Create and Manage Slides in Microsoft PowerPoint 2016

When you create a presentation from a design template, the only slide that is immediately available is the title slide. It’s up to you to add more slides for the content that you want the presentation to include. You can create slides based on slide templates that are designed to hold specific types of content, or you can copy existing slides from other presentations.

When the presentation you’re developing has multiple slides, you can organize them into sections. Sections are not visible to the audience, but they make it easier to work with slide content in logical segments. A logical presentation and an overall consistent look, punctuated by variations that add weight exactly where it is needed, can enhance the likelihood that your intended audience will receive the message you want to convey.

This chapter guides you through procedures related to adding and removing slides, dividing presentations into sections, rearranging slides and sections, applying themes, and changing slide backgrounds.

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The content in this chapter is about slides in general, rather than the content of the slides. Chapters 4 through 8 of this book are about working with the various types of slide content.

Add and remove slides

The appearance and structure of slides is defined by the slide layouts associated with the slide master that is part of the design template. Slide layouts define the elements on specific types of slides, such as:

• Slide backgrounds and incorporated graphics.
• Text box locations, sizes, and formats.
• Default paragraph and character formats for each text box location.
• Standard headers or footers.

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Text boxes can contain static content that can’t be changed by the presentation author (for example, a company logo), or they can serve as placeholders that define the default formatting of content entered within the text box.

A slide master could have only one slide layout, but most have unique slide layouts for slides that display the presentation title, section titles, and various combinations of slide titles and content, and a blank slide with only the background. Each slide layout is named; the name suggests the primary application of the slide layout, but you aren’t limited to that suggestion; you can enter any type of content in any slide layout and modify the layout of any slide. The slide layouts that are available in a presentation are displayed on the New Slide menu.

SEE ALSO

For information about working with slide masters and slide layouts, see “Customize slide masters and layouts” in Chapter 12, “Create custom presentation elements.”

The structure and design of each slide layout is visible on its thumbnail

You can modify the built-in slide layouts, create your own slide layouts, or create entirely new sets of slide layouts called slide masters, and you can reset slides to match their slide layouts, or apply different slide layouts to existing slides.

Insert new slides

When you create a new slide, PowerPoint inserts it after the currently active slide. In a new presentation based on a standard PowerPoint template, a slide you add after the title slide has the Title And Content layout, and a slide added after a slide other than the title slide has the layout of the preceding slide.

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The Title And Content layout accommodates a title and either text or graphic content—a table, chart, diagram, picture, clip art image, or media clip

If you want to add a slide that has a different layout, you can select the layout when you insert the slide or you can change the slide layout after you create the slide.

To add a slide based on the default slide layout

1. Select the slide after which you want to add the new slide.

2. Do either of the following:

   • On the Home tab, in the Slides group, click the New Slide button (not its arrow).
   • Press Ctrl+M.

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You can reset slide content to the slide layout defaults by clicking the Reset button in the Slides group on the Home tab. If you add content to a slide and then realize that the content would work better with a different layout, you can change the slide layout by clicking the Layout arrow in the Slides group, and then clicking the slide layout you want to apply.

To add a slide based on any slide layout

1. Select the slide after which you want to add the new slide.
2. On the Home tab, in the Slides group, click the New Slide arrow to display the New Slide gallery and menu.
3. In the gallery, click a slide layout thumbnail to add a slide based on that slide layout.

Copy and import slides and content

You can reuse slides from one presentation in another, in one of two ways: you can copy the slides from the original presentation to the new presentation, or you can use the Reuse Slides tool, which displays the content of an original presentation and allows you to choose the slides you want to insert in the new presentation.

Within a presentation, you can duplicate an existing slide to reuse it as the basis for a new slide. You can then customize the duplicated slide instead of having to create it from scratch.

If you frequently include a certain type of slide in your presentations, such as a slide that introduces you to the audience, you don’t have to re-create the slide for each presentation. You can easily reuse a slide from one presentation in a different presentation. (You can use the same techniques to reuse a slide from someone else’s presentation to standardize the appearance or structure of slide content with other members of your organization.) The slide takes on the formatting of its new presentation unless you specify otherwise.

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PowerPoint automatically applies the new theme to reused slides

If the content of your presentation exists in a document, you can configure that content in outline format and then import the outline into PowerPoint. For the import process to work smoothly, format the document content that you want to port into the presentation as headings. PowerPoint converts some styles into slide headings, converts some styles into bullet points, and ignores other styles.

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A slide created from an imported outline

The following table illustrates how PowerPoint converts Word document styles to PowerPoint slide elements.

To select a single slide

1. Do any of the following:

   • In Normal view, click the slide in the Thumbnails pane.
   • In Outline view, click the slide header in the Outline pane.
   • In Slide Sorter view, click the slide in the Slide pane.

To select multiple slides

1. In Normal view, Outline view, or Slide Sorter view, click the first slide you want to select.

2. Do either of the following:

   • To select a contiguous series of slides, press and hold the Shift key, and then click the last slide you want to select.
   • To select noncontiguous slides, press and hold the Ctrl key, and then click each additional slide you want to select.

To insert a copy of a slide immediately following the original slide

1. Display the presentation in Normal view.
2. In the Thumbnails pane, right-click the slide that you want to copy, and then click Duplicate Slide.

