How To Apply Powerpoint Templates

In this epic PowerPoint tutorial, you lot'll acquire how to create a PowerPoint template from scratch.

What is a PowerPoint template and why practice you need one?

In short, a template is a set of pre-congenital slide layouts and defined formatting to help yous chop-chop create make consistent and professional PowerPoint presentations.

Below is an example of the properly built template you'll learn how to create in this tutorial.

Fourth dimension Saving Tip:Y'all tin save yourself a bunch of fourth dimension by first ownership a professional PowerPoint template and then tweaking it to meet your needs.

To encounter the 4 best places I recommend finding professional PowerPoint templates online (and why I like them), read my guide hither.

If you and your squad make lots of PowerPoint presentations, a properly built template can save you THOUSANDS of hours edifice and editing your slides (no joke).

On the flip side, if your template is broken (which many are), it can brand working in PowerPoint a nightmare.

Chances are that if your electric current PowerPoint template is difficult to work with, you are using a cleaved template. This tutorial volition help you gear up it (fast).

To learn how to create your ain custom PowerPoint theme (that you can utilise with your template), read my guide here.

Part #1. Creating Your PowerPoint Template Slide Backgrounds

In the first part of this tutorial, you'll notice how to create your own slide backgrounds and how to:

Build the overall frame for your template
Use and navigate the PowerPoint Slide Master (and how the Parent and Child
Slides work together)
Use the different paste special options
Add together a pattern background to your slide
Crop images to fit your entire slide background
Add a radial gradient fill to a shape with transparency
Add new guides and move them effectually on your Slide Master
And more!

Boosted template resources: If yous're not 100% articulate on what exactly a PowerPoint template is, read my guide here.

And for a listing of questions I recommend request yourself before y'all build your template, read my guide hither.

1. Set the colors for your template

The first step is to select a color scheme for your template. You can easily do that in the Design tab, nether Variants.

To choose a color scheme for your PowerPoint template, but:

Navigate to the Design tab
Open the More variants options
Click on Colors to open the dropdown
Select the color scheme you want to use

If you want to apply a color scheme that isn't listed here, you tin can create your own. To acquire how to create your ain custom PowerPoint theme, including colors, font combinations, and shape effects, read my guide here.

Selecting a new PowerPoint theme changes all the default colors y'all have to work with inside your presentation (allowing you to maintain consistent formatting throughout).

Your theme colors will exist reflected in all of your color dropdowns as pictured beneath (with pre-populated variants for those colors).

Note: Selecting your own custom theme colors does not replace the standard colors at the bottom of your formatting dropdowns. You cannot alter these Standard Colors, unfortunately.

2. Set the fonts for your template

To navigate to your PowerPoint Slide Master, simply:

Navigate to the View tab
Select the Slide Master control

The next stride is to select a font pairing for your template, which yous can also practise in the Pattern tab, under Variants.

Note: This is i of my top PowerPoint template tips, and is 1 you don't want to mess up. To encounter my 9 other meridian tricks for your PowerPoint templates, read my guide hither.

To cull a new font combination for your PowerPoint template, simply:

Navigate to the Design tab
Open the More variants options
Click on Fonts
Select the font combination you want to utilise

Subsequently selecting your new font combination, all the placeholders throughout your presentation will automatically update to your new font styles.

The power to make this kind of macro level formatting is one of the major benefits of creating a PowerPoint template. Yous gear up your formatting in one identify, and it updates throughout your entire presentation (astonishing!).

One time yous have your colors and fonts selected, y'all are ready to create the framework. This includes your slide backgrounds and other common design elements you volition want in your presentation.

3. Navigate to the Slide Primary View

In order to properly create the slide backgrounds for your template, you'll demand to create a presentation framework on the Slide Chief.

To choose a new font combination for your PowerPoint template, simply:

Navigate to the View tab
Select the Slide Master command

Inside the Slide Primary, you'll come across two sets of slides on the left every bit pictured beneath:

#1. The Parent Slide (the bigger slide) is where y'all want to make the macro-level edits that yous desire to see reflected on the majority of your slides. For example, this is likely where you will want to see things like your company logo or any corporate branding design chemical element.

