Notion shipped over 30 updates in the first half of 2025. That's more than one new feature every week.
Most "feature roundup" articles will walk you through every single one, treating each update like it's equally important. But these smaller improvements won’t make a big dent in how your teams work or their output.
At your company size, every operational improvement needs to count. You can't afford to waste time on features that sound cool but don't solve real problems. Your team needs tools that actually streamline workflows, reduce administrative overhead, and help people focus on work that moves the business forward.
So instead of covering every update Notion released, we're focusing on the five that actually can make a difference for your business. Each section includes concrete implementation examples you can start using this week — not theoretical use cases, but practical workflows for teams just like yours.
1. Claude 4 integration in Notion AI (+Open AI’s GPT-5)
You're probably already using AI tools like ChatGPT for various work tasks. But there's always that moment of friction: you get a great response, then you need to copy it somewhere useful, format it properly, and connect it to your existing work. Your project context lives in Notion, but your AI conversations happen elsewhere.
What Claude 4 changes:
Claude 4 is now available directly within Notion AI, bringing stronger reasoning and better consistency for your work. From your Notion Home dashboard, you can chat with Claude 4 and instantly save any response as a page anywhere in your workspace.
It eliminates that copy-paste between tools. Ask Claude 4 to help analyze a complex situation, then save that analysis directly in Notion where your team needs it. Get help brainstorming ideas, then immediately add them to the right database. The AI conversation and your organized work happen in the same place.
Claude 4 also handles complex reasoning better than previous versions, making it more suitable when you need thorough analysis for strategic decisions, detailed planning, or situations where accuracy really matters.
How to use Claude 4 with Notion:
Research and planning: Ask Claude 4 to help you think through industry trends, competitive positioning, or market opportunities. For example: "I'm the CMO at a 50-person B2B SaaS startup in the productivity space. Analyze the AI writing tools market and suggest positioning opportunities for our content platform, considering our startup resources and target market."
Save the insights directly to your strategy folder where your team can reference them during planning sessions.
Content development: Get help brainstorming campaign ideas, refining messaging, or structuring content. Try: "Create 10 LinkedIn post ideas about remote team productivity for startup founders" or "Review this product launch email and suggest improvements." Save useful responses directly to your content calendar database with proper tags and assignments.
Learning and development: Use Claude 4 to break down complex concepts your team needs to understand. Ask something like: "Explain growth marketing principles with examples for a 5-person team and $10k budget." Create learning resources by saving explanations and examples directly to your team knowledge base.
Decision support: When facing complex choices, ask Claude 4 to help analyze different options. For instance: "Should we focus on enterprise clients or SMBs? Consider our current team, product, and 18-month goals." Save the analysis to your decision documentation for future reference.
Process improvement: Get help refining workflows or creating standard procedures. Try: "Create a client onboarding checklist from contract to kickoff" or "Review our hiring process and suggest improvements to reduce time-to-hire." Save the improved processes directly to your operations manual where everyone can access them.
Getting started:
Claude 4 is available on Business and Enterprise plans. Access it through your Notion Home dashboard where you can have natural conversations and save any useful response exactly where it belongs in your workspace.
Try asking for analysis that requires deeper thinking: "Help me work through our go-to-market strategy considering our current resources, target market, and competitive landscape." Then save the response directly to your strategy folder.
The key advantage is treating it as an integrated thinking tool rather than a separate service.
GPT-5 now available too (brand new!)
At the time of writing this, OpenAI launched GPT-5 and Notion added it as a beta option in Notion AI. Notion claims GPT-5 handles complex, multi-step tasks about 15% better than other models, particularly for coding and tasks with "multiple moving parts."
What's supposed to make GPT-5 different is its adaptive approach. Instead of choosing between fast and slow models, GPT-5 automatically adjusts based on your request. Simple tasks get quick responses, while complex requests trigger deeper reasoning.
Example from Notion's demo: Someone asked "I want to learn how to use AI better. Make me a dashboard of resources for me to study." GPT-5 created a complete Notion page with to-dos and a learning resource database with properties for status, priority, difficulty level, and more.
Since GPT-5 is rolling out gradually, not everyone has access yet. But if you see it as an option in your Notion AI, it might be worth trying for workflows where you need structured content or multi-step tasks.
2. Notion Mail: Finally, email that makes sense
You know that Monday morning feeling when you open your laptop and realize you'll spend the next two hours just catching up on everything you missed since Friday? If you're in HR with open roles, that's probably 100+ job applications. If you're in sales, it's figuring out which prospects actually need follow-up versus which ones can wait another week.
(How many unread emails do you have sitting in your inbox right now?)
But whether your team inbox zero or have unread emails in the hundreds or thousands, your inbox treats everything with equal urgency. For example, that critical bug report from a customer lands right next to a newsletter about productivity hacks. Everything demands your attention immediately, but most of it doesn't actually need it.
This creates two problems: people spend way too much time on email triage, and important things get missed.
