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How to Make a PowerPoint Presentation (Step-by-Step)

  • PowerPoint Tutorials
  • Presentation Design
  • January 22, 2024

In this beginner’s guide, you will learn step-by-step how to make a PowerPoint presentation from scratch.

While PowerPoint is designed to be intuitive and accessible, it can be overwhelming if you’ve never gotten any training on it before. As you progress through this guide, you’ll will learn how to move from blank slides to PowerPoint slides that look like these.

Example of the six slides you'll learn how to create in this tutorial

Table of Contents

Additionally, as you create your presentation, you’ll also learn tricks for working more efficiently in PowerPoint, including how to:

  • Change the slide order
  • Reset your layout
  • Change the slide dimensions
  • Use PowerPoint Designer
  • Format text
  • Format objects
  • Play a presentation (slide show)

With this knowledge under your belt, you’ll be ready to start creating PowerPoint presentations. Moreover, you’ll have taken your skills from beginner to proficient in no time at all. I will also include links to more advanced PowerPoint topics.

Ready to start learning how to make a PowerPoint presentation?

Take your PPT skills to the next level

Start with a blank presentation.

Note: Before you open PowerPoint and start creating your presentation, make sure you’ve collected your thoughts. If you’re going to make your slides compelling, you need to spend some time brainstorming.

For help with this, see our article with tips for nailing your business presentation  here .

The first thing you’ll need to do is to open PowerPoint. When you do, you are shown the Start Menu , with the Home tab open.

This is where you can choose either a blank theme (1) or a pre-built theme (2). You can also choose to open an existing presentation (3).

For now, go ahead and click on the  Blank Presentation (1)  thumbnail.

In the backstage view of PowerPoint you can create a new blank presentation, use a template, or open a recent file

Doing so launches a brand new and blank presentation for you to work with. Before you start adding content to your presentation, let’s first familiarize ourselves with the PowerPoint interface.

The PowerPoint interface

Picture of the different parts of the PowerPoint layout, including the Ribbon, thumbnail view, quick access toolbar, notes pane, etc.

Here is how the program is laid out:

  • The Application Header
  • The Ribbon (including the Ribbon tabs)
  • The Quick Access Toolbar (either above or below the Ribbon)
  • The Slides Pane (slide thumbnails)

The Slide Area

The notes pane.

  • The Status Bar (including the View Buttons)

Each one of these areas has options for viewing certain parts of the PowerPoint environment and formatting your presentation.

Below are the important things to know about certain elements of the PowerPoint interface.

The PowerPoint Ribbon

The PowerPoint Ribbon in the Microsoft Office Suite

The Ribbon is contextual. That means that it will adapt to what you’re doing in the program.

For example, the Font, Paragraph and Drawing options are greyed out until you select something that has text in it, as in the example below (A).

Example of the Shape Format tab in PowerPoint and all of the subsequent commands assoicated with that tab

Furthermore, if you start manipulating certain objects, the Ribbon will display additional tabs, as seen above (B), with more commands and features to help you work with those objects. The following objects have their own additional tabs in the Ribbon which are hidden until you select them:

  • Online Pictures
  • Screenshots
  • Screen Recording

The Slides Pane

The slides pane in PowerPoint is on the left side of your workspace

This is where you can preview and rearrange all the slides in your presentation.

Right-clicking on a slide  in the pane gives you additional options on the slide level that you won’t find on the Ribbon, such as  Duplicate Slide ,  Delete Slide , and  Hide Slide .

Right clicking a PowerPoint slide in the thumbnail view gives you a variety of options like adding new slides, adding sections, changing the layout, etc.

In addition, you can add sections to your presentation by  right-clicking anywhere in this Pane  and selecting  Add Section . Sections are extremely helpful in large presentations, as they allow you to organize your slides into chunks that you can then rearrange, print or display differently from other slides.

Content added to your PowerPoint slides will only display if it's on the slide area, marked here by the letter A

The Slide Area (A) is where you will build out your slides. Anything within the bounds of this area will be visible when you present or print your presentation.

Anything outside of this area (B) will be hidden from view. This means that you can place things here, such as instructions for each slide, without worrying about them being shown to your audience.

The notes pane in PowerPoint is located at the bottom of your screen and is where you can type your speaker notes

The  Notes Pane  is the space beneath the Slide Area where you can type in the speaker notes for each slide. It’s designed as a fast way to add and edit your slides’ talking points.

To expand your knowledge and learn more about adding, printing, and exporting your PowerPoint speaker notes, read our guide here .

Your speaker notes are visible when you print your slides using the Notes Pages option and when you use the Presenter View . To expand your knowledge and learn the ins and outs of using the Presenter View , read our guide here .

You can click and drag to resize the notes pane at the bottom of your PowerPoint screen

You can resize the  Notes Pane  by clicking on its edge and dragging it up or down (A). You can also minimize or reopen it by clicking on the Notes button in the Status Bar (B).

Note:  Not all text formatting displays in the Notes Pane, even though it will show up when printing your speaker notes. To learn more about printing PowerPoint with notes, read our guide here .

Now that you have a basic grasp of the PowerPoint interface at your disposal, it’s time to make your presentation.

Adding Content to Your PowerPoint Presentation

Notice that in the Slide Area , there are two rectangles with dotted outlines. These are called  Placeholders  and they’re set on the template in the Slide Master View .

To expand your knowledge and learn how to create a PowerPoint template of your own (which is no small task), read our guide here .

Click into your content placeholders and start typing text, just as the prompt suggests

As the prompt text suggests, you can click into each placeholder and start typing text. These types of placeholder prompts are customizable too. That means that if you are using a company template, it might say something different, but the functionality is the same.

Example of typing text into a content placeholder in PowerPoint

Note:  For the purposes of this example, I will create a presentation based on the content in the Starbucks 2018 Global Social Impact Report, which is available to the public on their website.

If you type in more text than there is room for, PowerPoint will automatically reduce its font size. You can stop this behavior by clicking on the  Autofit Options  icon to the left of the placeholder and selecting  Stop Fitting Text to this Placeholder .

Next, you can make formatting adjustments to your text by selecting the commands in the Font area and the  Paragraph area  of the  Home  tab of the Ribbon.

Use the formatting options on the Home tab to choose the formatting of your text

The Reset Command:  If you make any changes to your title and decide you want to go back to how it was originally, you can use the Reset button up in the Home tab .

Hitting the reset command on the home tab resets your slide formatting to match your template

Insert More Slides into Your Presentation

Now that you have your title slide filled in, it’s time to add more slides. To do that, simply go up to the  Home tab  and click on  New Slide . This inserts a new slide in your presentation right after the one you were on.

To insert a new slide in PowerPoint, on the home tab click the New Slide command

You can alternatively hit Ctrl+M on your keyboard to insert a new blank slide in PowerPoint. To learn more about this shortcut, see my guide on using Ctrl+M in PowerPoint .

Instead of clicking the New Slide command, you can also open the New Slide dropdown to see all the slide layouts in your PowerPoint template. Depending on who created your template, your layouts in this dropdown can be radically different.

Opening the new slide dropdown you can see all the slide layouts in your PowerPoint template

If you insert a layout and later want to change it to a different layout, you can use the Layout dropdown instead of the New Slide dropdown.

After inserting a few different slide layouts, your presentation might look like the following picture. Don’t worry that it looks blank, next we will start adding content to your presentation.

Example of a number of different blank slide layouts inserting in a PowerPoint presentation

If you want to follow along exactly with me, your five slides should be as follows:

  • Title Slide
  • Title and Content
  • Section Header
  • Two Content
  • Picture with Caption

Adding Content to Your Slides

Now let’s go into each slide and start adding our content. You’ll notice some new types of placeholders.

Use the icons within a content placeholder to insert things like tables, charts, SmartArt, Pictures, etc.

On slide 2 we have a  Content Placeholder , which allows you to add any kind of content. That includes:

  • A SmartArt graphic,
  • A 3D object,
  • A picture from the web,
  • Or an icon.

To insert text, simply type it in or hit  Ctrl+C to Copy  and Ctrl+V to Paste  from elsewhere. To insert any of the other objects, click on the appropriate icon and follow the steps to insert it.

For my example, I’ll simply type in some text as you can see in the picture below.

Example typing bulleted text in a content placeholder in PowerPoint

Slides 3 and 4 only have text placeholders, so I’ll go ahead and add in my text into each one.

Examples of text typed into a divider slide and a title and content slide in PowerPoint

On slide 5 we have a Picture Placeholder . That means that the only elements that can go into it are:

  • A picture from the web

A picture placeholder in PowerPoint can only take an image or an icon

To insert a picture into the picture placeholder, simply:

  • Click on the  Picture  icon
  • Find  a picture on your computer and select it
  • Click on  Insert

Alternatively, if you already have a picture open somewhere else, you can select the placeholder and paste in (shortcut: Ctrl+V ) the picture. You can also drag the picture in from a file explorer window.

To insert a picture into a picture placeholder, click the picture icon, find your picture on your computer and click insert

If you do not like the background of the picture you inserted onto your slide, you can remove the background here in PowerPoint. To see how to do this, read my guide here .

Placeholders aren’t the only way to add content to your slides. At any point, you can use the Insert tab to add elements to your slides.

You can use either the Title Only  or the  Blank  slide layout to create slides for content that’s different. For example, a three-layout content slide, or a single picture divider slide, as shown below.

Example slides using PowerPoint icons and background pictures

In the first example above, I’ve inserted 6 text boxes, 3 icons, and 3 circles to create this layout. In the second example, I’ve inserted a full-sized picture and then 2 shapes and 2 text boxes.

The Reset Command:  Because these slides are built with shapes and text boxes (and not placeholders), hitting the  Reset button up in the  Home tab  won’t do anything.

That is a good thing if you don’t want your layouts to adjust. However, it does mean that it falls on you to make sure everything is aligned and positioned correctly.

For more on how to add and manipulate the different objects in PowerPoint, check out our step-by-step articles here:

  • Using graphics in PowerPoint
  • Inserting icons onto slides
  • Adding pictures to your PowerPoint
  • How to embed a video in PowerPoint
  • How to add music to your presentation

Using Designer to generate more layouts ideas

If you have Office 365, your version of PowerPoint comes with a new feature called Designer (or Design Ideas). This is a feature that generates slide layout ideas for you. The coolest thing about this feature is that it uses the content you already have.

To use Designer , simply navigate to the  Design tab  in your Ribbon, and click on  Design Ideas .

To use Designer on your slides, click the

NOTE: If the PowerPoint Designer is not working for you (it is grey out), see my troubleshooting guide for Designer .

Change the Overall Design (optional)

When you make a PowerPoint presentation, you’ll want to think about the overall design. Now that you have some content in your presentation, you can use the Design tab to change the look and feel of your slides.