#2. The Child Slides (the smaller slides) are where you want to customize the individual layouts. For case, your championship slides and divider slides may wait quite different from the balance of your slides, which is why they'll have their own Kid Slides.

Alert: Although y'all can delete the Child Slide layouts within a presentation, I don't recommend information technology.

As Julie Terberg and Echo Swinford signal out in their book on templates, "Building PowerPoint Templates Pace by Step with the Experts", if yous delete these Child Slide layouts, y'all are likely to encounter formatting bug and errors when copying and pasting betwixt your templates down the route.

So unless you are 300% sure you are never going to use these layouts (and nobody on the planet is e'er going to send you a slide deck with one of these layouts), I don't recommend deleting them.

4. Customize your Parent Slide background

At present that you are on your Slide Master, y'all'll want to start by formatting your Parent Slide.

That's because the formatting that you gear up on your Parent Slide will affect all of the other slide backgrounds within your template.

A. Choose your PowerPoint template's background

Next, you are going to format your slide background with the various design elements you desire for all your slides.

In the case below, I've chosen a pattern for my template that is minimalist and modern. You can download and insert any picture or blueprint yous want to use every bit your slide background epitome.

To expand your knowledge and larn how to create PowerPoint backgrounds using the Designer characteristic (and how to troubleshoot it), read our guide here.

B. Crop to Aspect Ratio

If yous are using a moving-picture show for your slide background, the fastest way to make it fit on your slide is to ingather it using the Aspect Ratio Crop tool. To do that, simply:

Select the background image you have pasted on the slide
Navigate to the Format tab
Open the Ingather dropdown
Open up the Aspect Ratio options
Cull your aspect ratio. In the picture above I chose 16:9 for widescreen to lucifer my slide dimensions (another mutual attribute ratio is 4:iii for printed slides).
Adjust your photograph within the frame
Hit the Crop command again or striking Esc on your keyboard

This will make resizing the prototype to fit your template much easier without having to worry nigh any warping.

To learn more than about the cropping pictures in PowerPoint, read our guide here.

C. Make full out your slide background

To make the image fit your entire slide infinite, at that place are 2 options.

Choice #1. You lot can simply drag the handlebars to expand the paradigm. Only make sure you lot agree the Shift key while you lot enlarge your epitome, so you don't accidentally warp information technology.

Option #two. You can resize your paradigm more precisely:

In the Shape Width box, enter 13.33 and hit Enter on your keyboard
Drag the image in the center to fit the entire slide

Notation: In my example in the video in a higher place, I wanted a smaller pattern. That's why I duplicated the groundwork paradigm so that I have 2 smaller images next to each other.

So I made sure to group the two images together and so that they function every bit a unit. To learn all about grouping in PowerPoint, cheque out our guide here.

The final example of the background shown below is the outcome of that. And because the image is assail the Parent Slide like this, past default information technology volition show up as all of the slides in my PowerPoint template.

Later on resizing your background image, you lot volition want to ship it back behind all other elements.

To send the image backward, simply:

Select your background paradigm
Navigate to the Motion-picture show Tools Format tab
Click on the Send Astern dropdown
From the dropdown bill of fare, select Ship to Back

This sends the background behind the text as shown in the picture below. This makes all the Parent Slide content placeholders visible again on your slide.

D. Create a semi-transparent gradient layer

With the slide background set for my PowerPoint template, I'm additionally going to make the slide background less visible past adding a semi-transparent layer.

That's because every bit you tin can run across in the movie beneath, the text is not crystal clear confronting the background paradigm I used. This will make it difficult for people to read my slides during a presentation.

In the steps below, I will use the quondam method (non-Function 365 subscription) for creating a transparent background in PowerPoint. If you have an Part 365 subscription and want to come across the brand-new way to create a transparent image, run across our guide here.

Stride #1. Insert and format a rectangle

To insert and format a rectangle in PowerPoint, simply:

From the Insert Tab, click on the Shapes gallery, and select a rectangle (mine is on my QAT).
Draw in the rectangle so that it covers your entire background image (for this to piece of work, your rectangle needs to be the same verbal size as the epitome you want to make transparent).
Remove its outline by going to the Shape Outline dropdown and selecting No Outline.

