N-substituted phthalimides have been used to target many biological systems with examples that are clinically used as drugs. Furthermore, N-substituted phthalimides can also be used in other settings such as in the preparation of polymers, as catalysts, and as protective groups. Because of all these important fields of application, the synthesis of phthalimides is well reported. However, synthetic methods to phthalimides with different heteroatom substituents in position 4 are lacking. The present work describes the development of robust synthetic methods to N-substituted 4-aryloxy/thiophenoxy/thioisopropyloxy-phthalimides. The developed methods allow for the introduction of these substituents through an atom efficient one-step synthesis, which gives good to excellent yields and tolerate a wide range of substituents.