Edit a template with the AI assistant
The AI Assistant pane is the fastest way to change a template without writing any markup. You describe what you want in ordinary English and it rewrites the template for you, showing exactly what it changed before you decide whether to keep it.
Before you begin
- You need the PDF templates permission to use the assistant.
- Your account needs an AI provider key — see When the assistant isn't available.
- The assistant is the default left-hand pane in the template editor. Switch to Code Editor at any time; your conversation stays where it is.
Ask for a change
- Open the template you want to change.
- Type what you want in the message box — for example "make the items table full width", "add a notes section under the totals", or "put our logo in the top-right corner".
- Press Enter to send. Use Shift+Enter for a new line in a longer instruction.
On an empty conversation you get one-tap starter prompts chosen for the document type you have open — a packing slip suggests a barcode or a packed by line, a purchase order suggests vendor and signature blocks, a pick list suggests larger bin codes and a picker signature.
The assistant knows which document type you're editing and is given that type's exact list of available fields, so it only uses placeholders that really exist — it won't invent a shipping address on a credit note or a custom field on a packing slip. It also knows what styling survives the trip to PDF and keeps to layouts that print reliably.
A model picker sits under the input if you want a different one.
Review, undo or retry
Every reply comes back as a Proposed changes card with two tabs:
- Summary — what it did, in plain English. If it couldn't do part of what you asked, that's called out here.
- Diff — the before and after, side by side, so you can see exactly what moved.
The change is already applied to the editor, so the preview updates straight away and you can judge the result rather than the description. Nothing reaches a printed document until you click Save.
| Button | What it does |
|---|---|
| Undo | Puts the template back exactly as it was before that message. |
| Retry | Re-runs the same request from the original starting point — usually the quickest route to a different result. |
Once you send another message, the earlier card changes to Applied · superseded by a later edit and loses its Undo button. To go further back, save first and use History, or undo before asking for the next change.
Saved AI edits appear in History with an AI tag, so you can always restore a version from before the conversation started. See Find, save & restore templates.
Give the assistant an image to work from
Attach up to three images to a message, or drag them onto the conversation — a Drop an image panel appears when you do.
Use an image two ways:
- To place it in the template — a footer banner, a logo, a watermark. Say so: "use this as the footer banner".
- As a style reference — "match the heading style in this screenshot". The picture guides the design without being printed.
Every image you drop is also saved into Assets, including one you attached purely as inspiration. If you don't want it there, delete it from the Assets tab afterwards — see Add logos, images & footer banners.
Anything over 5 MB, or that isn't an image, is skipped with a message telling you why.
When the assistant isn't available
The assistant needs an AI provider key on your account. Without one the pane shows a Setup required chip and reads AI assistant isn't configured — Add an AI provider key in Settings → AI Assistant to start describing changes, with a button that takes you there.
The template assistant can also be switched off for the whole account, in which case it says so.
Either way, the Code Editor and every other part of the builder work normally — see Edit a template.
The assistant shares the provider key and model choice with the rest of SKU.io's AI features, so changing the model here changes it everywhere.
Limits and error messages
| What you'll see | Why, and what to do |
|---|---|
| A wait-and-retry message | There's an hourly cap on AI edits per person. The message tells you how long to wait. |
| The instruction is too long | Keep a single instruction under 5,000 characters. Split a long brief into several messages. |
| The template is too large to send | A very large template can't be processed. Trim it, or make the change in the Code Editor. |
| Only three images per message | Send the rest in a follow-up message. |
| Out of credits · rate-limited · key rejected · service unreachable · timed out | These come from the AI provider. Most are fixed by adding credits or checking the key in Settings → AI Assistant. |
| The change was invalid | The assistant produced something that wouldn't save. It corrects itself once automatically; if the second attempt also fails, nothing is applied. |
In every one of these cases your template is left untouched. Nothing is half-applied.
Next steps
- Preview a template — check the result against a real order.
- Edit a template — make the same change by hand.
- Common customizations by document type — what people usually ask for.