For additional help thinking through the design of your presentation,  read my guide here .

A. Picking your PowerPoint slide size

If you have PowerPoint 2013 or later, when you create a blank document in PowerPoint, you automatically start with a widescreen layout with a 16:9 ratio. These dimensions are suitable for most presentations as they match the screens of most computers and projectors.

However, you do have the option to change the dimensions.

For example, your presentation might not be presented, but instead converted into a PDF or printed and distributed. In that case, you can easily switch to the standard dimensions with a 4:3 ratio by selecting from the dropdown (A).

You can also choose a custom slide size or change the slide orientation from landscape to portrait in the Custom Slide Size dialog box (B).

To change your slide size, click the Design tab, open the slide size dropdown and choose a size or custom slide size

To learn all about the different PowerPoint slide sizes, and some of the issues you will face when changing the slide size of a non-blank presentation,  read my guide here .

 B. Selecting a PowerPoint theme

The next thing you can do is change the theme of your presentation to a pre-built one. For a detailed explanation of what a PowerPoint theme is, and how to best use it,  read my article here .

In the beginning of this tutorial, we started with a blank presentation, which uses the default Office theme as you can see in the picture below.

All PowerPoint presentations start with the default Microsoft Office theme

That gives you the most flexibility because it has a blank background and quite simple layouts that work for most presentations. However, it also means that it’s your responsibility to enhance the design.

If you’re comfortable with this, you can stay with the default theme or create your own custom theme ( read my guide here ). But if you would rather not have to think about design, then you can choose a pre-designed theme.

Microsoft provides 46 other pre-built themes, which include slide layouts, color variants and palettes, and fonts. Each one varies quite significantly, so make sure you look through them carefully.

To select a different theme, go to the  Design tab  in the Ribbon, and click on the  dropdown arrow  in the  Themes section .

On the Design tab you will find all of the default PowerPoint templates that come with the Microsoft Office Suite

For this tutorial, let’s select the  Frame  theme and then choose the third Variant in the theme. Doing so changes the layout, colors, and fonts of your presentation.

Example choosing the Frame PowerPoint theme and the third variant of this powerpoint presentation

Note: The theme dropdown area is also where you can import or save custom themes. To see my favorite places to find professional PowerPoint templates and themes (and recommendations for why I like them), read my guide here .

C. How to change a slide background in PowerPoint

The next thing to decide is how you want your background to look for the entire presentation. In the  Variants area, you can see four background options.

To change the background style of your presentation, on the Design tab, find the Background Styles options and choose a style

For this example, we want our presentation to have a dark background, so let’s select Style 3. When you do so, you’ll notice that:

  • The background color automatically changes across all slides
  • The color of the text on most of the slides automatically changes to white so that it’s visible on the dark background
  • The colors of the objects on slides #6 and #7 also adjust, in a way we may not want (we’ll likely have to make some manual adjustments to these slides)

What our PowerPoint presentation looks like now that we have selected a theme, a variant, and a background style

Note: If you want to change the slide background for just that one slide, don’t left-click the style. Instead, right-click it and select Apply to Selected Slides .

After you change the background for your entire presentation, you can easily adjust the background for an individual slide.

You can either right-click a PowerPoint slide and select format background or navigate to the design tab and click the format background command

Inside the Format Background pane, you can see you have the following options:

  • Gradient fill
  • Picture or texture fill
  • Pattern fill
  • Hide background

You can explore these options to find the PowerPoint background that best fits your presentation.

D. How to change your color palette in PowerPoint

Another thing you may want to adjust in your presentation, is the color scheme. In the picture below you can see the Theme Colors we are currently using for this presentation.

Example of the theme colors we are currently using with this presentation

Each PowerPoint theme comes with its own color palette. By default, the Office theme includes the Office color palette. This affects the colors you are presented with when you format any element within your presentation (text, shapes, SmartArt, etc.).

To change the theme color for your presentation, select the Design tab, open the Colors options and choose the colors you want to use

The good news is that the colors here are easy to change. To switch color palettes, simply:

  • Go to the  Design tab in the Ribbon
  • In the Variants area, click on the  dropdown arrow  and select  Colors
  • Select  the color palette (or theme colors) you want

You can choose among the pre-built color palettes from Office, or you can customize them to create your own.

As you build your presentation, make sure you use the colors from your theme to format objects. That way, changing the color palette adjusts all the colors in your presentation automatically.

E. How to change your fonts in PowerPoint

Just as we changed the color palette, you can do the same for the fonts.

Example of custom theme fonts that might come with a powerpoint template

Each PowerPoint theme comes with its own font combination. By default, the Office theme includes the Office font pairing. This affects the fonts that are automatically assigned to all text in your presentation.

To change the default fonts for your presentation, from the design tab, find the fonts dropdown and select the pair of fonts you want to use

The good news is that the font pairings are easy to change. To switch your Theme Fonts, simply:

  • Go to the  Design tab  in the Ribbon
  • Click on the  dropdown arrow  in the  Variants  area
  • Select  Fonts
  • Select  the font pairing you want

You can choose among the pre-built fonts from Office, or you can customize them to create your own.

If you are working with PowerPoint presentations on both Mac and PC computers, make sure you choose a safe PowerPoint font. To see a list of the safest PowerPoint fonts, read our guide here .

If you receive a PowerPoint presentation and the wrong fonts were used, you can use the Replace Fonts dialog box to change the fonts across your entire presentation. For details, read our guide here .

Adding Animations & Transitions (optional)

The final step to make a PowerPoint presentation compelling, is to consider using animations and transitions. These are by no means necessary to a good presentation, but they may be helpful in your situation.

A. Adding PowerPoint animations

PowerPoint has an incredibly robust animations engine designed to power your creativity. That being said, it’s also easy to get started with basic animations.

Animations are movements that you can apply to individual objects on your slide.

To add an animation to an object in PowerPoint, first select the object and then use the Animations tab to select an animation type

To add a PowerPoint animation to an element of your slide, simply:

  • Select the  element
  • Go to the  Animations tab in the Ribbon
  • Click on the  dropdown arrow  to view your options
  • Select the  animation  you want

You can add animations to multiple objects at one time by selecting them all first and then applying the animation.

B. How to preview a PowerPoint animation

There are three ways to preview a PowerPoint animation

There are three ways to preview a PowerPoint animation:

  • Click on the Preview button in the Animations tab
  • Click on the little star  next to the slide
  • Play the slide in Slide Show Mode

To learn other ways to run your slide show, see our guide on presenting a PowerPoint slide show with shortcuts .

To adjust the settings of your animations, explore the options in the  Effect Options ,  Advanced Animation  and the  Timing  areas of the  Animation tab .

The Animations tab allows you to adjust the effects and timings of your animations in PowerPoint

Note:  To see how to make objects appear and disappear in your slides by clicking a button,  read our guide here .

C. How to manage your animations in PowerPoint

You can see the animations applied to your objects by the little numbers in the upper right-hand corner of the objects

The best way to manage lots of animations on your slide is with the Animation Pane . To open it, simply:

  • Navigate to the  Animations tab
  • Select the  Animation Pane

Inside the Animation Pane, you’ll see all of the different animations that have been applied to objects on your slide, with their numbers marked as pictured above.

Note: To see examples of PowerPoint animations that can use in PowerPoint, see our list of PowerPoint animation tutorials here .

D. How to add transitions to your PowerPoint presentation

PowerPoint has an incredibly robust transition engine so that you can dictate how your slides change from one to the other. It is also extremely easy to add transitions to your slides.

In PowerPoint, transitions are the movements (or effects) you see as you move between two slides.

To add a transition to a slide, select the slide, navigate to the transitions tab in PowerPoint and select your transition

To add a transition to a PowerPoint slide, simply:

  • Select the  slide
  • Go to the  Transitions tab in the Ribbon
  • In the Transitions to This Slide area, click on the  dropdown arrow  to view your options
  • Select the  transition  you want

To adjust the settings of the transition, explore the options in the  Timing  area of the Transitions tab.

You can also add the same transition to multiple slides. To do that, select them in the  Slides Pane  and apply the transition.

E. How to preview a transition in PowerPoint

There are three ways to preview a transition in PowerPoint

There are three ways to preview your PowerPoint transitions (just like your animations):

  • Click on the Preview  button in the Transitions tab
  • Click on the little star  beneath the slide number in the thumbnail view

Note:  In 2016, PowerPoint added a cool new transition, called Morph. It operates a bit differently from other transitions. For a detailed tutorial on how to use the cool Morph transition,  see our step-by-step article here .

Save Your PowerPoint Presentation

After you’ve built your presentation and made all the adjustments to your slides, you’ll want to save your presentation. YOu can do this several different ways.

Click the file tab, select Save As, choose where you want to save your presentation and then click save

To save a PowerPoint presentation using your Ribbon, simply:

  • Navigate to the  File tab
  •  Select  Save As  on the left
  • Choose  where you want to save your presentation
  • Name  your presentation and/or adjust your file type settings
  • Click  Save

You can alternatively use the  Ctrl+S keyboard shortcut to save your presentation. I recommend using this shortcut frequently as you build your presentation to make sure you don’t lose any of your work.

The save shortcut is control plus s in PowerPoint

This is the standard way to save a presentation. However, there may be a situation where you want to save your presentation as a different file type.

To learn how to save your presentation as a PDF, see our guide on converting PowerPoint to a PDF .

How to save your PowerPoint presentation as a template

Once you’ve created a presentation that you like, you may want to turn it into a template. The easiest – but not technically correct – way, is to simply create a copy of your current presentation and then change the content.

But be careful! A PowerPoint template is a special type of document and it has its own parameters and behaviors.

If you’re interested in learning about how to create your own PowerPoint template from scratch, see our guide on how to create a PowerPoint template .

Printing Your PowerPoint Presentation

After finishing your PowerPoint presentation, you may want to print it out on paper. Printing your slides is relatively easy.

The print shortcut is control plus P in PowerPoint

To open the Print dialog box, you can either:

  • Hit Ctrl+P on your keyboard
  • Or go to the Ribbon and click on File and then Print

In the Print dialog box, make your selections for how you want to print your PowerPoint presentation, then click print

Inside the Print dialog box, you can choose from the various printing settings:

  • Printer: Select a printer to use (or print to PDF or OneNote)
  • Slides: Choose which slides you want to print
  • Layout: Determine how many slides you want per page (this is where you can print the notes, outline, and handouts)
  • Collated or uncollated (learn what collated printing means here )
  • Color: Choose to print in color, grayscale or black & white

There are many more options for printing your PowerPoint presentations. Here are links to more in-depth articles:

  • How to print multiple slides per page
  • How to print your speaker notes in PowerPoint
  • How to save PowerPoint as a picture presentation

So that’s how to create a PowerPoint presentation if you are brand new to it. We’ve also included a ton of links to helpful resources to boost your PowerPoint skills further.

