NDIS Support Plan Template - Free Download and Guide

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NDIS support plan template

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An NDIS support plan template gives you a ready structure for goals, supports, budgets, health information and review dates, so nobody starts from a blank page. Download the free template below, then use the rest of this guide to fill in each section properly.

A support plan is not the NDIS plan. The NDIS plan is the funding document the NDIA approves. The support plan is the working document that turns that funding into supports someone actually receives.

NDIS Support Plan Template: Key Points

• A support plan records goals, funded and informal supports, strategies, health and safety information, and review dates in one place.
• Plans are written with the participant, not for them. The Practice Standards expect each participant to be actively involved in developing their own support plan.
• Supports should map to the participant’s NDIS plan budget across core, capacity building and capital supports.
• Review at least annually, or earlier when goals, circumstances or supports change.
• The plan must be readable by the person it is about, in the language and format they are most likely to understand.

Download the NDIS Support Plan Template

Download the NDIS support plan template (DOCX)

The template includes:

• A participant information section
• An about me section for communication, preferences and routines
• A goal setting framework with strategies, supports and success measures
• Supports mapped to core, capacity building and capital budgets
• Provider and emergency contact details
• Health, safety and risk sections
• Review and progress tracking

How to use it:

1. Read the participant’s NDIS plan first, so goals and budgets match what is funded.
2. Fill it in with the participant, in their words. Use first person throughout.
3. Delete sections that do not apply. A shorter plan people read beats a long one nobody opens.
4. Set the review date before you finish, not afterwards.
5. Give the participant their copy in a format they can use, and share it only with their consent.

Related templates worth having beside it: the NDIS goals and plan review worksheet, the NDIS progress notes template for recording what happens between reviews, and the NDIS service agreement template for the separate contract with each provider.

What Is an NDIS Support Plan?

An NDIS support plan (also called “My Support Plan” or “My Plan”) is a working document that translates a participant’s NDIS plan into goals and support strategies. The NDIS plan is the official funding document created by the NDIA. The support plan is the practical tool that guides day to day service delivery.

A support plan does several jobs at once:

• Personalisation: makes the funding document mean something to the person it belongs to
• Goal clarity: breaks aspirations into steps that can be worked on
• Budget management: tracks how funding is used across categories
• Communication: gives everyone involved the same understanding of goals and needs
• Progress tracking: gives a structure for reviewing what is working

NDIS Support Plan vs NDIS Plan

These two documents are constantly confused.

The support plan puts the NDIS plan to work. It takes approved funding and turns it into goals and strategies that a worker can follow on a Tuesday morning.

Who Writes an NDIS Support Plan?

Participant-led planning

• The participant drives the process
• Family members or supporters contribute when asked
• A support coordinator or plan manager helps if needed
• Provider services follow the participant’s plan

Support coordinator assisted

• The coordinator leads the planning conversations
• The participant sets goals, preferences and priorities
• The coordinator turns those into a structured plan
• The participant reviews and approves the final version

Provider developed

• The provider writes a plan specific to their own service
• It has to fit the wider NDIS plan and goals
• The participant reviews it and gives input
• It forms one part of the broader planning picture

What to Put in Each Section of the Template

1. Participant information

• Full name: legal name and preferred name
• NDIS number
• Plan dates: current NDIS plan start and end dates
• Plan management: NDIA managed, plan managed or self managed
• Contact details: phone, email, address
• Emergency contacts: names and contact details
• Support network: family, advocates, circle of support

2. About me

This is the section workers actually read before a first shift.

My story

• Background and life experiences
• What is important to me
• What makes a good day
• My strengths
• Things I need support with

Communication

• How I prefer to communicate
• Languages I speak
• Communication aids I use
• How to understand me best
• When I need extra time

My preferences

• Activities I enjoy
• Places I like to go
• People I like to spend time with
• Things that make me uncomfortable
• My daily routines

3. Goals

The centre of the plan, and where most templates get filled in badly.

Goal structure

Write each goal so it is specific, measurable, achievable, relevant to the person, and time bound.