Step #2. Add together a gradient fill

With the rectangle nevertheless selected, make the post-obit adjustments:

Select your rectangle and click Format Shape to open the Format Shape dialog box. This gives you a wide variety of formatting options you tin can use to format your shape backgrounds for your template.
Select the Gradient fill.
In the Type dropdown, select Radial.
For the Direction, select the "from middle" option (in the middle).
In the Gradient stops bar, select the first gradient stop, and from the fill up Colour dropdown, select white. Under Transparency, enter 5 %. So that it nigh looks 100% white in the middle.
Side by side, select the 2d gradient bar and drag it to the correct. From the fill up Color dropdown, select white. For Transparency, enter 10%.
Then, select the tertiary gradient bar and drag it to the right. From the fill up Color dropdown, select white. For Transparency, enter x%.
Finally, select the last gradient bar and drag it to the right. From the make full Color dropdown, select white. For Transparency, enter 60%.

Using the slope fill options described above, your rectangle should expect similar mine, with some of your text haemorrhage through information technology.

Close the Format Shape pane and you're all set with your slope formatting.

As a final pace, right-click your slope rectangle and select Transport to Dorsum then Send Frontwards so that information technology sits behind your placeholders but on meridian of your pattern background.

v. Add a slide background design chemical element

Equally a side by side footstep, I'm going to add a bright bar down the right-side of my slide equally a nice blueprint chemical element. To do that, simply:

Navigate to theInsert tab and select theShapes dropdown.
Select aRectangle and describe it on the right-hand side of your slide. Brand certain to place it on the edge of your slide.
Select No Outline

Note: Make sure y'all are adding this to your Parent Slide and non a Child Slide. This automatically populates the design element on all the Kid Slides.

That's the power of creating a PowerPoint template – you add a design element in ane identify, and it shows upward throughout your presentation.

six. Add and edit your guides

In PowerPoint, guides help with formatting, positioning, and slide-to-slide consistency.

Consider guides as the anchors on your slide that help y'all to consistently align your objects. It's an optional step, simply I recommend adding them to your template.

To add guides to your PowerPoint template, merely:

Click on the View tab
Select Guides. Notice that at that place are ii guides: one vertical and one horizontal.
To move a guide, place your mouse over information technology, and when your cursor becomes a double-headed arrow, drag the guide to where you lot want it on your slide.

For now, I will simply place my guides on the edges of the slide, to create a "bleed area" in case part of the presentation gets cut off in print.

We will look at adding more guides in part #2 of this series.To add a new guide, just showtime dragging an existing one, and then hit the Ctrl key on your keyboard earlier you let become.

Depending on how you gear up your guides, they tell users where they should and shouldn't exist placing content on your slides.

Part #2. Setting up your template placeholders and footers

With your slide background at present set up up, let'southward boom down the following three placeholders on theParent Slide:

Title placeholder
Content placeholder
Appointment and time, Footer, and Slide Number placeholders

And even if y'all don't want to use these placeholders on all of your slides, it's however of import to set and format them on your Parent Slide.

Why? Considering if y'all don't, you run the risk of letting default formatting slip through the cracks and ruin an otherwise perfect template.

Later in this tutorial, you'll acquire how to tweak your slide layouts abroad from the Parent Slide if that'southward what you desire to exercise.

i. Format the Championship placeholder

In that location are a number of ways in which you tin format your placeholders and there is no correct or incorrect formatting.

Merely before we dive into that, let'due south talk about what placeholders are.Placeholders are blank spaces that are designated for sure types of content.

You lot ready these on your Slide Master so that they are locked when people fill them in when building their PowerPoint slides using your template.

3 keys to retrieve about your content placeholders are:

They can only be fix and edited (for real) on your Slide Chief.
Only text typed into your placeholders will show in the Outline View of your presentation.
Only text that has been typed into your placeholders will alter fonts automatically when you lot modify your theme'due south fonts.

To larn all about the Outline View in PowerPoint and how to use it, read our article here.

You tin can change the font size, alignment, size, position, etc. of your placeholders to encounter your requirements. Beneath I'll run yous through the near common formatting elements.