When you are creating your presentation, it is critical to first focus on the content (what you are trying to say) before getting lost inserting and playing with elements. The clearer you are on what you want to present, the easier it will be to build it out in PowerPoint.

If you enjoyed this article, you can learn more about our PowerPoint training courses and other presentation resources by  visiting us here .

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6 Simple Parts for Beginners to Create a PowerPoint Presentation

Last Updated: December 19, 2022 Fact Checked

Creating a New PowerPoint

Creating the title slide, adding a new slide, adding content to slides, adding transitions, testing and saving your presentation.

This article was co-authored by wikiHow staff writer, Darlene Antonelli, MA . Darlene Antonelli is a Technology Writer and Editor for wikiHow. Darlene has experience teaching college courses, writing technology-related articles, and working hands-on in the technology field. She earned an MA in Writing from Rowan University in 2012 and wrote her thesis on online communities and the personalities curated in such communities. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 4,309,155 times. Learn more...

Do you want to have your data in a slide show? If you have Microsoft 365, you can use PowerPoint! PowerPoint is a program that's part of the Microsoft Office suite (which you have to pay for) and is available for both Windows and Mac computers. This wikiHow teaches you how to create your own Microsoft PowerPoint presentation on a computer.

Things You Should Know

  • Templates make it easy to create vibrant presentations no matter your skill level.
  • When adding photos, you can adjust their sizes by clicking and dragging in or out from their corners.
  • You can add animated transitions between slides or to individual elements like bullet points and blocks of text.

Step 1 Open PowerPoint.

  • If you don't have a Microsoft Office 365 subscription, you can use the website instead of the desktop app. Go to https://powerpoint.office.com/ to use the website version.
  • You can also use the mobile app to make presentations, though it's easier to do this on a computer, which has a larger screen, a mouse, and a keyboard.

Step 2 Select a template.

  • If you don't want to use a template, just click the Blank option in the upper-left side of the page and skip to the next part.

Step 3 Select a theme if possible.

  • Skip this step if your selected template has no themes available.

Step 4 Click Create.

  • If you're creating a PowerPoint presentation for which an elaborate title slide has been requested, ignore this step.

Step 2 Add a title.

  • You can change the font and size of text used from the Home tab that's in the orange ribbon at the top of the window.

Step 3 Add the subtitle.

  • You can also just leave this box blank if you like.

Step 4 Rearrange the title text boxes.

  • You can also click and drag in or out one of a text box's corners to shrink or enlarge the text box.

Step 1 Click the Insert tab.

  • On a Mac, you'll click the Home tab instead. [1] X Research source

Step 2 Click New Slide ▼.

  • Clicking the white slide-shaped box above this option will result in a new text slide being inserted.

Step 3 Select a type of slide.

  • Title Slide
  • Title and Content
  • Section Header
  • Two Content
  • Content with Caption
  • Picture with Caption

Step 4 Add any other slides that you think you'll need.

  • Naturally, the title slide should be the first slide in your presentation, meaning that it should be the top slide in the left-hand column.

Step 1 Select a slide.

  • Skip this step and the next two steps if your selected slide uses a template that doesn't have text boxes in it.

Step 3 Add text to the slide.

  • Text boxes in PowerPoint will automatically format the bulk of your text for you (e.g., adding bullet points) based on the context of the content itself.
  • You can add notes that the Presentation will not include (but you'll still be able to see them on your screen) by clicking Notes at the bottom of the slide.

Step 4 Format the slide's text.

  • You can change the font of the selected text by clicking the current font's name and then clicking your preferred font.
  • If you want to change the size of the text, click the numbered drop-down box and then click a larger or smaller number based on whether you want to enlarge or shrink the text.
  • You can also change the color, bolding, italicization, underlining, and so on from here.

Step 5 Add photos to the slide.

  • Photos in particular can be enlarged or shrunk by clicking and dragging out or in one of their corners.

Step 7 Repeat this for each slide in your presentation.

  • Remember to keep slides uncluttered and relatively free of distractions. It's best to keep the amount of text per slide to around 33 words or less. [2] X Research source

Step 1 Select a slide.

  • Slide content will animate in the order in which you assign transitions. For example, if you animate a photo on the slide and then animate the title, the photo will appear before the title.
  • Make your slideshow progress automatically by setting the speed of every transition to align with your speech as well as setting each slide to Advance . [3] X Trustworthy Source Microsoft Support Technical support and product information from Microsoft. Go to source

Step 1 Review your PowerPoint.

  • If you need to exit the presentation, press Esc .

Step 5 Make any necessary changes before proceeding.

  • Windows - Click File , click Save , double-click This PC , select a save location, enter a name for your presentation, and click Save .
  • Mac - Click File , click Save As... , enter the presentation's name in the "Save As" field, select a save location by clicking the "Where" box and clicking a folder, and click Save .

Community Q&A

Community Answer

  • If you save your PowerPoint presentation in .pps format instead of the default .ppt format, double-clicking your PowerPoint presentation file will prompt the presentation to open directly into the slideshow view. Thanks Helpful 5 Not Helpful 0
  • If you don't have Microsoft Office, you can still use Apple's Keynote program or Google Slides to create a PowerPoint presentation. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

a powerpoint presentation for

  • Your PowerPoint presentation (or some features in it) may not open in significantly older versions of PowerPoint. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 1
  • Great PowerPoint presentations avoid placing too much text on one slide. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

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  • ↑ https://onedrive.live.com/view.aspx?resid=DBDCE00C929AA5D8!252&ithint=file%2cpptx&app=PowerPoint&authkey=!AH4O9NxcbehqzIg
  • ↑ https://www.virtualsalt.com/powerpoint.htm
  • ↑ https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/set-the-timing-and-speed-of-a-transition-c3c3c66f-4cca-4821-b8b9-7de0f3f6ead1#:~:text=To%20make%20the%20slide%20advance,effect%20on%20the%20slide%20finishes .

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8 tips to make the best powerpoint presentations.

Want to make your PowerPoint presentations really shine? Here's how to impress and engage your audience.

Quick Links

Table of contents, start with a goal, less is more, consider your typeface, make bullet points count, limit the use of transitions, skip text where possible, think in color, take a look from the top down, bonus: start with templates.

Slideshows are an intuitive way to share complex ideas with an audience, although they're dull and frustrating when poorly executed. Here are some tips to make your Microsoft PowerPoint presentations sing while avoiding common pitfalls.

define a goal

It all starts with identifying what we're trying to achieve with the presentation. Is it informative, a showcase of data in an easy-to-understand medium? Or is it more of a pitch, something meant to persuade and convince an audience and lead them to a particular outcome?

It's here where the majority of these presentations go wrong with the inability to identify the talking points that best support our goal. Always start with a goal in mind: to entertain, to inform, or to share data in a way that's easy to understand. Use facts, figures, and images to support your conclusion while keeping structure in mind (Where are we now and where are we going?).

I've found that it's helpful to start with the ending. Once I know how to end a presentation, I know how best to get to that point. I start by identifying the takeaway---that one nugget that I want to implant before thanking everyone for their time---and I work in reverse to figure out how best to get there.

Your mileage, of course, may vary. But it's always going to be a good idea to put in the time in the beginning stages so that you aren't reworking large portions of the presentation later. And that starts with a defined goal.

avoid walls of text

A slideshow isn't supposed to include everything. It's an introduction to a topic, one that we can elaborate on with speech. Anything unnecessary is a distraction. It makes the presentation less visually appealing and less interesting, and it makes you look bad as a presenter.

This goes for text as well as images. There's nothing worse, in fact, than a series of slides where the presenter just reads them as they appear. Your audience is capable of reading, and chances are they'll be done with the slide, and browsing Reddit, long before you finish. Avoid putting the literal text on the screen, and your audience will thank you.

Related: How to Burn Your PowerPoint to DVD

use better fonts

Right off the bat, we're just going to come out and say that Papyrus and Comic Sans should be banned from all PowerPoint presentations, permanently. Beyond that, it's worth considering the typeface you're using and what it's saying about you, the presenter, and the presentation itself.

Consider choosing readability over aesthetics, and avoid fancy fonts that could prove to be more of a distraction than anything else. A good presentation needs two fonts: a serif and sans-serif. Use one for the headlines and one for body text, lists, and the like. Keep it simple. Veranda, Helvetica, Arial, and even Times New Roman are safe choices. Stick with the classics and it's hard to botch this one too badly.

use fewer bullets

There reaches a point where bullet points become less of a visual aid and more of a visual examination.

Bullet points should support the speaker, not overwhelm his audience. The best slides have little or no text at all, in fact. As a presenter, it's our job to talk through complex issues, but that doesn't mean that we need to highlight every talking point.

Instead, think about how you can break up large lists into three or four bullet points. Carefully consider whether you need to use more bullet points, or if you can combine multiple topics into a single point instead. And if you can't, remember that there's no one limiting the number of slides you can have in a presentation. It's always possible to break a list of 12 points down into three pages of four points each.

avoid transitions

Animation, when used correctly, is a good idea. It breaks up slow-moving parts of a presentation and adds action to elements that require it. But it should be used judiciously.

Adding a transition that wipes left to right between every slide or that animates each bullet point in a list, for example, starts to grow taxing on those forced to endure the presentation. Viewers get bored quickly, and animations that are meant to highlight specific elements quickly become taxing.

That's not to say that you can't use animations and transitions, just that you need to pick your spots. Aim for no more than a handful of these transitions for each presentation. And use them in spots where they'll add to the demonstration, not detract from it.

use visuals

Sometimes images tell a better story than text can. And as a presenter, your goal is to describe points in detail without making users do a lot of reading. In these cases, a well-designed visual, like a chart, might better convey the information you're trying to share.

The right image adds visual appeal and serves to break up longer, text-heavy sections of the presentation---but only if you're using the right images. A single high-quality image can make all the difference between a success and a dud when you're driving a specific point home.

When considering text, don't think solely in terms of bullet points and paragraphs. Tables, for example, are often unnecessary. Ask yourself whether you could present the same data in a bar or line chart instead.

find a color palette

Color is interesting. It evokes certain feelings and adds visual appeal to your presentation as a whole. Studies show that color also improves interest, comprehension, and retention. It should be a careful consideration, not an afterthought.

You don't have to be a graphic designer to use color well in a presentation. What I do is look for palettes I like, and then find ways to use them in the presentation. There are a number of tools for this, like Adobe Color , Coolors , and ColorHunt , just to name a few. After finding a palette you enjoy, consider how it works with the presentation you're about to give. Pastels, for example, evoke feelings of freedom and light, so they probably aren't the best choice when you're presenting quarterly earnings that missed the mark.

