Tips and Resources on PowerPoint
We put down this collection of shortcuts and resources useful we recommend for designing creative presentations (pictures, speeches, tools).
We try to keep it updated with latest Office versions and publications, however if you have a suggestion what to add here, let us know.
Peter & Izabela
PowerPoint Keyword Shortcuts
Editing shapes:
- Ctrl + G / Ctrl + Shift + G
Group / Ungroup selected elements (in Polish Office only 2nd works) - Ctrl + D
duplicate selected element - Alt + F9
show / hide guide lines - Alt + F10
show Selection Pane window with all slide elements - Ctrl + keyboard arrow
move an object by a pixel - Ctrl + Shift + C or V
format painter, copy and paste the style of a selected object
General file functions
- Ctrl + Y and Ctrl + Z
Undo the last edit and Redo - Ctrl + Alt + V
Paste special (e.g. for pasting a slide as a bitmap image) - Win + Shift + S
screenshot taking (since Windows 10) - Ctrl + F1, Ctrl + Alt + F1
Hide or show the top menu stripe - F12
Save As the file with new name (on Mac: Cmd+S) - Ctrl + S
Save the file (on Mac:Cmd+S)
Editing text:
- Ctrl + [ or ]
font size decrease or increase of the selected text or text inside a selected shape - Ctrl + L or E or R
align selected text to Left or Center or Right - F2
editing text inside the selected shape - Tab, Shift Tab
increase a level in bullet-points (in SmartArt or Word, too) - Shift + F3
change case in the selected text (all small, ALL CAPS, As In Title) - Ctrl + Shift + C or V
format painter (works also on shapes and textboxes) - Ctrl + Space bar
clean the text formatting - Shift + Enter
soft Enter
Slide show mode:
- F5
start slide show from the 1st slide - Shift + F5
start slide show from the current slide - B key
show the black screen (for temporary turning off the presentation light) - W key
show the white screen
Information and Image Resources for PowerPoint presentations
PowerPoint application help & resources
- www.microsoft.com – detailed user documentation on specific PPT functions
- www.prezentio.com/blog/ – our articles on presentation design, tips, do-it-yourself examples
- www.infoDiagram.com – database of predesigned PPT diagrams , icons and templates
- www.effective-slides.com – blog with slide redesign examples PowerPoint
Presentation related resources
- Books by Nancy Duarte:
- „Slide:ology”
- “Data Story”
- Book by Dan Roam:
- “On the Back of the Napkin”
Inspirative presentations
- Kurzgesagt science animations – YouTube channel
- www.TED.com – inspiring presentations from world infuencers (see e.g. data visualization talk by Hans Rosling)
Paid Image Stock Databases:
- www.iStock.com – paid, more extensive image stock database but also more expensive
- stock.Adobe.com – (former Fotolia.com) paid image stock, cheaper
- www.dreamstime.com – paid image stock, cheaper
- www.123rf.com – paid image stock, cheaper
- www.flickr.com (use filter by license – CC, attribution is required)
Free Image Stock Databases:
- www.pexels.com – good for nature pictures
- www.pixabay.com – good for nature pictures
Quotation resources:
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