Template
World building template
Rules, places, power, culture, and history — scoped to what your book actually has to stay consistent with. Copy it into Notion, Google Docs, Scrivener, or a text file. No signup, no email, nothing to download.
The template
The one-paragraph world
Write this first and keep it short. If a later section contradicts it, one of them is wrong.
- What is true here that is not true where the reader lives
- When and where the story sits inside this world
- Who holds power, in one sentence
- What the story could not happen without
Rules
Magic, technology, or the one impossible thing. Rules are only interesting where they cost something.
- The rule, in one sentence
- Where it is established in the text
- What it costs to use
- What it cannot do — the limit is the story, not the power
- Who can use it, and how they learned
- Known exceptions, and who knows about them
Places
A place earns an entry the moment two scenes happen there.
- Name, and what kind of place it is
- What it looks, sounds, and smells like as described in the text
- Who lives or works there
- How long it takes to reach the next place that matters
- What it is known for by people who have never been
- Chapters it appears in
Power and money
Who decides, who enforces, and who eats. Most political questions in a draft are really one of these three.
- Who rules, and by what claim
- Who enforces it, and how visible they are
- What the currency is, and what a day's work buys
- What is scarce
- What is illegal, and how seriously that is taken
- How an ordinary person's life differs from the protagonist's
Culture and daily life
The details that make a world feel inhabited. Record them when they reach the page, not before.
- What people eat, and what counts as a feast
- What they believe, and how much of it they practise
- How they greet, marry, and bury
- What is rude here that is not rude elsewhere
- What children are taught
- Names: the pattern behind them, so the next one you invent fits
History
Only the past that presses on the present. A timeline nobody in the book remembers is a hobby.
- The event everyone still refers to
- How long ago, in a unit the characters would use
- Who tells it which way, and what each version is for
- What it changed that is still true
Consistency watchlist
The things you will contradict. Write each one down the first time you decide it.
- Distances and travel times you have already stated
- Dates, seasons, and how long journeys took
- Who knows about the rules, and since when
- Spellings of invented names and places
The failure mode nobody warns you about
Worldbuilding documents do not fail by being incomplete. They fail by growing — into a second project, with its own maps, languages, and four-thousand-year timelines, none of which the novel needs and all of which feel like work.
Two rules keep it useful:
- Nothing enters until it reaches the page. Invent freely while drafting; record only what you actually wrote. A document of intentions goes stale the first time you change your mind.
- Every rule needs a limit and a cost. A power with neither is not worldbuilding, it is a solution waiting to flatten your third act.
Common questions
How much worldbuilding do I need before writing?
The one-paragraph section and the rules. Everything else is better filled in from the draft, because worldbuilding invented in advance tends to be the part you never use.
What is the difference between a worldbuilding bible and a story bible?
A story bible records what is true in your book — characters, timeline, threads. A worldbuilding document records what is true in the world whether or not the book mentions it. Keep them separate and the story bible stays usable.
How do I stop worldbuilding and start writing?
Set the rule that nothing enters the document until it has reached the page. Worldbuilding is the most enjoyable way to avoid drafting, and it produces something that looks exactly like progress.
How do I keep a big world consistent across a long book?
Cite the chapter beside every fact, and keep the watchlist section above. Nearly all worldbuilding errors are distances, dates, or who-knew-what — not grand contradictions of the magic system.