A. Alter the font size

Before you start formatting your placeholders, brand sure you lot are on your Parent Slide. Nosotros volition focus on formatting your Child Slide layouts later.

As a get-go step, allow'due south alter the font size of the championship placeholder:

Select your title placeholder
In the Font Size dialog box, enter 40 (or whatever size you want)

B. Resize and position the placeholder

Next, conform the size and position of your championship placeholder. To do that, simply select the placeholder and:

Utilise the 4-headed pointer cursor to move the placeholder to where you desire information technology on your slide.
With the placeholder nevertheless selected, drag the resizing handles (the eight little white circles) in or out to resize the placeholder.

There is no right size and position for your championship. You'll simply want to make certain that it fits your slide.

You'll also want to think about how much text you lot're expecting people to type into the placeholder for their slides. Brand sure the placeholder is big enough to fit the typical scenario.

C. Gear up your vertical text alignment

Next, set the vertical text alignment for your title. To practice that:

Select your title placeholder
From the Abode tab, select the Align Text dropdown menu
Choose your desired vertical text alignment (I'll choose Bottom for mine)

Unless you take a specific reason to do otherwise, I recommend that y'all choose Lesser for your vertical text alignment. That fashion your title text volition always stay perfectly aligned at the bottom, from slide to slide.

This helps avoid jumping titles for any slides that accept more i line of text.
On the flip side, if y'all program on having short titles for all your slides (no more than one line), I recommend using the Middle text alignment instead.

Regardless of what you decide, make certain you examination different title lengths to see what volition work all-time for your PowerPoint template.

D. Align the guides to the championship

Since nosotros added our guides in the first part of this series, at present nosotros'll ready them to align with our title.

Drag your Horizontal Guides to match the top and the bottom of your title placeholder (add together more guides if necessary)
Drag your Vertical Guidesto match the left-hand and right-hand sides of the championship placeholder (add more than guides if necessary)

To add together a new guide, only get-go dragging an existing 1, and and then hit the Ctrl fundamental on your keyboard before you lot let go.

Adjusting your guides similar this volition make aligning objects on your slides much easier as your Smart Guides volition automatically snap them together.

Annotation: If your Guides are not visible, only right-click on a blank part of your slide and select Grid & Guides, and then Guides. That volition turn them on. Alternatively, yous can go up to the View tab in the Ribbon and select Guides inside the Show area.

two. Format the Text placeholder

The Text placeholder on your Parent Slide is special in that it volition dictate the default formatting of all the other content placeholders in your presentation (except for the Title placeholder and the Footer placeholders).

Setting the default hither on the Parent Slide is important because it makes it a lot easier to make fast and consistent changes to swathes of content down the route.

Later in this template series, I will show yous how to format away from this default beliefs on the Kid Slides. But beginning you desire to prepare its default formatting.

A. Resize and position the Text placeholder

The first thing to do with your Text placeholder is change its position and/or size and then that it's exactly aligned with the Title and Footer placeholders. To do that:

Select the Text placeholder and when the cursor becomes a four-headed pointer, drag the placeholder to the acme and left side and then that information technology is aligned with the Title placeholder.
With the placeholder still selected, use its sizing handles to adjust its size until information technology is simply right (factoring the corporeality of text that y'all predict yous'll type in, as well as the alignment with the other placeholders).

B. Align the guides

In this step, you need to align the horizontal and the vertical guides to that they marshal with the Text placeholder. To practise that:

Drag the horizontal guides to match the elevation and the lesser of the Text placeholder.
Similarly, drag the vertical guides to match the left and right-manus sides of the Text placeholder.

C. Alter the font size

The next step is to change the font size of the different levels of text inside the placeholder. To practice that:

Select the beginning level of text
In the Font Size box, blazon in 20 and hitting Enter

Echo these steps for the second, third, fourth, and fifth levels of bulleted text, changing their font sizes to eighteen,xvi, 14, and 14 respectively.

D. Adjust and align the bullet points

Once you take ready the font size, it is of import to adjust the bullets.

