Background: Guidelines to write Plain Language Summaries (PLS) in the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions are helpful, but leave writers with flexibility and creativity, which can lead to conflicting and imprecise reporting, as well as misinterpretation of the summaries. In addition, this flexibility has led to a variety of formats of PLS which are inconsistent across reviews. Work has been done over the past five years to develop a standard PLS format. The Opportunities Fund 2007 granted funds to evaluate this format. Objectives: To evaluate and redesign the PLS format; conduct user-testing of the format with consumers from different countries; and assess the effect of the PLS on users’ understanding. Methods: A template was designed by using the Handbook guidelines for PLS and by drawing on work with ‘Summary of findings’ tables. The template was distributed to an advisory group of Cochrane stakeholders, consumers, and others with a background in patient information, information production and design, and review methodology. Their feedback was used to revise the PLS format. User-testing will be conducted with consumers from English and non-English speaking countries. PLS formats in English and Spanish will be developed, and their effect on readers’ understanding of the review will be assessed. Results: The results of the user-testing and PLS evaluation as well as a template to produce consistently formatted and worded PLS will be presented. The template will include easy-to-follow steps to translate quantitative results and the quality of the evidence from Cochrane reviews into user-friendly summaries. Steps to create standardised and consistent qualitative statements and statements about the implications of the quality of the results will be included. Conclusions: A template and guidelines to write a PLS, which are tested among consumers and developed with Cochrane stakeholders, will promote the production of information that is consistent across reviews, precise, not misleading and comprehensible to its international readers.