It's also worth mentioning that you don't need to use every color in the palette. Often, you can get by with just two or three, though you should really think through how they all work together and how readable they'll be when layered. A simple rule of thumb here is that contrast is your friend. Dark colors work well on light backgrounds, and light colors work best on dark backgrounds.

change views

Spend some time in the Slide Sorter before you finish your presentation. By clicking the four squares at the bottom left of the presentation, you can take a look at multiple slides at once and consider how each works together. Alternatively, you can click "View" on the ribbon and select "Slide Sorter."

Are you presenting too much text at once? Move an image in. Could a series of slides benefit from a chart or summary before you move on to another point?

It's here that we have the opportunity to view the presentation from beyond the single-slide viewpoint and think in terms of how each slide fits, or if it fits at all. From this view, you can rearrange slides, add additional ones, or delete them entirely if you find that they don't advance the presentation.

The difference between a good presentation and a bad one is really all about preparation and execution. Those that respect the process and plan carefully---not only the presentation as a whole, but each slide within it---are the ones who will succeed.

This brings me to my last (half) point: When in doubt, just buy a template and use it. You can find these all over the web, though Creative Market and GraphicRiver are probably the two most popular marketplaces for this kind of thing. Not all of us are blessed with the skills needed to design and deliver an effective presentation. And while a pre-made PowerPoint template isn't going to make you a better presenter, it will ease the anxiety of creating a visually appealing slide deck.

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17 PowerPoint Presentation Tips to Make More Creative Slideshows [+ Templates]

Jamie Cartwright

Published: August 16, 2023

Creating a great PowerPoint presentation is a skill that any professional can benefit from. The problem? It’s really easy to get it wrong. From poor color choices to confusing slides, a bad PowerPoint slideshow can distract from the fantastic content you’re sharing with stakeholders on your team.

powerpoint tricks

That’s why it’s so important to learn how to create a PowerPoint presentation from the ground up, starting with your slides. Even if you’re familiar with PowerPoint, a refresher will help you make a more attractive, professional slideshow. Let’s get started.

How to Make a PowerPoint Presentation

  • Presentation Tips

PowerPoint Design

I like to think of Microsoft PowerPoint as a test of basic professional skills. To create a passing presentation, I need to demonstrate design skills, technical literacy, and a sense of personal style.

If the presentation has a problem (like an unintended font, a broken link, or unreadable text), then I’ve probably failed the test. Even if my spoken presentation is well rehearsed, a bad visual experience can ruin it for the audience.

Expertise means nothing without a good PowerPoint presentation to back it up. For starters, grab your collection of free PowerPoint templates below.

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No matter your topic, successful PowerPoints depend on three main factors: your command of PowerPoint's design tools, your attention to presentation processes, and your devotion to consistent style. Here are some simple tips to help you start mastering each of those factors, and don't forget to check out the additional resources at the bottom of this post.

A presentation is made up of multiple slides, let's delve deeper into PowerPoint's capabilities.

Getting Started

1. open powerpoint and click ‘new.’.

If a page with templates doesn‘t automatically open, go to the top left pane of your screen and click New. If you’ve already created a presentation, select Open then double-click the icon to open the existing file.

a powerpoint presentation for

10. Run your presentation.

It's always good to do a trial run to ensure that your slides are set up properly and your animations fire the way you expect them to.

To present your PowerPoint, go to the Slide Show tab and click Play from Start. The slide will cover your whole screen, blocking out your desktop and PowerPoint software. This is so your audience (in this case, you for the trial run) is solely focused on the visual elements of your presentation.

11. Advance the slides.

When you're done with one slide and want to show the next in your sequence, click your mouse in presentation mode. This will advance the slide. 

PowerPoint Presentation Tips

  • Don't let PowerPoint decide how you use PowerPoint.
  • Create custom slide sizes.
  • Edit your slide template design.
  • Write text with your audience in mind.
  • Make sure all of your objects are properly aligned.
  • Use ‘Format Object’ to better control your objects' designs.
  • Take advantage of PowerPoint's shapes.
  • Create custom shapes.
  • Crop images into custom shapes.
  • Present websites within PowerPoint.
  • Try Using GIFs.
  • Keep it simple.
  • Embed your font files.
  • Save your slides as JPEGs.
  • Embed multimedia.
  • Bring your own hardware.
  • Use ‘Presenter View.’

PowerPoint Style

1. don’t let powerpoint decide how you use powerpoint..

Microsoft wanted to provide PowerPoint users with a lot of tools. But this does not mean you should use them all. Here are some key things to look out for:

  • Make sure that the preset PPT themes complement your needs before you adopt them.
  • Try to get away from using Microsoft Office’s default fonts, Calibri and Cambria. Using these two typefaces can make the presentation seem underwhelming.
  • Professionals should never use PPT’s action sounds. (Please consider your audience above personal preference).
  • PowerPoint makes bulleting automatic, but ask yourself: Are bullets actually appropriate for what you need to do? Sometimes they are, but not always.
  • Recent PPT defaults include a small shadow on all shapes. Remove this shadow if it's not actually needed. Also, don’t leave shapes in their default blue.

2. Create custom slide sizes.

While you usually can get away with the default slide size for most presentations, you may need to adjust it for larger presentations on weirdly sized displays. If you need to do that, here's how.

  • In the top-left corner, choose File .
  • Select Page Setup .
  • Type the height and width of the background you'd like, and click OK .
  • A dialogue box will appear. Click Scale if you want to also resize your content, or Don’t Scale if you don’t. We recommend clicking Don’t Scale , then manually adjusting minor layout issues.

Tip : You can avoid a headache with the last step if you resize your slides before you add any objects to them. Otherwise, the dimensions of your objects will become skewed.

3. Edit your slide template design.

Often, it's much easier to edit your PowerPoint template before you start — this way, you don't have to design each slide by hand. Here's how you do that.

  • Select View in the top navigation.
  • Click Master .
  • In the drop-down, click Slide Master .
  • Make any changes you like, then click Close Master in the top ribbon. All current and future slides in that presentation will use that template.

4. Write text with your audience in mind.

A significant part of a PowerPoint's content is text. Great copy can make or break your presentation, so evaluating your written work from a few different angles could make you seem more persuasive. Keep the amount of text under 6-8 lines (or 30 words) at a minimum of size 24 pt. Thinking about how your text is received differentiates good presenters from the best.

Typography:

Many people underestimate the influence of typeface, but choosing the right font is important — the perception of your font type could influence your audience's impression of you. The right font is an opportunity to convey consistent brand personality and professionalism.

Some fonts are seen as clean and professional, but this doesn't mean they're boring. A common mistake is thinking your font isn't "exciting" enough, which could lead you to choose a font that distracts from your overall message. We recommend sticking to simple serif and sans-serif fonts . Avoid script fonts because of potential readability issues.

powerpoint presentation: types of fonts

That said, you can still use fun and eccentric fonts — in moderation. Offsetting a fun font or large letters with something more professional can create an engaging presentation.

Above all, be sure you're consistent so your presentation looks the same throughout each slide. That way, your audience doesn't become distracted by too many disparate fonts. Check out this example from HubSpot’s company profile templates:

Interested in this presentation template? Download it for free here.

5. Make sure all of your objects are properly aligned.

Having properly aligned objects on your slide is the key to making it look polished and professional. You can manually try to line up your images ... but we all know how that typically works out. You're trying to make sure all of your objects hang out in the middle of your slide, but when you drag them there, it still doesn't look quite right. Get rid of your guessing game and let PowerPoint work its magic with this trick.

Here’s how to align multiple objects:

  • Select all objects by holding down Shift and clicking on all of them.
  • Select Arrange in the top options bar, then choose Align or Distribute .
  • Choose the type of alignment you'd like.

Here’s how to align objects to the slide:

  • Select Align to Slide .
  • Select Arrange in the top options bar again, then choose Align or Distribute .

6. Use "Format Object" to better control your objects' designs.

Format menus allow you to do fine adjustments that otherwise seem impossible. To do this, right-click on an object and select the Format Object option. Here, you can fine-tune shadows, adjust shape measurements, create reflections, and much more. The menu that will pop up looks like this:

powerpoint presentation: format object pane

Although the main options can be found on PowerPoint’s format toolbars, look for complete control in the format window menu. Other examples of options available include:

  • Adjusting text inside a shape.
  • Creating a natural perspective shadow behind an object.
  • Recoloring photos manually and with automatic options.

7. Take advantage of PowerPoint's shapes.

Many users don’t realize how flexible PowerPoint’s shape tools have become. In combination with the expanded format options released by Microsoft, the potential for good design with shapes is readily available. PowerPoint provides the user with a bunch of great shape options beyond the traditional rectangle, oval, and rounded rectangle patterns.

Today’s shapes include a highly functional Smart Shapes function, which enables you to create diagrams and flow charts in no time. These tools are especially valuable when you consider that PowerPoint is a visual medium. Paragraphing and bullet lists are boring — you can use shapes to help express your message more clearly.

8. Create custom shapes.

When you create a shape, right click and press Edit Points . By editing points, you can create custom shapes that fit your specific need. For instance, you can reshape arrows to fit the dimensions you like.

Another option is to combine two shapes together. To do so, select the two shapes you’d like to work with, then click Shape Format in the top ribbon. Tap Merge Shapes .

You’ll see a variety of options.

  • Combine creates a custom shape that has overlapping portions of the two previous shapes cut out.
  • Union makes one completely merged shape.
  • Intersect builds a shape of only the overlapping sections of the two previous shapes.
  • Subtract cuts out the overlapping portion of one shape from the other.
  • Fragment will split your shape into different parts depending on where they overlap.

By using these tools rather than trying to edit points precisely, you can create accurately measured custom shapes.

9. Crop images into custom shapes.

Besides creating custom shapes in your presentation, you can also use PowerPoint to crop existing images into new shapes. Here's how you do that:

  • Click on the image and select Picture Format in the options bar.
  • Choose Crop , then Crop to Shape , and then choose your desired shape. Ta-da! Custom-shaped photos.

10. Present websites within PowerPoint.

Tradition says that if you want to show a website in a PowerPoint, you should just create a link to the page and prompt a browser to open. For PC users, there’s a better option.

Third party software that integrates fully into PowerPoint’s developer tab can be used to embed a website directly into your PowerPoint using a normal HTML iframe. One of the best tools is LiveWeb , a third-party software that you can install on your PowerPoint program.

By using LiveWeb, you don’t have to interrupt your PowerPoint, and your presentation will remain fluid and natural. Whether you embed a whole webpage or just a YouTube video, this can be a high-quality third party improvement. To install the add-on, simple head to the LiveWeb website and follow the instructions.