Select all the text styles in the content placeholder
In the Paragraph group, click on the Bullets and Numbering dropdown
Click on the square style bullets

Next, yous have to suit the indent of the bulleted lists so that information technology appears in all your slide layouts. To do that:

Select the bulleted list you want to accommodate
Click, hold, and drag the desired indent marker. In our example, nosotros'll drag the hanging indent marker.
Repeat this for each text level

Y'all can adapt the bullets every bit per your personal preference. Based on your knowledge of how someone is going to exist using this template, you might decide to add together more or less space.

Note: My recommendation as per Julie Terberg and Echo Swinford's book, "Building PowerPoint Templates Stride by Step with the Experts," is to always make sure that you format every single particular you have available. That includes formatting each text list level.

You can run across their book on templates hither.

That fashion, you lot have everything set in case someone decides to interruption the rules or practice their ain matter. This inevitably happens with templates and you want to be prepared for information technology!

3. Formatting the footers of your template

The footer department of the Slide Master has iii types of placeholders:

Slide number
Footer text
Appointment and fourth dimension

A. Ready the font size for all your footers

The first step is to alter the font size of the footer placeholders. To exercise that:

Select all your footer placeholders holding theShiftkey.
In theFont Sizedialog box, type 10 (of any your desired font size is) and hit Enter.

B. Resize and position the placeholders

The next affair to do with the footer placeholders is to change their position and/or size then that they're aligned with the residuum of the placeholders. To do that:

Select each placeholder and when the cursor becomes a four-headed pointer, drag the placeholder to its desired location (use the guides for assistance).
With the placeholder notwithstanding selected, use its sizing handles to adjust its size until it is just right (factoring the amount of text that you predict you'll blazon in, as well as the alignment with the other placeholders).
Echo this for each placeholder.

If y'all want to be 100% certain that all the Footer placeholders are the same, select them one at a time and go to the Shape Format tab in the Ribbon. In the Size section, verify that the height of the placeholders is the same.

In this instance, annotation that I am swapping the positions of the Appointment & Fourth dimension and Footer placeholders.

Recall to also add new guides around these placeholders to aid continue them in identify. Hither, I'm but going to add the top and bottom guides, and then as to avoid confusion and overkill.

C. Format the Slide Number placeholder

Next, we'll need to accommodate the formatting of the text inside the slide number placeholder. To do that:

Correct-click the placeholder, click onFormat Shapeand select Text Options
Open the Text box tab
Type 0 for the Left margin and hit Tab or Enter on your keyboard

Note: For the slide number placeholder, you can also add symbols as I have here (such every bit a bar and two spaces), in club to create a visual break from the other placeholders.

Slide numbers are oftentimes tricky to get right when trying to properly display them on all your slides. To expand your knowledge and learn how to add together slide numbers in PowerPoint (and how to troubleshoot them), read our guide here.

D. Format the Date and Time placholder

The side by side thing is to format the date and time footer placeholder. Yous tin choose whatsoever kind of format y'all like. Below y'all'll find the steps that I took in the video tutorial at the top of this page.

First, select the placeholder and hit Ctrl+R on your keyboard to right-align the text to the right (so that it's flush with the slide number to the correct).

Then, yous'll desire to cull what kind of date formatting you want. To do that, only:

Select the Date and fourth dimension placeholder and hit Ctrl + R on your keyboard to align the text to the right.
Become up to the Insert tab and in the Text group, select Header & Footer.
Click on Date and time so that there is a checkmark next to it.
Click on the Date dropdown and select the option every bit required. In this case, we are going to select December 30th, 2017.
Click Utilise to All to save the changes. You can see that the engagement and fourth dimension text has inverse appropriately.

E. Format the Footer text placeholder

The final default placeholder to format on the Parent Slide hither is the Footer text placeholder. This placeholder is designed for a tagline, an author's name, or cited sources. For helping citing sources in PowerPoint, read our guide here.

All you demand to do here is to select the placeholder and strikingCtrl+L on your keyboard to left-marshal the text. This way, information technology is next to the logo and the text inserted will extend out towards the right.

F. (Optional) Add together your logo

While all the default placeholders take now been gear up up and formatted correctly, in that location is still i chemical element that yous can add on the Parent Slide of your Slide Master; and that is a logo.

This is optional, and so don't feel obligated to add together ane. In fact, a mutual practice today is to display the logo more sparingly and only identify it on certain Child Slide Layouts.

