Set Up Custom Invoice Templates in ConnectWise Manage

Better Invoice gives you a complete invoice template editor for ConnectWise Manage with 150+ settings. No Report Writer, no HTML, no SQL. This page walks through every section of the editor.

Choose a layout

Better Invoice ships with four invoice layouts. Each layout controls the overall structure, visual style, and available features.

• Standard — Clean, professional layout with separate product and service tables. The most flexible starting point.
• Modern Owl — Rounded design with subtle shadows and generous spacing. Inspired by the native ConnectWise invoice format.
• Kinetic — Bold typography with technical diagrams and dramatic visual hierarchy.
• Win95 — Nostalgic Windows 95 themed invoice inside a desktop window frame.

Select a layout to start, then customize everything from there. You can switch layouts at any time without losing your settings.

Apply a theme preset

Each layout includes one or more theme presets. A preset applies colors, fonts, table style, and sensible defaults in one click.

The Standard layout ships with five presets:

• Classic — Navy and blue palette, Inter font, clean table style.
• Modern — Indigo and purple palette, DM Sans font, striped table.
• Minimal — Gray palette, Inter font at 11px, clean table.
• Corporate — Dark slate and blue palette, Source Sans and Barlow Condensed fonts, bordered table.
• Signature — Forest green and warm tan on a cream background, Satoshi and Playfair Display fonts. Enables sub-item indentation and hides quantity and unit price when they equal one.

Presets are a starting point. Every value they set can be overridden individually.

Branding

Logo

Upload your company logo and control how it appears on the invoice.

• Show or hide the logo entirely.
• Position — left or right side of the header.
• Size — small, medium, or large.
• Vertical alignment — top, middle, or bottom within the header block.

Colors

Set your brand colors or choose from a preset palette.

The Standard layout includes nine palettes: Better, Navy, Forest, Burgundy, Slate, Ocean, Warm, Purple, and Rose. Select one to apply a coordinated set of colors, or set each value manually.

Configurable color channels:

• Primary — headers, accents, totals.
• Secondary — section labels, meta field labels.
• Background — page background color.

Additional color channels are available on some layouts. Modern Owl and Clearbridge add accent and field name color controls.

Fonts

Choose body and heading fonts independently.

Body font options on the Standard layout: Inter, DM Sans, Source Sans, Satoshi, JetBrains Mono, Libre Baskerville.

Heading font options: Inter, DM Sans, Satoshi, Barlow Condensed, Playfair Display.

Other layouts offer their own font sets. Kinetic includes Archivo Black, Big Shoulders Display, and Bungee for headings.

Typography

• Base font size — 10px to 15px.
• Line height — 1.0 to 2.0.

Invoice header

Control what appears at the top of every invoice.

Company information

Toggle each field independently:

• Company name
• Address (remit-to block)
• Phone number
• Business number / tax ID
• Ship-to address (when different from bill-to)

Invoice details

Toggle each meta field independently:

• Invoice number
• Invoice date
• Due date
• Payment terms
• PO number
• Account number
• Reference

Invoice title

Set the title text that appears on the invoice (default: INVOICE). When the invoice is a credit memo, a separate title can be shown automatically (default: CREDIT MEMO).

Date format

Choose from four formats: MM/DD/YYYY, DD/MM/YYYY, YYYY-MM-DD, or Month DD, YYYY.

Line items and products

Table style

Choose how data tables render across the entire invoice:

• Clean — subtle row lines.
• Striped — alternating row colors.
• Bordered — full cell borders.
• Bordered + Striped — borders with alternating colors.

Table spacing adjusts cell padding from 2px to 14px.

Product columns

Toggle optional columns:

• Item ID / SKU — show the ConnectWise product identifier.
• Serial number — show serial numbers on invoiced products.

Invoice groups

• Show group headers — display the invoice group name as a section heading.
• Indent sub-items — indent individual items within a group.
• Hide $0 invoice groups — hide groups where all line items total zero.

Smart display

• Hide quantity when 1 — clean up single-item rows.
• Hide unit price when quantity is 1 — remove redundant pricing.
• Hide $0 amounts — suppress zero-dollar line items.
• Hide columns with no data — auto-hide entire columns when no line items have values.

Six-decimal precision

Turn on six-decimal display for quantity and unit price columns when your billing requires sub-cent precision.