Unfortunately, Mac users don’t have a similar option. A good second choice is to take screenshots of the website, link in through a browser, or embed media (such as a YouTube video) by downloading it directly to your computer.

11. Try Using GIFs.

GIFs are looped animated images used to communicate a mood, idea, information, and much more. Users add GIFs to PowerPoints to be funny or quickly demo a process. It's easy to add GIFs to your slides. To do so, simply follow these steps:

  • Download and save the GIF you want.
  • Go to the slide you want the GIF on.
  • Go to the Home tab, and click either Insert or Picture .
  • From the Picture drop-down menu, choose Picture from File .
  • Navigate to where you saved your GIF and select it. Then, choose Insert .
  • It will play automatically the moment you insert it.

PowerPoint Process

12. keep it simple..

PowerPoint is an excellent tool to support your presentation with visual information, graphics, and supplemental points. This means that your PowerPoint should not be your entire presentation. Your slides — no matter how creative and beautiful — shouldn't be the star of the show. Keep your text and images clear and concise, using them only to supplement your message and authority.

If your slides have dense and cluttered information, it will both distract your audience and make it much more likely that you will lose their attention. Nothing in your slides should be superfluous! Keep your presentation persuasive by keeping it clean. There are a few ways to do this:

  • Limit bullet points and text.
  • Avoid paragraphs and long quotes.
  • Maintain "white space" or "negative space".
  • Keep percentages, graphs, and data super basic.

13. Embed your font files.

One constant problem presenters have with PowerPoint is that fonts seem to change when presenters move from one computer to another. In reality, the fonts are not changing — the presentation computer just doesn’t have the same font files installed . If you’re using a PC and presenting on a PC, then there is a smooth workaround for this issue.

Here’s the trick: When you save your PowerPoint file (only on a PC), you should click File , then Options, then open up the Save tab. Then, select the Embed fonts in the file check box under Preserve fidelity when sharing this presentation . Now, your presentation will keep the font file and your fonts will not change when you move computers.

The macOS PowerPoint version has a similar function. To embed your fonts on a Mac, do the following:

  • Open up your presentation.
  • On the top bar, click PowerPoint , then click Preferences .
  • Under Output and Sharing , click Save .
  • Under Font Embedding , click Embed fonts in the file.

14. Save your slides as a PDF file for backup purposes.

If you’re still scared of your presentation showing up differently when it’s time to present, you should create a PDF version just in case. This is a good option if you’ll be presenting on a different computer. If you also run into an issue where the presenting computer doesn’t have PowerPoint installed, you can also use the system viewer to open up the PDF. No laptop will ever give you trouble with this file type.

The only caveat is that your GIFs, animations, and transitions won’t transfer over. But since the PDF will only work as a backup, not as your primary copy, this should be okay.

To save your presentation as a PDF file, take the following steps:

  • Go to File , then click Save as …
  • In the pop-up window, click File Format.
  • A drop-down menu will appear. Select PDF .
  • Click Export .

You can also go to File , then Export , then select PDF from the file format menu.

15. Embed multimedia.

PowerPoint allows you to either link to video/audio files externally or to embed the media directly in your presentation. You should embed these files if you can, but if you use a Mac, you cannot actually embed the video (see note below). For PCs, two great reasons for embedding are:

  • Embedding allows you to play media directly in your presentation. It will look much more professional than switching between windows.
  • Embedding also means that the file stays within the PowerPoint presentation, so it should play normally without extra work (except on a Mac).

Note: macOS users of PowerPoint should be extra careful about using multimedia files.

If you use PowerPoint for Mac, then you will always need to bring the video and/or audio file with you in the same folder as the PowerPoint presentation. It’s best to only insert video or audio files once the presentation and the containing folder have been saved on a portable drive in their permanent folder. Also, if the presentation will be played on a Windows computer, then Mac users need to make sure their multimedia files are in WMV format. This tip gets a bit complicated, so if you want to use PowerPoint effectively, consider using the same operating system for designing and presenting, no matter what.

16. Bring your own hardware.

Between operating systems, PowerPoint is still a bit jumpy. Even between differing PPT versions, things can change. One way to fix these problems is to make sure that you have the right hardware — so just bring along your own laptop when you're presenting.

If you’re super concerned about the different systems you might have to use, then upload your PowerPoint presentation into Google Slides as a backup option. Google Slides is a cloud-based presentation software that will show up the same way on all operating systems. The only thing you need is an internet connection and a browser.

To import your PowerPoint presentation into Google Slides, take the following steps:

  • Navigate to slides.google.com . Make sure you’re signed in to a Google account, preferably your own.
  • Under Start a new presentation , click the empty box with a plus sign. This will open up a blank presentation.
  • Go to File , then Import slides .
  • A dialog box will come up. Tap Upload , then click Select a file from your device .
  • Select your presentation and click Open .
  • Select the slides you’d like to import. If you want to import all of them, click All in the upper right-hand corner of the dialog box.
  • Click Import slides.

powerpoint presentation: importing slides into google slides

When I tested this out, Google Slides imported everything perfectly, including a shape whose points I had manipulated. This is a good backup option to have if you’ll be presenting across different operating systems.

17. Use Presenter View.

In most presentation situations, there will be both a presenter’s screen and the main projected display for your presentation. PowerPoint has a great tool called Presenter View, which can be found in the Slide Show tab of PowerPoint. Included in the Presenter View is an area for notes, a timer/clock, and a presentation display.

powerpoint presentation: using presenter view

For many presenters, this tool can help unify their spoken presentation and their visual aid. You never want to make the PowerPoint seem like a stack of notes that you’re reading off of. Use the Presenter View option to help create a more natural presentation.

Pro Tip: At the start of the presentation, you should also hit CTRL + H to make the cursor disappear. Hitting the "A" key will bring it back if you need it!

Your Next Great PowerPoint Presentation Starts Here

With style, design, and presentation processes under your belt, you can do a lot more with PowerPoint than just presentations for your clients. PowerPoint and similar slide applications are flexible tools that should not be forgotten. With a great template, you can be on your way to creating presentations that wow your audience.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in September 2013 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

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Don’t Present Without These 16 PowerPoint Dos and Don’ts

Don’t Present Without These 16 PowerPoint Dos and Don’ts

Table of Contents

Have you ever struggled to hold your audience’s interest during a presentation? Painstakingly created slide after slide only to be met with bored, disengaged faces? 

Even the most confident speakers can falter when it comes to crafting compelling PowerPoint decks. Without proper slide design best practices, it’s easy to lose your audience in a sea of dense text, chaotic graphics, and disorganized content.

You don’t have to suffer through presenting lackluster slides anymore. In fact, following simple PowerPoint best practices can totally transform your deck from meh to marvelous.

In this post, we’ll share 16 PowerPoint dos and don’ts to level up your presentations and captivate audiences. These tips will help you create professional, visually striking slides your viewers will remember.

A man presenting on stage

16 Dos And Don’ts Of Powerpoint Presentations

Here are some important 16 presentation dos and don’ts you need to keep in mind while creating slides and presenting them.

PowerPoint Dos

Let’s start with the best practices and strategies to implement when designing PowerPoint presentations . What techniques should you use to create memorable, polished slides?

1. Keep It Simple With Minimalist Design

Let’s start with a common mistake – overcrowded, distracting slide design. We get the temptation to tart up slides with fancy backgrounds. But resist the urge! Fancy templates with complex colored patterns or photos unrelated to your content just make it harder to digest key information.

Instead, embrace the power of simplicity. Stick to minimalist templates and avoid template themes with extra decorations. Use neutral backgrounds and empty negative space to let your content shine. Remember, your audience came for your message, not for clip art kittens. Keep slides clean and attention stays where it should be.

2. Cut the Clutter – Follow the 6×6 Rule

Now for another slide buzzkill – mammoth blocks of dense text. You may be tempted to pack slides with long sentences and paragraphs. Don’t give in! Text-heavy slides are guaranteed to lose audiences fast.

For easy-to-digest nuggets, follow the handy 6×6 rule. Limit slides to just 6 lines of text maximum, with each line containing 6 words max. Anything more turns into an overwhelming wall of words.

Stick to concise phrases, short sentences, and bulleted lists. Use just keywords and supporting stats – leave nonessential info out. With this less is more approach, key points will stick better.

SlidesAI is a text-to-presentation add-on tool that converts walls of text into beautiful slides. It does this automatically generate condensed phrases and bullet points from your text ensuring clutter-free slides throughout your presentation.

3. Boost Engagement With Quality Visuals

Speaking of key points sticking better…you know what helps even more? Quality graphics and visuals!

Research shows we process images 60,000 times faster than text. So reinforce your points with strong visuals. Use high-resolution photos, charts, illustrations, and infographics. But avoid clipart or random stock photos – ensure every graphic clearly supports your narrative.

Well-designed visuals make presentations more memorable and engaging. Just remember to optimize graphics for high-resolution viewing and include alt-text (alternative text) descriptions for accessibility. Then watch those visual aids boost information retention and audience interest.

SlidesAI has a library of 1.5M high-quality premium stock images that you can select and include in your slides.

4. Create Brand Consistency With Formatting

Imagine a presentation where every slide had a totally different layout, colors, and font… no visual consistency at all. It would look sloppy and amateurish, right?

Formatting matters – big time! Brand your presentation by using consistent design elements throughout all your slides.

Pick one professional font combination and stick to it. Limit your color palette to 2-3 colors max. Maintain alignment and space elements consistently.

With unified branding, your deck will feel polished, intentional, and visually pleasing. Bonus – consistent branding also boosts memorability as the audience becomes familiar with your “look”.

SlidesAI ensures complete branding consistency across all presentation slides by applying your color schemes , fonts, etc to designs through artificial intelligence.

5. Check Accessibility Settings

Speaking of memorability, if some audience members can’t actually view your slides, they certainly won’t remember your message.

Ensure your presentation is inclusive and accessible to all by checking key settings. Use color contrast and legible fonts so those with visual impairments can still grasp the content. Optimize images with alt text descriptions. Verify videos are captioned.

It may take a bit more effort up front but making your presentation accessible opens your message to a wider audience. It also demonstrates corporate responsibility.

6. Create Custom Icons and Illustrations

Most PowerPoint templates come with generic icons. However, you can amplify brand personality and memorability by creating custom icons and simple illustrations.

Don’t just use a generic checkmark when you can insert your own branded indicator relevant to your company. Design illustrated characters to represent concepts. Even use emojis strategically to inject fun and improve recall.

Handcrafted visuals, even if basic in style, make presentations stand out and drive home key points better than generic clip art ever could.