Goal areas

• Daily living skills
• Relationships and social connections
• Home and living arrangements
• Health and wellbeing
• Learning and education
• Work and meaningful activity
• Community participation
• Rights and advocacy

For each goal, record:

• What I want to achieve
• Why it matters to me
• How I will achieve it (strategies and supports)
• Who will help me
• When I want to achieve it
• How I will know I have succeeded

Worked example:

• Goal: I want to catch public transport on my own to visit my friends
• Why: it gives me freedom and I will not have to rely on other people
• How: practise routes with a support worker, learn the journey planner app, start with familiar routes
• Who: travel trainer, support worker, a friend who can practise with me
• When: within 6 months
• Success: I catch the bus to my friend’s house twice a week without support

Our guide on writing NDIS goals that get funded covers the wording that survives a plan reassessment, and NDIS goals examples has more worked goals by life area.

4. Budget breakdown

Core supports

• Assistance with daily life: personal care, household tasks
• Transport: getting to activities and appointments
• Consumables: everyday items such as continence aids
• Assistance with social and community participation

Capacity building

• Support coordination
• Improved living arrangements
• Increased social and community participation
• Finding and keeping a job
• Improved relationships
• Improved health and wellbeing
• Improved learning
• Improved life choices
• Improved daily living

Capital supports

• Assistive technology
• Home modifications
• Specialist disability accommodation

For each category, note the funding available, how it will be used, which providers will deliver the support, and how often. The NDIS budget planner does the arithmetic if you want the numbers checked as you go.

5. Current supports and providers

Informal supports: family, friends, community connections, volunteers. Funded supports: NDIS funded providers and services, frequency, contact details. Mainstream services: GP, specialists, allied health outside the NDIS, community and government services.

6. Strategies that work

What helps me

• Environment (quiet spaces, good lighting)
• Communication strategies (visual aids, extra time)
• Support approaches (step by step instructions, demonstrations)
• Motivators

What does not help

• Things to avoid
• Triggers and stressors
• Approaches that have not worked

When I am having a difficult time

• Early warning signs
• Helpful responses
• Who to contact
• What calms or helps me

7. Health and safety

Medical: diagnoses and how they affect me, medication requirements, allergies and adverse reactions. Risk management: identified risks, strategies to reduce them, emergency procedures. Health professionals: GP, specialists, allied health, hospitals or clinics used.

The Practice Standards expect risk assessments to be undertaken with the participant and documented in the support plan, including how much the person relies on the service for daily living needs and what would happen to their health and safety if that service were disrupted. That second question is the one most plans skip.

8. Rights and safeguards

My rights: choice and control, privacy and confidentiality, safe and respectful treatment, how to complain. Decision making: whether I have a guardian or appointed decision maker, where I make my own decisions, how I want to be supported to choose.

9. Review

• Review date: when the plan will be formally reviewed, at least annually
• Progress check-ins: how often informal reviews happen
• Triggers for an earlier review: what would prompt one
• Who is involved: participant, family, coordinator, providers

How to Write an NDIS Support Plan: Step by Step

Step 1: Prepare

• Read the participant’s NDIS plan
• Understand the budget and what is funded
• Gather information about current supports
• Book enough time for a real conversation
• Choose a comfortable, private setting
• Ask who the participant wants present

Step 2: Start with strengths and aspirations

• Ask about strengths, interests and what is going well
• Explore hopes for the next year and beyond
• Talk about what an ordinary life looks like for them
• Identify natural supports and community connections

Questions that work:

• What makes a good day for you?
• What would you like to do more of?
• If you could change one thing about your life, what would it be?
• Who are the important people in your life?
• What are you proud of?

Step 3: Write goals with the participant

• Listen first, then help put it into specific words
• Keep goals participant driven, not service driven
• Connect goals to the outcomes in the NDIS plan
• Include both short and longer term goals

Focus on outcomes, not services:

• Good: “I want to make new friends and join a sports team”
• Service focused: “I want to access community participation support”

Step 4: Identify supports and strategies

For each goal, work out what funded supports help, what informal supports contribute, what mainstream services exist, what skills or equipment are needed, who provides what, and when and where.

