Free template
Character profile template for novelists
The questions that turn a name into a person: what they want, what they fear, how they speak and how they change. Free to copy.
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Character profile template
Fill in what you know and leave the rest blank. A profile is a working document, and it grows as you draft.
The basics
- Full name, and what other characters call them
- Age, and the year they were born
- Role in the story: protagonist, antagonist, love interest, mentor or other
- Occupation, and how they feel about it
- Where they live, and who with
- In one line: who they are when the story opens
Appearance and voice
- Three physical details a reader would notice first
- How they dress, and what it says about them
- How they speak: vocabulary, rhythm, phrases they repeat
- A habit, a gesture or a tell
Inner life
- Want: the goal they would say out loud
- Need: what they must learn or face, often without knowing it
- Their greatest fear
- Wound: what happened before the story that still shapes them
- The lie they believe about themselves or the world
- A secret they keep, and who they keep it from
Strengths and flaws
- Strengths that help them
- Flaws that cause trouble for them or for others
- A contradiction that makes them surprising
Relationships
- Family, and where they stand with each member
- Friends, allies and rivals
- Who they love, and who they cannot forgive
Arc
- Who they are at the start
- The moment that forces them to change
- Their lowest point
- Who they are at the end, and what it cost them
Continuity notes
- Details to keep consistent: eye color, scars, birthdays, the names of pets and places
- Chapters where they appear
How to use this character profile template
Start with the inner life: want, need, fear and wound. Those four answers drive most of what a character does on the page, and the rest of the profile follows from them.
Fill in only what you know. Blank fields are fine: they are questions to answer while you draft. Make a full profile for your main characters and a short one, the basics and the want, for everyone else.
Want, need and wound
The want is what the character is chasing: the job, the person, the escape. The need is what they actually have to learn or face, and it is often the opposite of what they think they want.
The wound is the event in their past that explains the gap between the two. Once you know all three, the conflict follows: each scene pushes the character toward the want and away from the need, until something forces a choice.
Give each character a voice
Readers should be able to tell who is speaking without a dialogue tag. Note each character's vocabulary, sentence length, the subjects they avoid and the phrases they lean on.
Read a page of dialogue aloud with the names covered. If two characters sound the same, change how one of them talks, not just what they say.
A filled-in example
Here is part of a profile for Nell Garrow, the heroine of the invented mystery in our query letter example.
- Name: Eleanor Garrow, called Nell by everyone except her father.
- Want: to settle her father's debts and leave the island on the last ferry before winter.
- Need: to stop running from the place, and the people, she left at eighteen.
- Wound: her mother drowned when Nell was twelve, and her father never spoke of it.
- Flaw: she decides people are lying before they have finished talking.
- Arc: from leaving at the first chance to staying when it matters.
Character profile mistakes to avoid
- Answering a hundred questions before you write a word. Profile enough to start, and let the draft teach you the rest.
- Describing appearance in detail and leaving the inner life blank.
- Giving every character the same fear, or the same voice.
- Treating the profile as fixed. When the draft changes a character, update the profile.
Keep every character consistent across the book
A profile starts to drift the moment you draft: eyes change color, a sister becomes a cousin, a birthday moves. In StoryWith AI, the story bible builds a page for every character from your manuscript, and the continuity scan flags a detail that contradicts an earlier chapter.
The character map shows who is connected to whom, so you can spot a relationship that no longer matches between chapter three and chapter twelve.
How a story bible keeps characters consistentRun it on the whole manuscript
These tools read a sample. StoryWith AI reads the whole book: structure, pacing, continuity, and a readiness score with every issue linked to its passage. Start free, then upgrade when you're ready to analyze the whole book.
More free tools
- Manuscript Readiness ScorePaste your opening chapters for a score out of 100 and the issues most likely to stop an agent.
- Story RaterRate a chapter or short story on hook, pacing, clarity, dialogue and character, with your top three fixes.
- Query Letter GraderInstant checks on length, word count, genre, comps and greeting, plus an AI review with line-level fixes.
- Query Letter GeneratorAnswer six questions about your novel and get a first-draft query letter in agent format.
- Editing Cost CalculatorEstimate developmental, line, copyediting and proofreading costs from published EFA rates.
- Novel Word Count CheckerCheck your word count against what agents expect for your genre, from fantasy and romance to YA and memoir.
- Beat Sheet CalculatorSee where each beat of Save the Cat! or three-act structure falls in your novel, by word and by chapter.
- Query Letter TemplateA fill-in-the-blanks query letter in the format agents expect, with an annotated example and word counts for each paragraph.
- Book Synopsis TemplateA one-page synopsis in five parts, with a word budget for each and a full example that gives away the ending.
- Book Proposal TemplateThe eight sections of a nonfiction book proposal, with what to put in each and how agents read it.
- Story Bible TemplateOne document for every character, place, rule and date in your book, with notes for a series.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What is a character profile?
A working document about one character: who they are, what they want and fear, how they look and speak, who they know and how they change over the story.
What should a character profile include?
At minimum: name, role, the want, the need, the wound and the arc. Appearance, voice, relationships and continuity notes help as the book grows.
How detailed should a character profile be?
Detailed for the main characters and short for everyone else. A profile that takes longer to write than the chapters is a way of putting off the draft.
What is the difference between a character profile and a story bible?
A profile covers one character. A story bible collects every character, place and fact in the book, so they stay consistent from the first chapter to the last.
Should I fill it in before or after the first draft?
Either. Planners fill in the basics and the inner life first. Discovery writers fill it in during or after the draft, to keep details straight in revision.
Does it work for memoir?
Yes. Use it for the real people in your story, especially their relationships and the continuity notes, so dates and details stay straight.
Is the template free?
Yes. Copy it and use it for as many characters as you like. No signup.