diff --git a/website/docs/configuration/functions/templatefile.html.md b/website/docs/configuration/functions/templatefile.html.md
index cfe5e347f..77cf80df8 100644
--- a/website/docs/configuration/functions/templatefile.html.md
+++ b/website/docs/configuration/functions/templatefile.html.md
@@ -64,6 +64,59 @@ backend 10.0.0.2:8080
 
 ```
 
+### Generating JSON or YAML from a template
+
+If the string you want to generate will be in JSON or YAML syntax, it's
+often tricky and tedious to write a template that will generate valid JSON or
+YAML that will be interpreted correctly when using lots of individual
+interpolation sequences and directives.
+
+Instead, you can write a template that consists only of a single interpolated
+call to either [`jsonencode`](./jsonencode.html) or
+[`yamlencode`](./yamlencode.html), specifying the value to encode using
+[normal Terraform expression syntax](/docs/configuration/expressions.html)
+as in the following examples:
+
+```
+${jsonencode({
+  "backends": [for addr in ip_addrs : "${addr}:${port}"],
+})}
+```
+
+```
+${yamlencode({
+  "backends": [for addr in ip_addrs : "${addr}:${port}"],
+})}
+```
+
+Given the same input as the `backends.tmpl` example in the previous section,
+this will produce a valid JSON or YAML representation of the given data
+structure, without the need to manually handle escaping or delimiters.
+In the latest examples above, the repetition based on elements of `ip_addrs` is
+achieved by using a
+[`for` expression](/docs/configuration/expressions.html#for-expressions)
+rather than by using
+[template directives](/docs/configuration/expressions.html#directives).
+
+```json
+{"backends":["10.0.0.1:8080","10.0.0.2:8080"]}
+```
+
+If the resulting template is small, you can choose instead to write
+`jsonencode` or `yamlencode` calls inline in your main configuration files, and
+avoid creating separate template files at all:
+
+```hcl
+locals {
+  backend_config_json = jsonencode({
+    "backends": [for addr in ip_addrs : "${addr}:${port}"],
+  })
+}
+```
+
+For more information, see the main documentation for
+[`jsonencode`](./jsonencode.html) and [`yamlencode`](./yamlencode.html).
+
 ## Related Functions
 
 * [`file`](./file.html) reads a file from disk and returns its literal contents