Your engineering team needs to jump on that security issue today, but they don't have time to monitor their inbox constantly. When they finally do check email, they need the critical stuff to surface immediately — not get buried under meeting invites and company announcements.
What Notion Mail solves:
Remember how Notion databases changed the way you think about organizing information? Notion Mail does the same thing for email. Instead of that endless chronological scroll, you get custom properties, filtered views, and AI that understands your workflow patterns.
The magic happens with auto-labeling. Tell Notion AI what types of emails matter to you — "documents requiring signatures," "product feedback from customers," "travel bookings" — and it automatically sorts incoming messages as they arrive.
You also get the familiar Notion block editor for composing emails, built-in scheduling links (read more on that below), and Notion AI directly in your email composer for drafting responses. No need to jump to ChatGPT or Claude — Notion AI is already inside your email and can help you write messages.
How to implement Notion Mail in your workflow:
Recruiting pipeline: Create a "Hiring" view that automatically labels job applications and groups them by role. Add custom properties for candidate status, interview stage, and hiring manager notes. Your recruiting coordinator can see everything from initial application to offer letter in one organized flow.
Client project management: Set up views filtered by client domain and add custom properties for project phase and priority level. When a client emails about website feedback, it automatically appears in your "Client Communications" view, and you can quickly tag it with the relevant project details. This way you can keep tabs on active projects and archive finished project emails to keep a clear overview of what needs attention right now.
Sales lead organization: Let AI labels categorize incoming leads by company size, industry, and urgency. Create filtered views for "Hot Prospects," "Demo Scheduled," and "Follow-up Required." Set up email snippets for common responses: type /follow up to insert "Hi {first name}, thank you for taking the time to meet with us today..." or /schedule reply for "That sounds great! I'd love to chat. Please find my availability here..." This way your sales team can respond quickly while maintaining consistency.
Support ticket triage: Group support emails by issue type and severity. Use AI to automatically route technical questions to your development team view and billing inquiries to your finance view. This way response times improve when the right person sees the right email immediately.
Getting started:
Download the standalone app and connect your Gmail account. Notion Mail is available free on all Notion plans, with Outlook support coming soon. Start by creating a few basic views: "Priority Senders" for key clients, "Attachments" for documents needing review, "Action Required" for emails requiring responses.
Set up AI labels for your most common email types. The system learns from your corrections, getting smarter over time. Create email snippets with dynamic placeholders for frequently sent responses. For example, project status updates or meeting follow-ups that maintain a personal touch while saving time.
If you're on Business or Enterprise plans, you get unlimited AI usage, including the ability to draft contextual responses using information from your Notion workspace and connected tools like Slack or Google Drive.
3. Native scheduling with Notion Calendar
You're paying for Calendly, Acuity, and who knows what other scheduling tools across different departments. Your sales team has their preferred booking system, HR uses something else for interviews, and client services has another tool for discovery calls.
Each tool requires its own setup, branding, and integration. Worse, none of them connect to your project context. When someone books a meeting, you still need to manually create project pages, add context, or figure out which deal or candidate this relates to.
What Notion’s built-in scheduling solves:
Notion Calendar now includes native scheduling, so you can create booking links without another subscription. Set your availability, customize your link, and handle both one-time meetings and recurring appointment slots directly in your calendar.
Everything stays connected. When someone books a client discovery call, you can automatically link it to their project page. Schedule interviews and connect them directly to your hiring pipeline. Now, you can even see all your dated databases (project deadlines, content schedules, task due dates) directly in your calendar view. Your calendar, project context, and scheduling coordination all happen in the same place.
How to make the most of scheduling with Notion Calendar
Client discovery calls: Set up recurring scheduling links for different service tiers your company offers. You could even route prospects to the correct scheduling link using Notion Forms with an added webhook or Gmail automation. When prospects book calls, you can easily add project context directly in each meeting description and link to relevant sales materials stored in Notion.
Interview scheduling: Create different scheduling links for each role you're hiring. This could also work well paired with Notion Mail snippets to quickly insert the correct scheduling link without writing email responses from scratch each time. Then, connect candidate meetings directly to your hiring database so interview notes, feedback, and scheduling all live in one place.
Internal reviews: Create one-off or repeat scheduling links for quarterly reviews, project check-ins, or team retrospectives. You can auto-populate meeting agendas from relevant project templates and connect to ongoing work in your Notion databases.
Team coordination: Quickly create scheduling links for same-day or next-day meetings without the usual back-and-forth. When you need to coordinate availability, view teammate calendars directly to find open slots. Drag a teammate from the sidebar onto your calendar grid to create a 1:1 meeting — the title, participants, and video link get added automatically.
Getting started:
Open Notion Calendar (or get it here if you haven’t already) and click "Scheduling" in the left panel (or press 'S'). Create recurring links for regular meeting types and one-off links for specific occasions. You can add locations, video links, or phone numbers, and set expiration dates for links that shouldn't be used indefinitely.
