Agile Retrospective Templates are one of the core elements for the quick preparation of first-class retrospectives. Thats why I am happy to present you 22 cool Agile Retrospective Templates. Some of them you will have seen before, but many will be new. But before we start with the templates, here is some important information to make your next retrospective a success.

What makes a retrospective successful?

Before we dive into the templates for agile retrospectives, let’s take a quick look at what makes a retrospective successful.

As always, there is no such thing as the ideal retrospective, although there are clues as to what makes one retrospective more successful than others. As a company that helps thousands of teams run better retrospectives, we’ve now gained insight into well over 30,000 retrospectives and have been able to identify commonalities in retrospectives that have been identified as particularly successful.

The most influential factors are:

1. The most successful day of the week for a retrospective is Friday, although most retrospectives are held on Wednesday.
2. The ideal duration for a retrospective is between 30 and 60 minutes. Short retrospectives tend to be more satisfying.
3. Smaller teams hold better retrospectives. - Make sure that the number of participants in a retrospective remains manageable.
4. 7-14 days is the perfect frequency for retrospectives.

If you want to get a deeper insight into the best practices of the 30,000 retrospectives, feel free to read our article on the subject: Analysis of 30k retrospectives

If you’re interested in improving your retrospectives, here are some more resources on that:

• An entry guide for retrospectives.
• How to define valuable “actions”.
• Our full retrospective agenda.
• “Psychological Safety” for agile teams.
• The best retro check-ins for any situation.

And now let’s start with the Agile Retrospective Templates…

9 Agile Retrospective Templates Classic

Let’s start with the “best” templates for agile retrospectives - or at least the 9 most common ones, before we focus on the “Echometer Originals.”

If you want to get started with one of these retrospectives right away, just click the button next to it to open Echometer and try our agile retrospective templates for free.

The “What Went Well” retrospective is probably the most popular or best known of all the templates for retrospectives. It’s based on the pattern we find in many other retrospectives, but simply without all the frills:

The “Mad Sad Glad” retrospective method has a similar pattern, but uses three typical emotions to make it a bit more interesting and tangible for the team:

The Scrum Retrospective Start Stop Keep is also known as the Start Stop Continue Retrospective. I highly recommend making it a “Keep Stop Start” Retro (pay attention to the order). This is how you start the retro with something positive that has proven to be a good start:

The “Liked, Learned, Lacked, Longed for” retrospective is called 4l retrospective. I think the reason for this is clear:

Sailboat Retro is the first image-painting retro in this list of Agile Retrospective Templates. So get ready and weigh anchor:

The DAKI Retrospective, standing for the English words “Drop Add Keep Improve”, is a simple acronym that is also classically used as a retrospective method. (More information about the DAKI Retrospective: 2 tips for the DAKI retrospective incl. examples )

“The Three Little Pigs” retrospective is based on the fairy tale of the same name, in which 3 pigs build three houses from completely different materials. Of course, the three houses are built with different robustness. The question is - what material are the results in your team built from?

The Starfish Sprint Retrospective is particularly visually interesting: 5 questions are asked, which can be optimally divided into the columns of a starfish. The Sprint Retrospective “Starfish” tends to take a little longer with 5 questions.

This Agile Retrospective Template basically has a very similar structure to the “What Went Well Retro”. Only a fourth question has been added here, which makes the small but subtle difference:

Echometer Originals

Agile Retrospective Templates Your Team Hasn’t Seen…

Now you know perhaps the best or at least the most common retrospective methods. But since agile teams usually like to use a new method regularly (or at least their Scrum Masters or Agile Coaches 😉), here you will find newly developed Agile Retrospective Templates. Quasi “Echometer Originals”.