To add a logo, simply:

Copy the logo and hit Ctrl+V to paste it on the slide. Make sure you paste it as a PNG because it won't lose its quality over time, whereas a JPEG will.
Resize and reposition the logo to make it fit nicely in its desired position. Alternatively, you tin can click on the Picture show Format tab in the Ribbon and set up the height to 0.35 to go far even with the other placeholders.

You can also use this aforementioned technique to add together a watermark to your PowerPoint slides. To see how to add a watermark to your slides (like Typhoon or Confidential), read our guide hither.

Part #3. Creating Custom PowerPoint Template Slides

In the last part of this guide, y'all'll finalize the slide layouts that you lot desire to use in your PowerPoint presentation past formatting the Kid Slides.

TheChild Slides represent the blueprints for each type of slide included in your template. By default, your Kid Slide layouts volition inherit your Parent Slide formatting. Merely every bit you will see, you tin tweak these layouts to meet your individual needs.

The key to designing good Child Slide layouts is to keep in mind how the end-user is probable going to insert content on each blazon of slide. You desire to make information technology easy for anybody to quickly fill them in when using your template.

In this section you'll larn how to:

Remove background graphics so that they're hidden on your Child Slide layouts,
Brand the slide groundwork an existing pic,
Rename your custom Child Slide,
Add prompt text to help the template user properly fill in each layout,
and more!

one. Format the Title slide layout

The beginning step is to edit the Title slide layout. This layout is designed to exist filled in with the title and general information most your presentation.

Typically, its looks slightly unlike than the rest of the layouts. It usually has less text and fewer images/objects, and it stands autonomously.

That being said, it yet needs to match the other layouts overall and look similar it's a part of the aforementioned template.

The get-go affair we demand to exercise when formatting our Title slide layout is to think about the background. Typically, a Title slide will take a slightly unlike background from the regular Content slides.

However, considering the groundwork has been attack the Parent Slide, this means that you will take to deviate from information technology. In that location are 2 means to approach this – let's get over each i.

A. Hibernate the groundwork graphics on a Child Slide - Method #1

The first method for hiding annihilation in the background (graphics such as the logo, background patterns, design elements, etc.) is to insert a bare rectangle to encompass it up.

To comprehend upwardly your slide background with a white rectangle, simply:

Become to the Insert tab on the Ribbon, click on the Shapes dropdown, select a rectangle.
Describe in the rectangle so that information technology fills out the unabridged slide.
Change the rectangle'south fill color to White.
Remove the rectangle'south outline.

Next, nosotros'll need to make sure the placeholders are visible on the slide, in front of the newly inserted rectangle.

To do that, with the rectangle still selected, go to the Shape Format tab on the Ribbon, click on the Send Backward dropdown and select Send to Back.

Note: Go along in mind that roofing upwards the background elements like this ways that the logo (and whatever other image you've pasted onto the Parent Slide) volition exist hidden. If yous want that element to be visible on this Child Layout, yous'll take to copy/paste information technology in.

B. Hide the background graphics on a Child Slide - Method #2

The "technically better" way to practice this is to utilise the default PowerPoint feature gear up to exercise this for y'all. Simply:

Go to the Slide Main tab in the Ribbon
Click on Hide Groundwork Graphics to add a checkmark adjacent to it

This hides anything from the Parent Slide that isn't a placeholder. This includes whatsoever groundwork images or patterns, logos, and other design elements.

Y'all tin can easily make them visible again past unchecking the Hide Background Graphics checkbox.

C. Add in a new groundwork for this layout

Now that we've removed the background inherited from the Parent Slide layout, nosotros'll need to add in groundwork elements we want on this detail Kid Slide.

While the groundwork prototype tin be different, we want to keep it consistent. And so permit'due south go dorsum upwards and take some elements we can reuse.

Commencement, navigate back to the Parent Slide and select the pattern prototype (without the gradient). And so hitting Ctrl + C on your keyboard to re-create it.

Then, get back to your Championship slide layout and:

Right-click a blank surface area on your slide and select Format Groundwork.
In the Format Background tab, select Picture or texture fill.
Select Clipboard.

This pastes whatever is currently copied on your clipboard into your slide background.