You'll want to set booking windows with minimum and maximum time limits to avoid last-minute requests or meetings scheduled too far out. Make sure to enable "Avoid conflicts" so your availability updates automatically as your schedule fills up.
For teams, you can create different scheduling links for different departments and let each one manage their own. This removes the need for a central scheduling admin while giving each department control over their own meeting coordination.
4. Database feed view: See context quickly
Notion database views are great for organizing information, but sometimes you need to see the actual content, not just titles and properties. For things like company updates, team announcements, or content reviews, having to click into each entry to read what's inside can slow down your scanning process.
What database feed view solves:
Feed view lets you display database content more visually, like a social media feed or news bulletin. Instead of just seeing titles and properties, you get a scrollable view of the actual content — perfect for internal communications, content review, or creating visual displays that work well with published Notion Sites.
It's essentially a more visual way to present your database information without needing external tools or embeds.
Database feed view workflow ideas
Company bulletin board: Create a feed view for company updates, announcements, and team news. Instead of clicking through individual posts to see what's new, team members can quickly scroll through recent updates and stay informed on company happenings.
Content calendars: See blog post previews and social media content alongside publication dates and approval status. You won't see the entire post, but if you keep the most important info at the top of each page, your marketing team can quickly review key points and approval status without clicking into each entry.
Meeting notes: Preview key discussion points and action items from team meetings. Instead of opening each set of notes to remember what was discussed, you can scan recent meetings and follow up on commitments.
Getting started:
When creating or editing a database view, look for the "Feed" option in the layout menu. Feed view works best for databases where the page content is just as important as the properties. Think documentation, notes, or any content-heavy entries.
Keep in mind that the feed view shows more content per entry, so you'll see fewer items on screen at once (but you can still control which properties — if any — are visible just like any other database view). It's perfect for when you need to review or scan content quality rather than just manage large lists of items.
5. Smarter forms with conditional logic
Generic forms create extra admin work when they ask everyone the same questions. Whether it's feedback surveys about features people don't use, job applications that ignore role differences, or customer surveys that treat all company sizes the same, the result is more irrelevant data to sort through.
It's not a huge problem, but it means more time wasted handling the data.
What conditional logic solves:
Notion Forms now include conditional logic on Business and Enterprise plans, making it easy for your teams to create smart forms for both internal and external use — all within their Notion dashboards. Responses automatically land in your databases, where you can organize them or set up automations for follow-up actions.
The conditional logic works with Select, Multi-Select, and Checkbox questions to show relevant follow-ups based on answers. Since forms are already included in your Notion account, your teams can create what they need without requesting separate tools or going through procurement.
How to use conditional logic in Notion Forms
Customer onboarding: Ask about company size first, then show relevant questions. Enterprise clients see integration questions, while small businesses see basic feature questions.
Employee feedback: Start with satisfaction ratings, then show detailed questions only for low-rated areas. High scores skip the extra questions.
Lead qualification: Ask about budget range first, then show appropriate follow-ups. Different budget ranges see different question sets.
Internal requests: Create a form where team members first select their request type (IT Support, HR Question, Facilities Issue, Finance Query). IT requests then show fields for device and urgency, HR questions show fields for topic (benefits, time off, performance review) and whether it's confidential, while facilities requests ask about location and timing.
Getting started:
Conditional logic is available on Business and Enterprise plans. When creating forms, add your main question first, then click the three dots and choose "Add conditional logic." Set up conditions to show relevant follow-up fields and test to make sure it flows smoothly.
For more setup details, check out our complete guide to Notion Forms.
Why these updates matter for growing teams
These H1 2025 updates are all about useful tool consolidation. Instead of paying for separate email tools, scheduling platforms, AI subscriptions, and form builders, you get integrated solutions that connect to your existing Notion workspace.
Everything works together. Your email connects to your project databases. Your scheduling links tie to your actual workflows. Your forms feed directly into the databases you're already using.
When your email, calendar, AI assistance, and data collection work together, your team can focus on actual work instead of managing tools. This is how growth feels sustainable rather than chaotic.
With Make with Notion — Notion's annual conference — just around the corner in September, we can expect even more feature announcements and product direction updates. These H1 updates show Notion's commitment to solving real operational challenges, so it's worth keeping an eye on what's coming next.
Ready to put these Notion features to work?
You’ll want to implement 2-3 of these updates well rather than trying to use everything at once. The key is choosing the ones that solve your biggest operational challenges and rolling them out systematically.
If you're looking at this list and feeling overwhelmed by the implementation possibilities, we'd love to help. We've guided 150+ companies through exactly these kinds of system improvements, and we understand both the technical capabilities and change management needed for successful adoption.
Talk to our ops expert and let's discuss which of these updates would have the biggest impact on your team.
Note: Icons used in the cover design of this blog post are by Mary Amato, digital illustrator and creator of Notioly.com. These icons are licensed under CC BY 4.0.
