2025 Make With Notion Conference

I had the opportunity to travel this month to San Francisco for the Notion 2025 Conference, and let me tell you, the vibe was electric.

A Conference That Actually Builds

Notion packed the house this year, not only with solid keynotes but also a refreshingly hands-on lineup of workshops, community booths, and breakout sessions.

The keynote by Ivan Zhao, Notion’s founder, introduced what the team is calling Notion 3.0.

If 1.0 gave us pages and 2.0 gave us databases, then 3.0 is where things get really interesting. This version is all about autonomous assistance — letting Notion actually do the work, not just store it.

Here’s a quick hit list of what was announced:

🧠 Notion AI Agents

AI teammates that can:

• Build project plans
• Break down tasks
• Assign action items
• Summarize docs
• Update databases
• And soon, operate autonomously with triggers and workflows

Yes, you can name, style, and assign your agent a role. You can give it memory using Notion’s pages and databases. You can even give it sunglasses if you’re feeling spicy.

Granular Permissions

• Row-level visibility
• Field-level editing rights
• Role-based access across internal and external teams

This one was long overdue, but done right. No more hacks. No more workarounds. Just clean, powerful access control.

Custom Agents (Coming Soon)

Autonomous agents that operate with specific roles. Think: a support bot that logs tickets, or a sales bot that follows up on leads.

Why I’m Genuinely Excited About This

As a Notion consulting partner, I’ve seen all the hacks people have used to stretch this platform into project management tools, CRM dashboards, team wikis, knowledge libraries, you name it. This next evolution? It eliminates the hacks and builds these use cases into the foundation.

But more than the features, what struck me was how seamlessly AI is being baked into the experience, not slapped on top.

It doesn’t feel like a “chatbot in the sidebar.” It feels like Notion understands the rhythm of real work, and now it's building tools that help carry that weight with you.

Beyond the Keynotes: The Ambassador Summit

But this trip wasn’t just about the conference.

Before the main event, I also attended the Notion Ambassador Summit — a small, intimate gathering of Notion Ambassadors from all over the world. As both a Notion Consultant Partner and a Notion Ambassador, I had the honor of being part of the organizing crew this year, working alongside a handful of brilliant folks from the community.

And let me say this:

There’s something powerful about getting people in a room who aren’t just “users” of a tool, but caretakers of the culture around it.

We shared war stories from consulting projects, traded templates, lol and just vibed.

Then came the surprise.

Ivan Zhao walked in.

No script. No slides. Just Ivan, sitting with us, asking:

“What do you want to know?”

We talked Notion AI.

We talked Mail and Calendar — and how Notion is quietly building its own ecosystem, the way Apple or Google did, but with more intention around joyful workflows.

We asked hard questions. He answered every single one.

And in that room, it clicked.

Notion isn’t just building features.

They’re building an operating system for modern work.

An ecosystem where tools don’t just coexist, they collaborate.

A Few More Moments That Mattered

A day or two after the conference, I dropped by the Notion office again. No fanfare. Just to co-work, connect, and decompress with a few employees and fellow ambassadors still in town.

Sometimes, those unscheduled moments are the ones that linger the longest.

I got to talk shop. Trade ideas. Get a peek at the culture from the inside.

And it just reinforced the same thing I kept feeling all week:

These are people who care about the product.

Not just to ship features, but to make work feel better.

Final Thought

I came to San Francisco needing a break. A reset. A reminder of why I do what I do.

I left with a notebook full of new ideas.

A head buzzing with possibilities.

A heart full of connection.

And a growing curiosity for what’s coming next — not just from Notion, but from the whole community building around it.

If this year was about new building blocks, I have a feeling next year is going to be about what we build with them.

I can’t wait.