Note: Pasting an object direct into your slide background like this means that it tin no longer be edited in your PowerPoint template.

If instead yous paste it directly onto the slide as an image, yous tin always go back in and make adjustments to the image, and therefore to the background too.

Information technology's up to you whether you want your template'due south users to exist able to edit the background image or not.

So if y'all're putting the image straight into the slide background, I recommended that yous only do so when you lot are sure that this is the final background prototype you want to use.

D. Add together in an extra design element

The next stride is to add in a blueprint element that matches the full general theme and style of the template. To practice that:

Go to the Insert tab on the Ribbon, click on the Shapes dropdown and select a rectangle.
Describe in the rectangle (information technology should be filled with the first accent color of your theme) so that information technology fills about 80% of your slide.
Brand sure the rectangle is centered and in the middle of the slide.

Adjacent, let's send the rectangle backside the placeholders.

To practice that, right-click the rectangle, open up the Transport Backward dropdown and select Send to Dorsum.

Due east. Adjust the placeholders

Get-go, adjust your Title and Subtitle placeholders. To exercise that, simply select the two placeholders and:

Change their Font color to white.
Adjust their position and size on the slide, keeping in mind how much room you demand to get out for the text.

Next, permit's address the Footer placeholders.

Even if you don't desire footers visible on the Title slide of your template, I don't recommend deleting them here in the Slide Master View.

Why? Because if someone decides to use them despite your instructions, you nevertheless want them to announced correctly and match the rest of the template.

To format and hide your footer placeholders, simply:

Format the footer placeholders the mode you'd like them to announced if they were used.
Go up to the Slide Master tab in the Ribbon and deselect the Footerscheckbox.

Notation: Even if your footers stay selected on this Title slide layout in the Slide Master View, they typically don't appear on that Title slide in the Normal View.

To turn them on, y'all take to go to the Insert tab in the Ribbon and select Header & Footer. There, you can turn them on.

And then, unless you truly want someone to NEVER be able to add together a page number, date and fourth dimension, and footer text to the Title layout, then I recommend leaving them on the Child Slide, to proceed that pick open.

If you deselect the Footers checkbox in the Slide Primary View as we did above, and then when someone tries to insert footers in the Normal View, they will non appear.

To learn all about how to add slide numbers in PowerPoint (and troubleshoot ones that won't show up), read our guide here.

One more thing you lot might notice is that the guides are not visible on the Title slide. Since this is a Kid Slide, you tin can't edit the guides here.

Unfortunately, the guides you gear up on the Parent Slide will likely not match the content you have on the Title slide (and whatever Child Slide whose content deviates from it). In that location is no way effectually this in PowerPoint at this point in time.

ii. Format your Title and Content layout

The next step is to edit the well-nigh commonly used PowerPoint slide in whatsoever presentation, the Championship and Content layout.

This specific slide layout volition look almost identical to to the Parent Slide layout that we've already gear up at this point. This means that there isn't much nosotros have to do to change it.

However, in this case, we are going to add together one more design element to the layout, which is a direct line. To do that simply:

In the Inserttab on the Ribbon, click on theShapes dropdown and select the directly line. To make certain information technology's 100% straight, hold the Shift key as you depict in the line.
Elevate the direct line and identify information technology underneath the title. It should perfectly fit in thanks to the Smart Guides. Make certain that it'southward long enough to go past the text in the Title placeholder.

The reason yous don't add this line to the Parent Slide is that the layout has to be formatted to piece of work for the majority of the layouts in your template.

That means that the Parent Slide has to be relatively bare-bones. You can always add together actress elements in the Child Slides.

three. Format the other Child Slides

From here onward, you will demand to format each of the Kid Slides to match the content that goes in them.

You will desire to follow the same procedure equally in Pace #2 to a higher place, keeping in heed what each Child Slide is designed for and how the content should be placed.

Some layouts will require more than custom formatting and design elements.For case, for the Divider slide (the commencement slide in the examples below,) I have added a rectangle that matches the design elements on the Title Slide layout.

iv. Optional pace: Create your own Child Layouts

In addition to the default Kid Slides that PowerPoint gives you, y'all have the pick to create your own.