Services and time entries

The services summary table appears on the main invoice page with time grouped by work role, work type, and rate.

Column visibility

Toggle each column: member, work role, work type, hours, rate, amount.

Work type merging

Consolidate work types like Remote, Onsite, and Travel into a single summary line. Select which work types to merge from a list pulled from your ConnectWise instance. Hours and amounts are summed. Entries with different hourly rates or work roles remain separate.

Time entry detail

A dedicated detail page appended to the invoice with the full entry-by-entry breakdown. 13 independent toggles, each configurable per invoice type (standard, fixed fee, project, agreement). For the full toggle reference, see Time Entry Detail Settings Reference. For the thinking behind which toggles to use when, see How Much Time Detail Belongs on MSP Invoices?.

Expenses

Expense summary

Toggle columns on the main invoice page: type, member, amount.

Expense detail

A separate detail page with individual expense entries. Toggle: date, staff, notes, billable indicator, amount, subtotals. Each setting can be configured per invoice type.

Totals and currency

Currency

• Currency symbol ($) — show or hide.
• Currency code (USD) — show or hide.

Tax display

Show taxes as a single combined line or as separate lines per tax type.

Payment and balance rows

Toggle each row independently:

• Payment amount — optionally hide when zero.
• Balance due — optionally hide when it matches the total.
• Credits applied
• Downpayment applied

Auto-pay notice

Display an auto-pay message when the invoice’s payment terms match a trigger keyword. Default triggers: PAD and Auto. The message text is fully customizable.

Paid stamp

Overlay a stamp on paid invoices. Choose between diagonal watermark or banner style. Customize the text, color, and opacity. The stamp appears automatically when the invoice balance reaches zero.

Page settings

Paper

• Page size — Letter (8.5 x 11”), A4 (210 x 297mm), or Auto-Fit (adjusts height to content).
• Margins — Narrow, Normal, or Wide.

Page header

A repeating header on continuation pages (page 2 and beyond). Toggle: company name, invoice number, page numbers.

Page footer

Custom footer text at the bottom of every page (default: “Thank you for your business!”). Optionally include page numbers.

Billing footer

Show or hide the footer content configured in ConnectWise Manage under Setup Tables > Billing.

Comments

• Top comment — show or hide the header comment from the ConnectWise invoice.
• Bottom comment — show or hide the footer comment.

Markdown

Convert markdown formatting in comments, time entry notes, and product descriptions to styled HTML on the invoice. Controls:

• Apply to — comments, time entry notes, product descriptions (each toggleable).
• Cleanup markdown — normalize raw formatting before rendering.
• Display images — render inline images from markdown.
• Clickable links — convert URLs to hyperlinks.
• Icons — render Phosphor icons using :ph-icon-name: syntax. Choose icon style: thin, light, regular, bold, fill, or duotone.

For a full reference, see Using Markdown in Your Invoice Templates.

Labels

Every column header, section heading, and field label on the invoice is editable. Blank fields fall back to the default. Labels are grouped by section:

• Header and meta — title, bill to, business number, invoice number, dates, terms, PO, reference, account.
• Products — section heading, description, quantity, price, amount, item ID, serial number, subtotal.
• Services — section heading, member, work role, work type, hours, rate, amount, ticket, subtotal.
• Time detail — section heading, description, subtotal, billable column header and values.
• Expenses — type, member, amount.
• Totals — subtotal, tax, total, credit memo, remaining balance, payment, balance due, credits, downpayment.
• Project — project name, company, contact, amount, billing method, downpayment.

Data sources

Pull additional data into your invoice templates from ConnectWise and external APIs.

ConnectWise data

• Company details — name, address, phone, website, and custom fields for the billed company.
• Company finance — payment terms, tax code, and billing settings.

Custom endpoints

Add external API endpoints that return JSON data. Use token variables in the URL to pass invoice and company context:

• {{ company.id }}, {{ company.identifier }}
• {{ invoice.id }}, {{ invoice.number }}

For a full reference, see Configure a Data Source.

Project invoices

Project invoices display additional header fields. Toggle each independently:

• Project name
• Company name
• Contact name
• Amount
• Billing method
• Original downpayment

Getting started

To connect Better Invoice to your ConnectWise Manage instance, see Connect Better Invoice to ConnectWise PSA.

To add your Better Invoice template URL in ConnectWise Manage, see Add a Custom Invoice Template in ConnectWise Manage.