Step 5: Map supports to the budget

Review the funding in each category, assign supports to the right budget lines, prioritise essential supports, check the budget covers the plan, and note any gaps early rather than at month nine.

Step 6: Add health, safety and communication detail

Medical conditions and medications, communication needs, cultural or religious considerations, risk strategies, emergency contacts, preferred routines.

Step 7: Write it in language the participant understands

• First person (“I want”, not “the participant wants”)
• Plain language, short sentences
• No jargon or unexplained acronyms
• Headings and bullet points
• Pictures or symbols where they help

This is a Practice Standards requirement, not a style preference: the plan must be provided in the language, mode of communication and terms the participant is most likely to understand, and be readily accessible to them and to the workers providing supports.

Step 8: Review and approve it together

Read through the whole plan with the participant, check it reflects their words, make the changes they ask for, confirm they understand each section, get their sign-off, and give them a copy in their preferred format.

Step 9: Share it, with consent

Copies usually go to the participant, family or supporters, the support coordinator or plan manager, and providers delivering supports. Under the Practice Standards, that sharing happens with the participant’s consent. Our NDIS consent form guide covers how to record it properly.

Step 10: Use it, track it, review it

Confirm the services, set up regular check-ins, track progress against each goal, adjust strategies when they are not working, and update the plan when circumstances change.

What the NDIS Practice Standards Expect

Registered providers are audited against the NDIS Practice Standards, and the support planning standard is specific about what good looks like:

• Each participant is actively involved in developing their support plan, and the plan reflects their needs, preferences, strengths and goals.
• Work with the participant and their support network happens with the participant’s consent.
• Risk assessments are undertaken with the participant, documented in the plan, and reviewed periodically.
• Each plan is reviewed annually or earlier, in collaboration with the participant, as needs or circumstances change.
• Progress against goals is assessed at a frequency that matches the risks and the participant’s wishes, and where progress differs from what was expected, the plan is changed.
• The plan is provided in the language, mode of communication and terms the participant is most likely to understand, and is readily accessible to them and to their workers.
• Plans include arrangements for preventative health where needed, such as support to access vaccinations, dental check-ups, health assessments and allied health.
• Plans anticipate emergencies and disasters, individual and community.

Providers who are not registered are not audited against these standards, but the list is still the clearest published description of a support plan that does its job.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Service driven rather than person driven

• Problem: the plan describes services to be delivered rather than the person’s goals
• Fix: start with what they want, then work backwards to the supports

Vague goals

• Problem: goals like “be happier” or “improve skills”
• Fix: specific and measurable (“make 2 new friends”, “cook 3 meals independently per week”)

Language the participant cannot read

• Problem: the plan is written for auditors, in professional language
• Fix: plain language, first person, accessible formats

No participant voice

• Problem: written by professionals without genuine input
• Fix: co-design it, and use the participant’s own words

Unrealistic goals

• Problem: goals too ambitious for the supports available
• Fix: keep the aspiration, break it into stages

Ignoring informal supports

• Problem: only funded services are listed
• Fix: map funded, informal and mainstream supports together

No review schedule

• Problem: written once, never revisited
• Fix: set the review date and the triggers for an earlier one

Missing critical information

• Problem: no emergency contacts, medical detail or risk strategies
• Fix: complete the health and safety sections before the plan goes out

Support Plans for Different Participants

Children and young people

• Involve the child in age appropriate ways
• Include family goals and priorities
• Focus on development and learning
• Plan for school and social inclusion
• Consider transitions, such as school to work
• Use visual and creative planning tools

People with cognitive disability

• Use Easy Read formats
• Include pictures and symbols
• Break information into small chunks
• Allow extra processing time
• Involve trusted supporters
• Keep goals concrete and observable

People with psychosocial disability

• Expect goals to shift with mental health
• Include wellness and recovery planning
• Build in flexible support arrangements
• Record early warning signs
• Plan for both well and unwell periods
• Connect to mental health services

Culturally and linguistically diverse participants

• Provide translated documents where needed
• Use interpreters for planning conversations
• Respect cultural values and practices
• Include cultural activities in goals
• Consider family and community connections

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander participants

• Engage with community and family
• Respect cultural protocols
• Include connection to country and culture
• Recognise the importance of family and kinship
• Work with Aboriginal community controlled organisations

Reviewing and Updating Your Support Plan

When to review

Scheduled: at least annually, midway through the NDIS plan period, and before a plan reassessment meeting.