To insert a copy of one or more slides anywhere in a presentation

1. Display the presentation in Normal view or Slide Sorter view.

2. Do either of the following to copy a slide or slides:

   • Select the slide thumbnail or thumbnails, and then press Ctrl+C or, on the Home tab, in the Clipboard group, click the Copy button.
   • Right-click a slide thumbnail, and then click Copy.

3. Do either of the following to insert the slide copy or copies:

   • Click the thumbnail that you want to insert the slide copy or copies after, or click the empty space after the thumbnail. Then press Ctrl+V or, on the Home tab, in the Clipboard group, click the Paste button.

   • Right-click where you want to insert the slide copy or copies, and then, in the Paste Options section of the shortcut menu, click the Use Destination Theme button or the Keep Source Formatting button.

     

     You can match the destination theme, retain the source theme, or paste as a picture

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   When PowerPoint displays the paste options, press H to use the destination style or K to use the source style.

4. Repeat step 3 to paste additional copies of the slide or slides into the presentation.

To insert a slide from another presentation

1. Open the source and destination presentations in PowerPoint. Display each presentation in Normal view or Slide Sorter view.
2. Display the two PowerPoint windows side by side.
3. In the source presentation, select the slide or slides you want to copy.

4. Drag the selection to the destination presentation. A horizontal line between slide thumbnails in Normal view or a vertical line between thumbnails in Slide Sorter view indicates the location at which PowerPoint will insert the slides.

   PowerPoint creates copies of the slides and applies the destination theme to the copies.

Or

1. Display the destination presentation in Normal view.
2. On the Home tab or Insert tab, in the Slides group, click the New Slide arrow.
3. On the New Slide menu, below the gallery, click Reuse Slides to open the Reuse Slides pane on the right side of the screen.

4. Click the Browse button, and then click Browse File. In the Browse dialog box, browse to the folder that contains the presentation you want to use slides from, and then double-click the presentation.

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   If you’ve previously connected to the presentation you want to import slides from, you can click the down arrow in the Insert Slide From box to expand the list, and then click the presentation in the list, or click the presentation file name in the Open section of the Reuse Slide pane.

   Or

   Click the Browse button, and then click Browse Slide Library. In the Select a Slide Library window, browse to the slide library that contains the slide or slides you want to insert.

   SEE ALSO

   

   For information about slide libraries, see the sidebar “SharePoint slide libraries” in this topic.

   The Reuse Slides pane displays thumbnails of the available slides.

5. In the Reuse Slides pane, click the thumbnail of each slide you want to use to insert that slide into your presentation.

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   The reused slide takes on the design of the presentation in which it is inserted. If you want the slide to retain the formatting from the source presentation instead, select the Keep Source Formatting check box at the bottom of the Reuse Slides pane.

6. Close the Reuse Slides pane.

To prepare a source document to import as a presentation

1. Enter the content that you want to appear on the slides (and any other content) in a document.

2. Review the styles applied to the content you want to include in the presentation.

   • Title, Subtitle, Heading 1, and any list items will convert to slide titles.
   • Heading 2 through Heading 8 will convert to bulleted list items.
3. Save and close the document.

To create a presentation by importing a Word document

1. On the Open page of the Backstage view, click Browse.
2. In the file type list, click All Files (*.*).
3. Browse to the folder that contains the Word document that contains the slide title and bullet point information.
4. Double-click the document to create a new presentation.
5. Select all the slides in the new presentation, and then on the Home tab, in the Slides group, click the Reset button.
6. Apply the design template you want.

SEE ALSO

For information about applying design templates to presentations, see “Create presentations” in Chapter 2, “Create and manage presentations.”

To create slides in an existing presentation by importing a Word document

1. Select the slide after which you want to insert the new slides.
2. On the Home tab or Insert tab, in the Slides group, click the New Slide arrow.
3. On the New Slide menu, below the gallery, click Slides from Outline to open the Insert Outline dialog box, which resembles the Open dialog box.
4. Use standard Windows techniques to browse to the folder that contains the Word document you want to use for the slide titles and content.
5. Double-click the document to insert slides based on its content.

Hide and delete slides

If you create a slide and then later realize that you don’t need it, you can delete it. If you don’t need the slide for a presentation to a specific audience but might need it later, you can hide the slide instead. Hidden slides aren’t presented in slide shows. They remain available from the Thumbnails pane, but their thumbnails are dimmed and slide numbers crossed through with a backslash.

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You can edit the content of hidden slides

When you select a hidden slide, the Hide Slide button on the Slide Show tab is shaded to indicate that the command is in effect. You can edit a hidden slide in the Slide pane just as you can any other, so you might use this feature to keep a slide that you’re still working on hidden until it’s final. You can unhide a slide to include it in the slide show.

To hide or unhide slides

1. Select the slide or slides you want to hide or unhide.

2. Do either of the following:

   • Right-click the selection, and then click Hide Slide.
   • On the Slide Show tab, in the Set Up group, click the Hide Slide button.

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The name of the Hide Slide command and button doesn’t change; when a hidden slide is active, the command and button are shaded.

To delete slides

1. Right-click a single slide, and then click Delete Slide.

Or

1. Select the slide or slides you want to delete.

2. Do any of the following:

   • Right-click the selection, and then click Delete Slide.
   • On the Home tab, in the Clipboard group, click Cut.
   • Press the Delete key.

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When you add or delete slides in a presentation, PowerPoint renumbers all the subsequent slides.