Starter packs are pre-built collections of symbol templates and line items organized by construction trade. Each pack gives you a ready-made set of measurement types and associated cost items so you can begin takeoffs without building everything from scratch.

Starter packs cover nine trades: Drywall, Electrical, FFE, General contracting, Glazing, Landscaping, Mechanical, Painting, and Plumbing. Each trade contains multiple collections grouped by work category, and each collection contains templates with measurement types (count, linear, or area) and associated line items.

Open the Templates panel in the takeoff sidebar. Your own template collections appear at the top. Below them, expand the Community section to see a list of available starter packs sorted by trade name. Click any trade to drill into its collections.

Each collection row shows a color dot, the collection name, and an Installed badge if you have already added it. Click a collection to preview its contents before installing.

A collection preview displays all of its templates. Each template has a name, a measurement type icon (count, linear, or area), and a list of line items beneath it. Line items show their name, category (Material, Labor, Equipment, Subcontract, or Other), and unit of measure when applicable. This lets you evaluate exactly what you are adding before committing.

From the collection preview, click Install to add that collection to your project. Exayard creates a new template collection with the corresponding symbols, groups, and line items. After installation the sidebar navigates to the newly created collection so you can start using it immediately.

You can also install an entire trade at once. Open a starter pack from the grid view in the drawer and click Install all to add every collection in the pack. Collections you have already installed are skipped automatically.

Once a collection is installed, it appears in your template list alongside any collections you created manually. In the community section, installed collections display an Installed badge so you can tell at a glance which packs are already in your project. In the full-screen drawer view, the Install all button changes to Added when every collection in a trade has been installed.

Installed templates work identically to ones you create yourself. Select a template from your collection to start drawing measurements on the canvas. The associated line items carry over, giving you pre-configured cost tracking tied to each measurement type. You can rename, reorder, or delete installed templates just like any other.

Beyond starter packs, you can build custom template collections for your organization's specific workflows. Open the + menu in the takeoff sidebar and select New template pack. Give the collection a name and color, then add templates with measurement types and line items tailored to your estimating needs. Custom collections appear alongside installed starter packs in the Templates panel.

Template collections are project-level by default. Each project gets its own copy of installed templates, so changes in one project do not affect others.