7. Use Subtle Animations – But Not Too Many!

Animations, when used well, can help guide the audience’s eye and transition between ideas smoothly. Emphasize key points and important transitions with subtle animations.

Entrance and exit effects can focus attention while builds and motion path animations can demonstrate processes dynamically. Use sparingly and subtly for the best impact.

But avoid going animation crazy with sounds and excessive movement. That becomes more distracting than engaging. Limit animations so they enhance content rather than detract.

8. Pace Your Delivery

Creating stellar slides is an excellent start but don’t stop there. The live delivery is just as crucial. Invest time practicing your presentation with your slides.

Rehearse the flow and pace of your narrative. Refine and memorize transitions between slides . Nail your timing to keep the audience engaged. Get so comfortable delivering your content that the slides become natural visual aids.

With great slides and honed delivery skills, your audience will hang on to your every word from the introduction to a powerful conclusion.

A woman presenting traditional advertising

PowerPoint Donts

Just as important as the dos are the don’ts. What pitfalls should you avoid when designing PowerPoint presentations?

9. Don’t Use Distracting Backgrounds

Remember our tip to embrace minimalism? Well, the opposite is using distracting backgrounds. Avoid loud colors, complex patterns, or images totally unrelated to your content. At best, they are distracting. At worst, they make key info harder to comprehend.

Stick to simple, neutral backgrounds. If using an image, ensure it directly reinforces your narrative. Anything extra risks your message getting visually lost. Keep backgrounds clean so content remains the focal point.

SlidesAI avoids using distracting backgrounds like crowded templates or unrelated images in the presentations. It focuses on simple, clean backgrounds to keep attention on your key content.

10. Don’t Overwhelm With Walls of Text

We covered the 6×6 text limit rule earlier. But even with 6 lines and 6 words, slides can become text walls without good visual breakdown. Big blocks of text are tiring to read and make retainment tough.

Instead, thoughtfully chunk text into concise sections. Use headers, subheaders, and bullet points to organize key bits. Align text left for easier scanning. Supplement with supporting imagery. Breaking up text improves comprehension drastically.

11. Don’t Rely On Boring Bullets

Speaking of bulleted lists, bullet overkill is another issue that turns slides into snore fests. Slides crammed with back-to-back bullet points lose audiences fast. The endless text blurs together with minimal memorability.

For memorable content, limit bullets to key takeaways only. Then reinforce each point visually – a photo, icon, chart, etc. Quality visuals boost memorability way more than a slide stuffed with 11 bullet points ever could.

12. Don’t Use Inconsistent Formatting

Remember, formatting matters! Shifting layouts, fonts, and color schemes appear disjointed and sloppy. The mismatched design screams amateur hour.

Establish a visual style and stick to it slide to slide. Use the same fonts, limit your color palette, and space elements consistently. Most importantly – maintain alignment across all slides. With unified branding, your presentation will look polished and professional.

SlidesAI ensures your presentation formatting stays consistent slide to slide by applying your preferred color palette, fonts, etc through its intelligent algorithms.

13. Don’t Include Unnecessary Animations

Animations can be great for guiding the viewer’s eye and demonstrating motion. But avoid going overboard. Excessive animations, sounds, and movement become more distracting than engaging.

Use animations subtly and intentionally . Emphasize only key points and important transitions with simple builds or entrance effects. Anything superfluous, whether flying text or whooshing sounds, pulls attention away rather than enhancing content.

Keep it simple and purposeful. Let smooth, minimal animations work behind the scenes rather than take center stage away from your narrative.

14. Don’t Use Unsupported Graphics

Only include images, photos, charts, etc that directly support the ideas and messaging in your presentation. Don’t insert fluffy visuals that have no clear tie to your content.

Every visual aid you present should clearly reinforce your narrative rather than derail tangents. Unsupported graphics quickly become distractions. They also undermine your credibility if audiences can’t grasp the connection.

Keep it focused. Be intentional about every visual you include. Remove anything superfluous that doesn’t serve a purpose.

15. Don’t Plagiarize Content

While it’s fine to find inspiration from other presentations, copying chunks of text or visuals without proper attribution is unethical. Never pass off someone else’s hard work as your own.

Always credit sources directly within your presentation if incorporating external ideas, quotes, charts, images, etc. Also, avoid violating copyright laws by inserting visuals without licensing them appropriately first.

Your presentation should showcase your unique ideas, voice, and message. Ensure you create original content or properly cite anything derived from others. Your integrity depends on it.

16. Don’t Wing Your Speech

With great slides completed, don’t just wing it on presentation day. The live delivery is just as crucial. Invest time to refine your pacing, transitions, slide timing, and flow.

Practice your speech thoroughly with the deck so your narrative and movements feel natural. Nail down transition phrases between slides. Get 100% comfortable presenting your content.

With stellar slides and a well-rehearsed delivery, your presentation is sure to wow audiences from start to finish.

A girl student presenting in front of class

There you have it – 16 PowerPoint dos and don’ts for creating memorable, professional PowerPoint presentations. Apply the dos to make high-impact slides, and avoid the don’ts for mistake-free presentations.

Put these PowerPoint best practices into play and watch your ordinary slides transform into extraordinary visual stories. Your audiences will be engaged from start to finish.

But even with these tips, crafting stunning presentations can be time-intensive. Instead, let SlidesAI do the work for you using the power of AI.

SlidesAI integrates with Google Slides and PowerPoint (coming soon) to instantly generate professional presentation decks from your content. Simply input your text – SlidesAI will turn them into visually cohesive slides designed for audience engagement.

SlidesAI saves tons of time by handling slide layouts, formats, graphic design, and branding tailored to you. The AI delivers presentation-ready slides in seconds.

Take your Presentation skills from amateur to pro – try SlidesAI for free today!

What are the dos and don’ts of PowerPoint presentations?

Key PowerPoint dos include simple designs, concise text, quality visuals, consistency, accessibility, custom icons, subtle animations, and practice. Don’ts involve distracting backgrounds, walls of text, boring bullets, inconsistent formatting, excessive animations, irrelevant graphics, plagiarism, and winging it.

What is the 5 by 5 rule in PowerPoint?

The 5 by 5 rule recommends having no more than 5 lines of text per slide and 5 words per line. This keeps each slide focused and text easy to digest. Too much text overwhelms audiences.

What is the 7 rule on a PowerPoint presentation?

The 7 rule states that your slides should have no more than 7 bullet points. Like the 5 by 5 rule, this maintains simplicity for the audience. More than 7 bulleted items become hard to retain.

What are the 5 rules of PowerPoint?

5 key rules are: don’t cram slides with too much text, minimize slides for emphasis, utilize quality visuals, stick to a consistent format, and limit animations. Following these makes presentations professional, clean, and engaging.

Frequently Asked Questions

Key PowerPoint dos include simple designs, concise text, quality visuals, consistency, accessibility, custom icons, subtle animations, and practice. Don'ts involve distracting backgrounds, walls of text, boring bullets, inconsistent formatting, excessive animations, irrelevant graphics, plagiarism, and winging it.

5 key rules are: don't cram slides with too much text, minimize slides for emphasis, utilize quality visuals, stick to a consistent format, and limit animations. Following these makes presentations professional, clean, and engaging.

Save Time and Effortlessly Create Presentations with SlidesAI

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Home Blog Presentation Ideas How to Create a 5 Minutes Presentation

How to Create a 5 Minutes Presentation

Cover for 5 Minutes Presentation Guide

Giving a 40-60-minute speech isn’t a synonym for success. Sticking to shorter presentation formats can increase the impact of large-format events. Among its many advantages, allowing multiple speakers to give their insights rises above everything. Still, presenters often struggle to be concise, as they aim to disclose as much content as possible, ending up overdoing the allotted time or delivering rushed-up presentations.

In this article, we’ll share our experience on how to master the art of 3-5 minute presentations, keeping your speech concise while using powerful graphics to connect with the audience.

Table of Contents

What is a 5 Minutes Presentation?

What are the requirements of 5 minutes presentations, how many slides for a 5 minute presentation, 5 minute presentation ideas, how to make a 5 minute presentation, common mistakes to avoid in 5-minute presentations, recommended templates for 5 minute presentations, final words.

A 5-minute presentation is a short talk designed to convey a specific message, idea, information, or argument within a limited timeframe, between three to five minutes – the latter being the average duration. Due to the brevity, these presentations require careful planning and preparation to ensure the content is concise, focused, and impactful. 

We can define a five-minute presentation’s must-have(s) in seven different categories.

Objective Definition

The purpose of your talk has to be clear from the presentation planning phase. This implies acknowledging whether you intend to inform, persuade, inspire, or instruct your audience on a given topic.

On this behalf, we made a list of frameworks to help you pinpoint the core objective of your presentation:

  • SPIN (Situation, Problem, Implication, Need-payoff): Intended for sales strategy or customer-driven presentations. The focus is set on understanding the audience’s situation, presenting the problems, implications, and potential benefits of a proposed solution.
  • AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action): The AIDA framework is extremely popular in marketing campaigns and sales presentations. You can learn more about this approach for engaging presentations by checking our guide on the AIDA model .
  • SCQA (Situation, Complication, Question, Answer): Intended for problem-solving meetings and business presentations. The SCQA framework establishes a context and its challenges, raises a question, and provides solutions for it.
  • Minto Pyramid Principle: This unconventional approach is used for business presentations and reports, and was developed by Barbara Minto at McKinsey & Company in the 1970s . We start by stating the conclusion or core recommendation, then organize the information that supports your statement in a logical flow. By implementing this approach, you inspire the audience to think critically about the presented scenario, while discussing complex ideas in an easier-to-digest format due to its hierarchical organization of ideas.
  • Monroe’s Motivated Sequence: A framework with a focus on persuasive presentations. It is structured by five pillars recognized by its author, Alan H. Monroe : Attention, Need, Satisfaction, Visualization, and Action. 

SCQA slide in 5 Minute Presentation preparation

Concise Content

“How many words in a 5-minute speech” is a commonly asked question by beginner presenters. The average range for seasoned speakers is 130-150 words per minute in a fluent speech, and depending on the topic, that can go slower (technical-based presentations) or faster (motivational presentations, like the ones delivered by Tony Robbins ). 

Therefore, for a 5-minute speech, you might aim for:

  • At 130 words per minute: 130×5=650 words
  • At 150 words per minute: 150×5=750 words

That calculation can help you curate the script for your speech. In general lines, our expertise tells us that selecting a topic that can be covered within 5 minutes is roughly 60% of the job. After effectively selecting a topic, you must restrict the content to 2-3 main points to remain within the time limit and end your presentation in style. 

Presentation Structure

In more laid-back scenarios, presentations can lean toward a conversational mode rather than a strict agenda. Still, we ought to ensure the presentation structure contains an Introduction, a Body, and a Conclusion. 

