Notion's Timeline View (and 3 Other New Features!)

Notion’s latest release adds a database Timeline view—aimed at building Gantt-style schedules—but the feature arrives with plan-based limits that force power users to rethink how they structure projects. On the free plan, only three timeline views are allowed; team plans get five; enterprise users get unlimited. That restriction matters because templates like “Ultimate Tasks” can spawn many project instances, and each instance would otherwise consume a timeline slot. A workaround is to keep a single timeline view and switch which project it shows via filters, effectively trading multiple timelines for one configurable view.

The Timeline view itself stretches items across timeframes by mapping a database property to a visible schedule window. By default, items are “timelined” using a single date property (such as Due date), which creates a subtle mismatch: Notion filters based on the underlying date value, but the timeline display uses the computed start/end range. In the example given, a task due “today” appears on the timeline with an end date later than today, even though filtering still treats it as due today. To avoid that discrepancy, the recommended setup is to timeline using separate Start and End date properties—setting Start to one property (like “start”) and End to another (like “due”). With that approach, the timeline reflects the intended schedule, and sorting (for example, by start date) can enforce the real execution order.

Timeline views also support independent property display: the table and the timeline can show different fields. That enables a cleaner schedule view—such as showing a Done checkbox on the timeline without cluttering the table. But there’s a tradeoff: hiding the table can hide any items that don’t have the required start/end fields, so databases with mixed date structures may need compromises.

Beyond timelines, three quieter features land that directly improve day-to-day usability. First, Notion now allows customizing which properties appear on individual pages and database pages. For database-backed pages, the customization applies across all pages in that database, letting users hide properties that are empty or hide large property sets by default—so key sections like scripts and checklists become immediately visible.

Second, sharing permissions become more granular for sub-pages. Instead of sub-pages inheriting parent-page access settings, each sub-page can now have its own sharing rules. That unlocks more precise permission “trees,” such as giving a sponsor list view-only access to most employees while granting full access to specific people, or limiting edit rights on dashboards to only the dashboard owner and a manager.

Third, inline database views can now limit how many rows load on first display. A database can show only 10 (or another chosen number) initially, with a “load more” control to fetch additional rows later—helpful for dashboards and mobile layouts where loading hundreds of items would push important content far below the fold.

Taken together, the release targets both planning (Timeline view) and information management (property customization, sub-page sharing, and row-loading limits), with the biggest caveat being timeline view quotas that require thoughtful workspace design.