomes unreadable by 11am. For the full tradeoffs (timezones, when async wins, how to stop it becoming a wall of ignored updates), see async and remote standups.

The seven standup templates built into TeamRetro

TeamRetro ships seven ready-made standup templates. Each one below has its exact questions, a sample answer, a plain-text version you can paste into Slack or Teams, and a link to a live demo you can open without signing up. If none of them fits, you can build your own template with up to 10 questions and flag each one as blocked, doing or done, so the standup still counts blockers and progress.

Daily Standup

Use it when: your team wants the classic three questions with no surprises.

1. What did you do yesterday?
2. What will you do today?
3. What is blocking you?

Example from a backend developer: “Merged the rate-limit fix for the public API. Today I’m writing the retry logic for failed webhooks. Blocked: I need a test account on the payment provider’s sandbox.”

Daily Standup
1. What did you do yesterday?
2. What will you do today?
3. What is blocking you?

Try the Daily Standup demo (no signup).

Async check-in

Use it when: your team is spread across time zones and everyone writes their update on their own time. It skips the icebreaker.

1. What did you get done since your last check-in?
2. What’s your focus today?
3. Anything blocking you?

Example from a product manager: “Finished the interview notes for the onboarding research and shared them in the doc. Today I’m turning them into three problem statements for Thursday’s planning. Nothing blocking.”

Async check-in
1. What did you get done since your last check-in?
2. What's your focus today?
3. Anything blocking you?

Try the Async check-in demo (no signup).

Weekly sync

Use it when: a daily meeting is too often, and a weekly check-in on wins, priorities and help needed is enough.

1. What were your wins this week?
2. What are your top priorities next week?
3. Where do you need help or unblocking?

Example from a marketing lead: “The pricing page test finished and the new layout won. Next week my priority is the webinar launch. I need help from design on the landing page by Wednesday.”

Weekly sync
1. What were your wins this week?
2. What are your top priorities next week?
3. Where do you need help or unblocking?

Try the Weekly sync demo (no signup).

Daily Standown

Use it when: you’d rather close the day than open it. The Daily Standown is an end-of-day check-in, so tomorrow starts with blockers already known.

1. What did you finish today?
2. What carries over to tomorrow?
3. Any blockers for tomorrow?

Example from a site reliability engineer: “Finished moving the staging database to the new cluster. The alert clean-up carries over to tomorrow. Blocker for tomorrow: I need sign-off from security before I change the firewall rules.”

Daily Standown
1. What did you finish today?
2. What carries over to tomorrow?
3. Any blockers for tomorrow?

Try the Daily Standown demo (no signup).

Support team huddle

Use it when: you run a support team and the standup is about the queue, not a sprint.

1. How is the queue looking — anything unusual?
2. Which tickets need escalation or another pair of eyes?
3. Anything blocking you from resolving a ticket?

Example from a support agent: “Billing tickets doubled overnight, mostly about the new invoice email. Two enterprise tickets need someone from engineering to look at them. Blocked: I can’t reproduce the SSO error without a test tenant.”

Support team huddle
1. How is the queue looking? Anything unusual?
2. Which tickets need escalation or another pair of eyes?
3. Anything blocking you from resolving a ticket?

Try the Support team huddle demo (no signup).

Design crit check-in

Use it when: your designers need to share work in progress and line up the feedback they need.

1. What are you designing right now?
2. What feedback or review do you need today?
3. Anything blocking your design work?

Example from a product designer: “I’m on high-fidelity screens for the new checkout flow. I need a review of the error states from someone in engineering today. Blocked: I’m still waiting on final copy for the payment step.”

Design crit check-in
1. What are you designing right now?
2. What feedback or review do you need today?
3. Anything blocking your design work?

Try the Design crit check-in demo (no signup).

Goal-focused standup

Use it when: you run Scrum and want every update tied to the sprint goal.

1. What did you do to move the sprint goal forward?
2. What will you do today toward the goal?
3. What is blocking the goal?

Example from a QA engineer: “Tested the new sign-up flow end to end and logged two bugs against the goal. Today I’m retesting the fixes so the story can close. Blocking the goal: the test environment is two builds behind.”

Goal-focused standup
1. What did you do to move the sprint goal forward?
2. What will you do today toward the goal?
3. What is blocking the goal?

Try the Goal-focused standup demo (no signup).

What “good” looks like, with examples

A template only helps if people fill it in with signal. The difference:

• Strong: “Blocked: I need the staging DB credentials from Sam before I can test the import.” (A blocker, an owner, an action.)
• Strong: “Checkout is code-complete; starting on the failed-payment states today.” (Progress framed against the work, plus a heads-up.)
• Weak: “Worked on some tickets yesterday, more of the same today.” (Says nothing anyone can respond to.)

The test for any line is simple: would this change what a teammate does today? If not, it belongs in the ticket, not the standup.

Make it a habit, then vary it

Use one template unchanged long enough for it to become automatic (a fortnight is about right), which is easier when the prompts are saved in standup software rather than pasted in each morning. Then, if the daily rhythm starts to flatten, borrow a format from the standup ideas catalog rather than letting the template quietly bloat back to a status report. And whichever template you land on, it only works inside a facilitated meeting: see how to run an effective standup. The daily standup guide hub links the rest, from the agenda to the anti-patterns.

Frequently asked questions

What should a daily standup template include?

Three prompts at most: what’s changed since yesterday, what you’re focused on today, and what’s blocking you, with blockers first if you want the meeting to earn its time. A good template is short enough that filling it in takes a minute and pointed enough that it can’t be answered with a task diary. Anything longer trains people to write status reports.

What is a good Slack standup format?

One short post per person, blockers at the top, at a set time each morning. Keep it to three lines (focus, blockers, anything the team needs from you) and thread the follow-ups so the channel stays scannable. Most teams either post manually to a dedicated channel, use a standup bot to prompt everyone and collect the replies in one place, or post in TeamRetro and let its Slack integration send the reminder and the closing digest.

What should you say in a standup (with examples)?

Lead with anything that changes a teammate’s day. Good: “Blocked: I need the staging DB credentials from Sam before I can test the import.” Good: “Checkout is code-complete; starting on the failed-payment states today.” Weak: “Worked on some tickets, more of the same today.” The test is whether your update gives the team something to act on or respond to.

How do you run an async standup in Slack or Teams?

Pick a channel, set a daily deadline (say 10am local), and have everyone post the same short template: focus, blockers, needs. A bot can prompt people and roll the replies into one digest so nobody has to scroll. Reserve threads for the back-and-forth, and escalate any blocker that isn’t moving to a quick live call. See the async and remote standups chapter for the tradeoffs.