And because I happen to be a nerd, we also start with the nerdiest retrospectives first:

With the modern internet, memes were born. Meme faces are a big part of meme culture. In this retrospective, we’ve taken a fun approach to looking back at the last Sprint:

Mario Kart is as unpredictable as today’s work. You never know when a banana peel will be thrown, but you can mentally prepare for it. This time it goes as both a “futurespective” and a retrospective:

The work often feels like a game: With each level (sprint), things get more difficult. But the game character (our team) also develops its strengths to master the challenges:

Tetris is a challenging arcade game with the goal of puzzling under pressure, so to speak. Sounds similar to work? It kind of is. The corresponding Retrospective Template:

Echometer Originals

Work-Life Balance Retrospectives Samples

Not everyone is a nerd and keeps themselves alive with computer games. That’s why here are more retrospectives. Work-life balance guaranteed:

Who doesn’t like sitting around a campfire and letting their mind wander?
The only problem is that it’s best not to start a fire in your office. But that’s exactly why we created the Campfire Retrospective:

Sometimes work is like theater. There is so much drama! People play a role instead of being themselves. Let’s look at our work from the perspective of theater:

Escape Rooms have just the right balance of “pressure” and “fun,” like a good retrospective. If the team feels like it’s stuck somehow, it’s worth trying to break out of its own situation. Like with the escape game.

Agile Retrospective Template 17

17. Not In The Flow? The Surfer Retro 🏄🏽‍♀️ 🌊

Sun, salty water, waiting for the next wave. Surfing can be a lot of fun and look pretty relaxed. How did your team catch the last wave? Are you guys ready for the next wave yet? Let’s test it with this retrospective template:

Michelangelo was a great artist, known for his artistic paintings. You as a team are basically painting a painting as well. How can you ensure that it will be a masterpiece?

Echometer Originals

A Retrospective For Every Season!

When the weather changes, our mood often changes as well. That’s why there is now a suitable retrospective for every season:

A new season is dawning and definitely one of the better ones. The days are getting longer and you can slowly leave your jacket at home. In the best case, your team will flourish like the plants in front of the windows. - Find out with these retro questions:

At its best, a sprint feels like what you imagine summer to be like. There’s a positive vibe, the trees are blooming magnificently, everything is working smoothly. Nevertheless, there are some things that can make us sweat:

After summer inevitably comes autumn. A time of change, but also of new beginnings and gratitude. It’s best to make sure you’re prepared for all eventualities early on.

Winter can be a long, hard and cold time. Or it can be a time of coziness and winter sports. Thus, it offers a lot of potential for creative questions that help you reflect on your agile sprint.

Echometer Originals

How is your team doing?
Find out with Health-Check Retros!

One of the most important indicators of good performance in a team is team satisfaction. This is precisely why it makes sense to regularly check well-being in addition to project progress:

The Spotify Health Check (based on the Spotify model) is one of the classics when it comes to frameworks to scale agile. The nice thing about it: The Spotify Health Check Retrospective can be carried out in tribes (several teams) as well as in individual teams.

Note: This retrospective format asks for agreement with the given Health Check items on a scale.

• Speed: We get stuff done really quickly. No waiting, no delays.
• Tech Quality: We’re proud of the quality of our code! It is clean, easy to read, and has great test coverage.
• Learning: We’re learning lots of interesting stuff all the time!
• Mission: We know exactly why we are here, and we are really excited about it.
• Other items (customizable)

The agile values and principles belong to the basics of a Scrum course. Only when you live up to them, you can reach higher agile maturity levels achieve. This health check helps you to reflect on the 5 agile Scrum values from a different perspective with your team and make them measurable - see below for an insight.

Note: This retrospective format asks for agreement with the given Health Check items on a scale.

• Courage: We value people showing courage.
• Respect: We value each other’s ideas, even when disagreeing.
• Commitment: Every team member is committed to follow through on what they have promised.
• Focus: We don’t allow ourselves to be distracted from reaching the sprint goal.
• Openness: We are open to constructive feedback and grow from it.

Echometer Originals

Something different for a change?
Crazy Retro Templates!

Not everything has to be taken seriously:

What would you do in the event of an alien invasion? Probably it will never happen, but it is almost certain that other unforeseen things will happen. With this you can prepare your team top.

Clear the ring for the most varied retro, which also takes place in a tent:

Agile Retrospective Templates: Conclusion

We hope you’ll try some of the retrospective templates mentioned for agile teams. I guess it always depends on the agile maturity level and retro fatigue which methods are most suitable. 

Retrospective Templates: Some Final Notes

If you still have retrospective examples or ideas for an agile retrospective template or would like to give us feedback… just write to us.

And if you’re looking for a free online retro board software for retrospectives, you may have seen that Echometer is just that. Have fun trying out the different retro templates in our tool 😄