The Introduction helps us familiarize the audience with what’s expected out of your presentation. Additionally, it is our chance to make a good first impression . Knowing how to start your presentation guarantees audience engagement from the initial moments of your delivery.

Moving to the Body, this is where facts are laid out and backed up using evidence or examples to support your view. Visual aids can contribute to minimizing the need for lengthy text walls. 

Finally, the Conclusion summarizes the key takeaways and, when applicable, brings a call to action in the format of thought-provoking statements, data shared, an irresistible offer, and plenty of other scenarios.

Audience Engagement

Connecting with the audience is vital, especially in short formats like Pecha Kucha presentations . Your speech pace and body language are significant factors that contribute to how the audience perceives your interest in their time. 

Aim for a relaxed but confident attitude, as if you were passionately talking about a topic with a group of acquaintances. This reinforces your authority in the topic you deliver, as being anxious or rushing through the presentation only speaks of a lack of interest.

Apply professional presentation techniques like storytelling for presentations or harnessing the power of visual communication strategies to make your message memorable. 

Usage of storytelling metaphors in 5 minute presentation

Audience Acknowledgement

Tailoring your presentation for the audience’s interest is the first step every presenter must take to guarantee success, especially if we’re another speaker in large-scale events. In some niches, like academic presentations, it is vital as some of the audience may not feel connected with your research topic. 

Based on information gathered from our customer’s feedback, a good recipe to connect with your audience is to work with a sales approach in mind and create your “ideal audience persona.” This would be your attendee who’s 100% connected with what you intend to share. Compare and contrast demographics with the public you know will attend, and find the common points and where you need to adjust your expectations to meet the audience’s interest.

If the event format allows for it, be ready to present questions at the end of your presentation that may drive the interest of a Q&A session.

Visual Aids

Slides featuring infographics , dashboards , or storytelling-based illustrations help to attract the spectator’s interest and increase the retention rate, as research proves it’s easier to recall pictures than words . As previously mentioned, leveraging graphics helps us reduce our slides’ word count.

Infographics in 3-5 Minutes Presentation

Other presentation aids , like videos, audio, and even sensory elements such as smells, can drive a broad range of emotional responses within the audience. It’s worth exploiting this route if your presentation aims to persuade or motivate the spectators. 

Time Management

Last but not least, time management is an etiquette rule of respect for fellow presenters. Your content has to fit within the 5-minute limit, including transition times and variations in your delivery speed.

A good presenter is an adaptable one. Be ready to adjust your speech on the fly if you find yourself running short or long on time or if the audience’s interest drives the conversation briefly away from your intended destination.

Defining how many slides is a 5 minute presentation isn’t an automatic task. Some topics can be quickly resolved following the premises of the 1-2-3 rule for presentations, applying:

  • One main message: Your presentation should center around a single, clear main message or idea. This ensures focus and helps your audience grasp the core of your presentation without getting lost in details. 
  • Two supporting points: Support your main message with two strong, relevant points or arguments. This structure helps provide depth to your presentation without overwhelming your audience with too much information. 
  • Three examples or pieces of evidence: For each supporting point, provide three examples, pieces of evidence, or data points to substantiate your arguments. This reinforces your message and helps in making your case more convincing.

In short, implementing this practice can result in a range between 5 and 10 slides in your 5-minute presentation. More complex topics, like medical presentations or scientific conferences, cannot be summarized easily, as graphs require one full slide for accurate data visualization. In this case, weigh the critical points your presentation must cover, assign a maximum of 3 slides per crucial point, and avoid filler content.

Googling around you can come across lists with 200, 60, 40, and plenty other title combinations referring to 5 minute presentation ideas. Despite it being a good starter to brainstorm potential topics or angles for your presentation, we shall introduce our method to implement AI tools to come up with 5 minute presentation topics. The following instructions apply to ChatGPT , Gemini (Bard) or Bing.

  • Consider the niche in which you want to deliver a 5 minute presentation. 
  • Gather the main keywords around the topic you intend to present. For example, if you want to deliver a presentation about artificial intelligence, the following keywords may suit your needs as well: AI, artificial intelligence chatbot, types of artificial intelligence, artificial intelligence solutions, what is artificial intelligence.
  • Open your AI tool of preference and write the following prompt: “Give me a list of 20 5-minute presentation ideas in the IT niche that fit these keywords: AI, artificial intelligence chatbot, types of artificial intelligence, artificial intelligence solutions, what is artificial intelligence.”

ChatGPT generated 5-minute presentation ideas

And this is the list generated by ChatGPT-4

  • Introduction to Artificial Intelligence: Basics of AI, its history, and evolution.
  • Exploring AI Technologies: A dive into machine learning, neural networks, and deep learning.
  • Types of Artificial Intelligence: From narrow (or weak) AI to general (or strong) AI, and superintelligence.
  • AI Chatbots: Revolutionizing Customer Service: How chatbots are changing the customer service landscape across industries.
  • Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare: Discussing AI solutions for diagnostics, treatment recommendations, and patient care.
  • The Role of AI in Autonomous Vehicles: Examining how AI technologies power self-driving cars.
  • Ethical Considerations in AI: The moral implications of AI in decision-making and privacy concerns.
  • AI in Cybersecurity: Using artificial intelligence to predict, detect, and respond to cyber threats.
  • The Impact of AI on Job Markets: How AI is reshaping employment opportunities and the workforce.
  • Machine Learning Algorithms Explained: An overview of popular algorithms and their applications in AI.
  • AI and Big Data: How AI algorithms process and analyze large datasets to extract meaningful insights.
  • Natural Language Processing (NLP) in AI: Understanding how AI interprets, understands, and generates human language.
  • AI in Finance: The use of artificial intelligence in fraud detection, algorithmic trading, and personalized banking.
  • Artificial Intelligence for Environmental Sustainability: Exploring AI solutions for climate change, conservation, and sustainable energy.
  • AI and Robotics: How AI is applied in robotics for automation, exploration, and manufacturing.
  • Deep Learning and Neural Networks: An introduction to the architecture of neural networks and their significance in AI.
  • Implementing AI Solutions in Small Businesses: Practical AI applications for improving efficiency and productivity in SMEs.
  • The Future of AI: Predictions and emerging trends in artificial intelligence technologies.
  • AI in Education: Personalized learning, automated grading, and AI’s role in educational institutions.
  • Ethics and Bias in AI: Addressing the challenges of bias in AI algorithms and ensuring ethical AI development.

In this section, we will apply the explained suggestions earlier, approaching a real use case of a motivational speaker addressing an audience of marketing professionals. The speaker has to deliver a 5 minute presentation for a large onsite event.

Defining the Objective & Core Message

Our presenter is faced with the challenge of highlighting the importance of data analysis in marketing these days, and why marketing professionals should be adaptable to the latest trends. Therefore, using Minto’s Pyramid Principle, the presenter who already knows the answer – that hunch-based decisions need to be turned into data-driven decisions – plans how to convey the importance of that statement into the presentation’s flow.

Then, a powerful hook comes to mind on how to start this presentation: “Today, I want to share why embracing change isn’t just necessary; it’s our most powerful tool for growth in the marketing world.” Since that statement can sound somewhat vague, the presenter opts for a quote to impact the audience. A definition of what Social Listening is, indicating the connection between data and consumer behavior analysis.

Using an intro slide with quote as a hook for 5-minute presentation

Concise Content Tailored for the Audience

Research or inquire about the audience’s background in marketing. Are they novices or seasoned professionals? What challenges are they facing? Use this information to shape your presentation content.

In our presenter’s case, the event’s organizer gave some basic information about the demographics and audience’s background. Returning to the “ideal audience persona” concept, this presenter’s audience consists of mid-level marketing professionals facing rapid industry changes. Some already have experience working with data analytics but couldn’t extract the full potential. Therefore, rather than losing time with basics, the presenter prepares a compelling dashboard slide showing metrics of how working with data helped a client grow its revenue rate by 19% in three months.

Dashboard slide in 3-5 minutes presentation

The time limit for this presentation is 6 minutes in total, as a 1-minute Q&A session is contemplated. Therefore, using our word-per-minute calculation, the presenter opts for a 5 minute speech word count of 600 words, as it’s best to impact with powerful visuals and data storytelling rather than to rush the speech. As the recommended slide deck length for this presentation format is between 5 and 10 slides, the presenter opts for 3 extra slides, totaling 13 slides, since the two main points require 2-3 slides each.

The Introduction for this presentation is a powerful statement, as we mentioned above, taking one full minute to deliver the phrase and share the information that backs up such a statement.

The Body will take 3 minutes to be presented, and it shall cover a three-tier structure with the following premises:

  • Challenge: “The digital marketing landscape is evolving faster than ever before, leaving many behind.”
  • Strategy: “Yet, some marketers are thriving by adopting agile methodologies and data-driven strategies.”
  • Success Story: “Take, for example, a small business that doubled its online engagement and grew its revenue rate by 19% in three months just by simply listening to its audience through social media analytics.”

The Conclusion takes another minute, using a powerful slide to leave a lasting thought that the audience can dwell on.

Conclusion slide in a 5 minute presentation

As the format is brief, the presenter will use powerful graphics to boost audience engagement. Additionally, there’s a short exercise at the beginning of the presentation where the speaker promptly says: “Turn to the person next to you and share one change you’ve embraced in your marketing strategy this year that made a difference.” This is a fine example of how to implement interactive presentation techniques to boost audience engagement.

Leveraging this kind of strategy helps the audience to connect with the importance of making changes in the marketing strategy of their work environments, but not just any change, something that’s measurable and has a significant impact. The presenter expects that not many members can successfully relate to change with results due to their inexperience in marketing data analytics – a piece of information disclosed by the event’s organizer – so the remaining of the presentation consists of ‘wowing’ the audience on the importance of data and how to measure that impact to stay tuned with the latest trends.

Although it seems an easy-to-adapt format, presenters working under 5-minute presentation can face some challenges that affect the overall outcome of their presentation delivery. Most of these presentation mistakes apply to any kind of presentation. In particular, we consider the following list as beginner mistakes we can easily prevent.

  • Using Jargon or Complex Language: This can alienate your audience. Use clear, accessible language.
  • Reading from Slides: This is literally “death by PowerPoint.” Use slides as a visual aid, not a script.
  • Overuse of Animations or Transitions: While they can be engaging, too many can be distracting and appear unprofessional.

Check the following slide decks and PPT templates to maximize your performance in 3-5 minute presentations.

1. 5 Minute Business Marketing Presentation Template

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Create eye-catching marketing presentations by using this best PPT template with a clean layout and wavy backgrounds. The information can be structured around the included icons, maximizing the retention rate by giving an area to focus on just the core information to be disclosed.

