topic Re: Office Library & Template Management - When to Embed vs Link in Libraries & objects

Office Library & Template Management - When to Embed vs Link

srdavids — Wed, 23 Sep 2026 15:14:21 GMT

Hi All,

When creating an office template - How do you decide when to put something in the embedded library vs a linked library?

Are there ever any instances where you'd put something, like textures, in the template's embedded library or is it best to just put everything in a linked office standard library?

Thanks!

Re: Office Library & Template Management - When to Embed vs Link

JeffH — Thu, 24 Sep 2026 12:38:24 GMT

The template should have nothing or minimal embeded library clutter.

It is best practice to have all of that baseline information in your office library that is Loaded / linked into the template file.

Re: Office Library & Template Management - When to Embed vs Link

Barry Kelly — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 00:38:50 GMT

Embedded libraries are only good for that particular job (file) and don't get updated unless you manually do this.

Keep everything in an office library that you can keep up to date.

So long as your file links to the updated library, you will have no issues.

Barry.

Re: Office Library & Template Management - When to Embed vs Link

Laszlo Nagy — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 00:44:29 GMT

Also, consider that an office library is a library used by most or all projects. So, its contents should not be embedded into any individual project file. It should be located in a storage device (or in BIMcloud) from where it can be easily linked into all project files.