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Template gallery

n8n publishes a public gallery of community workflow templates at n8n.io/workflows, served by api.n8n.io. n8nctl lets you search that gallery, inspect a template's definition, and deploy one straight into an instance without leaving the terminal.

Two endpoints are in play, and the distinction matters:

  • The gallery (api.n8n.io) is a public, read-only catalog. search and get talk to it and need no API key, no profile, and no instance — they work before you have configured n8nctl at all.
  • The active instance (<host>/api/v1) is where deploy writes. It creates a workflow on the instance selected by your active profile (or --profile), using the key in your keyring, exactly like workflows create.

search: find a template

templates search <query> queries the gallery and returns matching templates with their id, name, and view count. Use the id with get or deploy.

# Search by keyword
n8nctl templates search slack

# Multi-word query, capped to the top results
n8nctl templates search "google sheets" --limit 5

ID     NAME                                                          TOTALVIEWS
12345  Notify Slack when a Google Sheets row is added                52
10174  Post daily standup reminders to Slack                         36
Flag Meaning
--limit <N> Maximum number of results (default 20)

-o json returns the full result objects for scripting.

get: print a template's definition

templates get <id> prints the template's workflow definition. It writes the definition to stdout, so pipe it to a file to save it, or to jq to inspect it.

# Inspect the definition
n8nctl templates get 1750 -o json

# Save it as a workflow file you can edit and lint
n8nctl templates get 1750 -o json > slack-bot.json

A saved definition is a plain workflow file: edit it, run workflows lint over it, or feed it through workflows apply like any other file in a workflows-as-code directory.

deploy: create the template on an instance

templates deploy <id> fetches the gallery template and creates it as a new workflow on the active instance. This is the one command in the group that writes, so it honors --dry-run and uses the active profile's stored key.

# Deploy into the active instance under the template's own name
n8nctl templates deploy 1750

# Give the new workflow a name of your own
n8nctl templates deploy 1750 --name "My Slack bot"

# Deploy into a specific instance and activate it on arrival
n8nctl --profile dev templates deploy 1750 --activate

# Preview the create call without sending it
n8nctl templates deploy 1750 --dry-run
Flag Meaning
--name <name> Name for the new workflow (default: the template's name)
--activate Activate the workflow after creating it
--dry-run (global) Print the equivalent create call and send no request

Credentials are not included

A gallery template carries node definitions, not secrets. deploy creates the workflow with its credential references but no credential values, so the new workflow cannot run until you open it and connect the credentials each node needs. Deploy first, then wire credentials, then activate.

Deploy into a dev instance first

Because deploy targets whichever profile is active, the safe pattern is to deploy into a throwaway or dev profile, inspect and adapt the workflow there, and only then promote it with workflows sync or workflows apply.

See also