You lot can choose to create your own if you have a very specific type of slide that you'll need to create over and over in your presentation.

If you make the slide under 10 times, it may not exist worth bottleneck up your Slide Master surface area. Just if you use it oft, creating a layout template for that type of slide volition save you countless hours.

Here are the kinds of slides you may want to create a custom layout for:

Table of Contents / Calendar
Quote folio
Team bios / Team headshots
Case studies
Thanks / Learn more than
Nearly u.s.a.
Data dashboard
and more than

Keep in heed that the blank layout (and other bare variations) tin e'er be used to create more ane-off slides.

Creating a custom agenda slide

In this example, we're going to add a custom Agenda Kid Slide. To add this custom layout:

Go to the Slide Master tab in the Ribbon and click Insert Layout. Y'all'll see that a new Child Slide gets added in with only a Title placeholder and the Footer placeholders.
Add whatever additional placeholders you need (Slide Master tab > Insert Placeholder) and format them as per your requirements. In this example, I've added xx text placeholders that I've resized and formatted.
Accommodate the prompt text in the placeholders to fit the respective content need. For example, in the image below you can write "Type in item" then that the user knows to type in the right text into each placeholder.

Notation: You tin change the shape of a placeholder, also as adjust all other properties of a typical shape. That means that you can also add fill, outline, effects, etc.

This is how I was able to create the circular TOC numbers in this layout:

You tin can also rename the custom Child Layout by:

Correct-clicking it in the Thumbnail View on the left-manus side and selecting Rename Layout.
Blazon in a helpful proper noun and click Rename.

Annotation: You tin can perform these steps for all custom Kid Slides. You tin can too create custom layouts for a lot of slides such as for products, case studies, contact us, etc.

Even so, try not to get overboard because you don't want to have a layout area packed full of slides, which will misfile the user.

But for very oft occurring slides, I highly recommend making a custom layout.

There are as well other slides in the template such as the content slide with subtitles or a blank slide with a title. You can format them per your requirements.

5. Finalize your PowerPoint template

Now that the template is almost finished, y'all still have a few critical steps.

A. Ready animations and transitions

The first thing is to set the animations and transitions for your slides. For all placeholders that you want to automatically breathing in your template, simply select it and utilize your animation.

Notation: Go on in heed that animations should exist used in your template VERY sparingly. That'southward not but considering animations can be overly distracting, but it'south too because the user of your template may not want to take animations set automatically for them.

In brusque, brand certain you create the template in a way that makes your users' life easier, rather than harder.

In one case that's done, let's set the slide transitions. To do that, simply:

Select all of the slides in your template (in the Slide Main View).
Click into the Transitions tab in the Ribbon and select your preferred slide transition.

Next, let's make sure nosotros close the Slide Main View since we are washed with it. From the Slide Master tab in the Ribbon, clickClose Principal View.

Annotation: At that place is also a Notes Master and Handout Master in PowerPoint that yous can ready and format. These masters determine the look and experience of your PowerPoint handouts when yous print them.

To learn how to format these elements in regards to printing multiple slides per page in PowerPoint, read our guide here.

B. Stress exam your template

Information technology is highly recommended that you test your template before you distribute it. That mode y'all catch whatever errors before your users do.

Here are some means y'all can stress test your template:

Attempt to employ it in a variety of unlike ways to run into if it breaks
Type in all kinds of dummy text
Delete things and plough them back on again
Paste slides in from other templates to meet what happens in your template

Final Template Thoughts

And that's how to create a PowerPoint template that works the manner it is supposed to.

You at present have the foundational skills to start creating your own PowerPoint templates and building beautiful and tailor-made presentations.

If you want to larn more about building and deploying your template in professional settings, I recommend checking out my pace-by-step preparation course, run into details here.

As a quick recap of everything we covered, you learned how to:

Navigate the Slide Master View,
Create and insert slide backgrounds, too every bit hide background graphics,
Format each of the elements on the Parent Slide layout,
Format each Kid Layout and create your own custom Kid Slide layouts,
Add together and adjust the Guides on your Parent Slide layout,
And more than!

If you lot enjoyed this in-depth tutorial, you lot'll honey our PowerPoint preparation courses and tutorials that you can learn more about hither.

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