Use This Template

2. Business Executive 5-Minute Presentation Template

a powerpoint presentation for

Geared toward business presentations, this slide deck layout contains cutting-edge graphics that grab your audience’s interest. It can be easily customized to speak about your company’s growth process, reach out to potential investors, or even for non-business topics.

3. Modern Hexagon 5-Minute Pitch Deck PowerPoint Template

a powerpoint presentation for

Another clean layout template with vivid colors to highlight the information shared. This professional PPT slide deck helps us discuss data or compare features between competitor products in the blink of an eye. The color palette uses gradients to transition between sections smoothly.

4. Kaleidoscope 5-Minute Company Profile PowerPoint Template

a powerpoint presentation for

Although it is intended for company profiles or company overview presentations, this highly visual PPT template can be repurposed for many niches. Due to its limited-space placeholder text areas, the 5 minute speech word count can be significantly reduced, aiming for concise content.

5. Academic 5-Minute Presentation Template

a powerpoint presentation for

An ideal template for presenting thesis dissertations, this slide deck features designs to introduce the scope of our research, problem statement, methodology used, outcomes, and their significance while preserving a cohesive aesthetic.

As we can see, concise presentation formats like the 5 minute presentation have their own challenges when we strive for quality. Consider rehearsing your presentation multiple times, opting for the slideshow mode , to spot any areas where you can trim the speech or change text for graphics. 

Speak reasonably, and remember it’s best to fall short some seconds and allow for a Q&A session rather than rushing and not giving a proper closure to your speech.

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AI presentation maker

When lack of inspiration or time constraints are something you’re worried about, it’s a good idea to seek help. Slidesgo comes to the rescue with its latest functionality—the AI presentation maker! With a few clicks, you’ll have wonderful slideshows that suit your own needs . And it’s totally free!

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Generate presentations in minutes

We humans make the world move, but we need to sleep, rest and so on. What if there were someone available 24/7 for you? It’s time to get out of your comfort zone and ask the AI presentation maker to give you a hand. The possibilities are endless : you choose the topic, the tone and the style, and the AI will do the rest. Now we’re talking!

Customize your AI-generated presentation online

Alright, your robotic pal has generated a presentation for you. But, for the time being, AIs can’t read minds, so it’s likely that you’ll want to modify the slides. Please do! We didn’t forget about those time constraints you’re facing, so thanks to the editing tools provided by one of our sister projects —shoutouts to Wepik — you can make changes on the fly without resorting to other programs or software. Add text, choose your own colors, rearrange elements, it’s up to you! Oh, and since we are a big family, you’ll be able to access many resources from big names, that is, Freepik and Flaticon . That means having a lot of images and icons at your disposal!

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How does it work?

Think of your topic.

First things first, you’ll be talking about something in particular, right? A business meeting, a new medical breakthrough, the weather, your favorite songs, a basketball game, a pink elephant you saw last Sunday—you name it. Just type it out and let the AI know what the topic is.

Choose your preferred style and tone

They say that variety is the spice of life. That’s why we let you choose between different design styles, including doodle, simple, abstract, geometric, and elegant . What about the tone? Several of them: fun, creative, casual, professional, and formal. Each one will give you something unique, so which way of impressing your audience will it be this time? Mix and match!

Make any desired changes

You’ve got freshly generated slides. Oh, you wish they were in a different color? That text box would look better if it were placed on the right side? Run the online editor and use the tools to have the slides exactly your way.

Download the final result for free

Yes, just as envisioned those slides deserve to be on your storage device at once! You can export the presentation in .pdf format and download it for free . Can’t wait to show it to your best friend because you think they will love it? Generate a shareable link!

What is an AI-generated presentation?

It’s exactly “what it says on the cover”. AIs, or artificial intelligences, are in constant evolution, and they are now able to generate presentations in a short time, based on inputs from the user. This technology allows you to get a satisfactory presentation much faster by doing a big chunk of the work.

Can I customize the presentation generated by the AI?

Of course! That’s the point! Slidesgo is all for customization since day one, so you’ll be able to make any changes to presentations generated by the AI. We humans are irreplaceable, after all! Thanks to the online editor, you can do whatever modifications you may need, without having to install any software. Colors, text, images, icons, placement, the final decision concerning all of the elements is up to you.

Can I add my own images?

Absolutely. That’s a basic function, and we made sure to have it available. Would it make sense to have a portfolio template generated by an AI without a single picture of your own work? In any case, we also offer the possibility of asking the AI to generate images for you via prompts. Additionally, you can also check out the integrated gallery of images from Freepik and use them. If making an impression is your goal, you’ll have an easy time!

Is this new functionality free? As in “free of charge”? Do you mean it?

Yes, it is, and we mean it. We even asked our buddies at Wepik, who are the ones hosting this AI presentation maker, and they told us “yup, it’s on the house”.

Are there more presentation designs available?

From time to time, we’ll be adding more designs. The cool thing is that you’ll have at your disposal a lot of content from Freepik and Flaticon when using the AI presentation maker. Oh, and just as a reminder, if you feel like you want to do things yourself and don’t want to rely on an AI, you’re on Slidesgo, the leading website when it comes to presentation templates. We have thousands of them, and counting!.

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5 Of The Best Free PowerPoint Templates For Any Project Or Presentation

Y ou don't need to start from scratch if you want to create a captivating presentation to hook audiences. PowerPoint offers a range of free templates you can use for a variety of purposes. Whether you're planning a personal project or making a plan for your next business idea, PowerPoint templates can save you a great deal of time building custom slides.

To access templates in PowerPoint, all you need is a Microsoft account, which grants you access to Microsoft 365 online (formerly Microsoft Office 365). Click on PowerPoint from the sidebar, then access the search bar at the top of the window to search for templates. The templates cover multiple purposes for use at work and home. While a fair amount of templates are available to premium members only, there are still a large number of free templates hidden away in Microsoft's expansive library. This is good news for those who've been drawn away from premium subscriptions after Microsoft announced price hikes for Microsoft 365 subscriptions .

While PowerPoint is widely used for giving basic presentations, it can also be incredibly practical for other occasions, such as planning events, mapping out project timelines, or giving an effective sales pitch. Check out these five free templates from PowerPoint.

Read more: Major PC Monitor Brands Ranked Worst To Best

Blue Spheres Pitch Deck

The Blue Spheres Pitch Deck template offers a stylish and corporate look if you want to give the best first impression for your next product or service. The template offers a minimal color palette alongside tools specifically targeted towards businesses. There are plenty of opportunities to showcase statistics, such as projected revenue growth, thanks to the template's multiple graph types and timelines.

The opening slides feature everything you need to introduce your product to investors and other companies. There's an About Us section followed by a Problem and Solution slide so you can clearly describe your company's aim. The template also offers multiple section dividers, so you can pick a style that best reflects your brand image. Several corporate images are featured throughout the template for a professional and polished look. However, if you're unhappy with any images, you can easily swap them. Right-click a picture, then select Change Picture to replace an image. PowerPoint preserves any image effects when replacing images, saving plenty of time and effort when editing your slides.

Infographic Resume

If you're building a resume, the last thing employers want to do is look through page after page of information. Infographic resume , a free template offered by PowerPoint, condenses all the details of your resume into one informative page.

On the right side of the template is an Experience column that you can use to showcase an informative work history. Most of the template is built from text boxes, so all you have to do is double-click a box and input your information for each category. The template neatly structures essential fields for your resume, including ones for company names, dates, job descriptions, and names of colleges.

Featured on the left side of the template are sections for a short personal profile, education, and any relevant skills to showcase. The Education section features customizable fields for names of colleges, the dates you attended them, and what degrees you acquired. At the bottom of the template is a section for your contact details, including a name, phone number, and any URLs you wish to add. Adding online links to your resume is a great way to show your work in a digital portfolio . Overall, PowerPoint's infographic template presents an appealing display to showcase your talents while remaining concise.

Event Planning Deck

PowerPoint's Event Planning Deck is a great option for organizing charity or fundraising events, but it can be tailored toward several other types of events. The template features essential tools for effective planning, including RSVP tracking, food and drink vendors, and budgeting.

Planning events can be a nightmare, especially if you're a person who writes things down only to forget them. PowerPoint's event planning deck template brings all the necessary details for your next event into one concise presentation to avoid a desk littered with sticky notes.

The Overview slide outlines key event details such as the date, location, and number of guests. This way, you can view all important information for your event at a glance. The remaining slides provide plenty of space to organize different aspects of your event. If you have several catering and entertainment options, the budgeting table includes pre-made columns for up to three choices. You can easily add more options by right-clicking a cell and selecting Insert. Whether you're hosting a party, school fayre, or a charity event, PowerPoint's Event Planning Deck is an excellent choice for arranging small events in minimal time.

Business Brainstorming Template

PowerPoint is probably not the first program that springs to mind when thinking about the best brainstorming tool for your team. The software does offer a range of effective brainstorming tools, however, including a great business brainstorming presentation template to promote productive ideation sessions.

Brainstorming can be a mess, so it's helpful to stick to a template, especially if you have some ground rules. The template traverses a typical brainstorming session, with slides covering an agenda, brainstorming objectives, and relevant next steps. Also included is a Rules section so you can ensure all your employees get a fair share of time to discuss their ideas.

The Summarize slide is a useful tool to help you process all the information covered in brainstorming sessions. You can use this slide to determine how to select ideas or restate decision-making criteria. While no slide is dedicated to creating a brainstorming diagram, PowerPoint offers unlimited potential to create powerful mind maps with its library of tools and shapes. Using a free version of PowerPoint online , you can access a range of editing tools underneath the Insert and Draw tabs to map out visual ideas. You can also add speaker notes to your PowerPoint presentation to capture ideas from specific team members.

Bold Project Timeline

Having a clear vision for your next project helps you stay on track and focus on the necessary steps toward your goal. PowerPoint's Bold Project Timeline template provides a neat step-by-step structure to help turn your next idea into a success.

The template offers diagrams for project timelines and outlines, featuring two of each. Like other templates, the project timeline uses text boxes so you can easily edit information. The timeline is broken into five steps (which unfortunately can't be edited), but you can add extra lines as sub-steps if desired.

The Project Outline slides utilize a different approach, which is arguably even simpler to use. Double-click the template to open the editing view, where you can edit headers and descriptions simultaneously. Also featured in the template is a Project Milestones slide, which lets you edit key dates and project deadlines.

You might think of PowerPoint purely as a tool for giving presentations, but there's a lot more it has to offer. Whether you're crafting an effective resume, building a project plan, or impressing investors with a business idea, you can find dozens of practical templates to use at no cost.

Read the original article on SlashGear .

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