Triggered: circumstances change, goals are met or no longer matter, supports are not working, new needs emerge, a new NDIS plan starts, or the participant asks.

What to review

• Progress towards each goal
• Whether the supports and strategies are working
• Budget use and whether it will last
• Provider performance and relationships
• Barriers that have appeared
• New priorities
• Health or living situation changes

How to run a review

1. Prepare: gather progress information, talk to providers, check the budget
2. Reflect: what is working, what is not, what has changed
3. Acknowledge progress: name what has been achieved
4. Problem solve: deal with the barriers
5. Adjust: update goals, strategies or supports
6. Document: record what changed and why
7. Communicate: share the updated plan with the people who need it

The NDIS plan review checklist and our guide on preparing for your NDIS plan review cover the separate NDIA process.

What Is Changing in NDIS Planning

Update, September 2026. The NDIA delayed the rollout of new framework planning to 1 April 2027, following consultation with people with disability, families, carers and advocates. The delay gives more time to hear feedback, test the proposed rules and processes, and publish detail. The NDIS rules for the new planning approach are still being developed.

What is known:

• Support needs assessments are being introduced from April 2027, carried out by trained, accredited assessors who meet with participants aged 16 and over.
• The assessment uses the Instrument for the Classification and Assessment of Support Needs (I-CAN v6) as its base, a person based and strengths based tool developed by the Centre for Disability Studies. It is used alongside a questionnaire covering personal and environmental circumstances.
• The NDIA is expanding its testing program, testing the new way of planning with thousands of people.
• Approaches for children are being developed separately.

What is not settled: how assessment results will translate into an individual budget. Do not let anyone tell you the number is already decided, and be careful with second hand explanations of the method.

What to do in the meantime: keep using your current plan and your current support plan. Document support needs thoroughly and keep your own records, because an assessment works from information someone has to provide. If you have a plan reassessment scheduled before April 2027, it runs under the current process. Our NDIS news page tracks changes as the rules are published.

Whatever the funding method ends up being, the support plan keeps doing the same job: turning funding into goals, strategies and supports that people can follow.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I have to have a support plan? Participants are not required to have one. Registered providers, though, are audited against a Practice Standard that expects support plans developed with the participant and reviewed at least annually.

Who keeps the support plan? The participant keeps their own copy. Copies also go to the support coordinator, plan manager and providers, with the participant’s consent.

Can I update my support plan whenever I want? Yes. Unlike the NDIS plan, which runs for a set period, the support plan can be updated any time needs, goals or circumstances change.

What is the difference between a support plan and a service agreement? A support plan sets out goals and how supports help reach them. A service agreement is the contract with a specific provider covering the services they deliver, the price and the conditions attached.

Do all my providers need a copy of my support plan? Only if you want them to have one. Share it with providers who need to understand your goals to support you well.

Can my family help create my support plan? Yes, if you want them involved. The plan still has to reflect your goals and your choices.

What if my goals change? Update the plan. Goals changing is normal, and the Practice Standards expect the plan to change with them.

How detailed should my support plan be? Detailed enough to be useful, short enough to be read. Focus on what matters to you and what a worker needs to know to support you properly.

Resources

• NDIS support plan template (DOCX)
• NDIS goals and plan review worksheet
• NDIS progress notes template
• NDIS Practice Standards, provision of supports (NDIS Commission)
• New way of planning (NDIA)

Summary

A support plan turns NDIS funding into something a person actually receives. Write it with the participant, in their words, with goals that can be measured and supports that map to real budget lines. Review it at least once a year, and update it when life changes rather than when the calendar says so.

Download the NDIS support plan template (DOCX)

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