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Presentation design guide: tips, examples, and templates

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Anete Ezera January 09, 2023

Presentation design defines how your content will be received and remembered. It’s responsible for that crucial first impression and sets the tone for your presentation before you’ve even introduced the topic. It’s also what holds your presentation together and guides the viewer through it. That’s why visually appealing, easily understandable, and memorable presentation design is what you should be striving for. But how can you create a visually striking presentation without an eye for design? Creating a visually appealing presentation can be challenging without prior knowledge of design or helpful tools. 

With this presentation design guide accompanied by Prezi presentation examples and templates, you’ll have no problem creating stunning and impactful presentations that will wow your audience.

In this guide, we’ll start by looking at the basics of presentation design. We’ll provide a simple guide on creating a presentation from scratch, as well as offer helpful tips for different presentation types. In addition, you’ll discover how to organize information into a logical order and present it in a way that resonates with listeners. Finally, we’ll share tips and tricks to create an eye-catching presentation, and showcase some great presentation examples and templates you can get inspired by!

With our comprehensive introduction to designing presentations, you will be able to develop an engaging and professional presentation that gets results!

a man working on his laptop

What is presentation design?

Presentation design encompasses a variety of elements that make up the overall feel and look of the presentation. It’s a combination of certain elements, like text, font, color, background, imagery, and animations. 

Presentation design focuses on finding ways to make the presentation more visually appealing and easy to process, as it is often an important tool for communicating a message. It involves using design principles like color, hierarchy, white space, contrast, and visual flow to create an effective communication piece.

Creating an effective presentation design is important for delivering your message efficiently and leaving a memorable impact on your audience. Most of all, you want your presentation design to support your topic and make it easier to understand and digest. A great presentation design guides the viewer through your presentation and highlights the most essential aspects of it. 

If you’re interested in learning more about presentation design and its best practices , watch the following video and get practical insights on designing your next presentation:

Types of presentations

When creating a presentation design, you have to keep in mind several types of presentations that shape the initial design you want to have. Depending on the type of presentation you have, you’ll want to match it with a fitting presentation design.

1. Informative

An informative presentation provides the audience with facts and data in order to educate them on a certain subject matter. This could be done through visual aids such as graphs, diagrams, and charts. In an informative presentation, you want to highlight data visualizations and make them more engaging with interactive features or animations. On Prezi Design, you can create different engaging data visualizations from line charts to interactive maps to showcase your data.

2. Instructive

Instructive presentations teach the audience something new. Whether it’s about science, business strategies, or culture, this type of presentation is meant to help people gain knowledge and understand a topic better. 

With a focus on transmitting knowledge, your presentation design should incorporate a variety of visuals and easy-to-understand data visualizations. Most people are visual learners, so you’ll benefit from swapping text-based slides for more visually rich content.

presentation design guide to design presentations

3. Motivational

Motivational presentations try to inspire the audience by giving examples of successful projects, stories, or experiences. This type of presentation is often used in marketing or promotional events because it seeks to get the audience inspired and engaged with a product or service. That’s why the presentation design needs to capture and hold the attention of your audience using a variety of animations and visuals. Go beyond plain images – include videos for a more immersive experience.

4. Persuasive

Persuasive presentations are designed to sway an audience with arguments that lead to an actionable decision (i.e., buy the product). Audiences learn facts and figures relevant to the point being made and explore possible solutions based on evidence provided during the speech or presentation.

In a persuasive presentation design, you need to capture your audience’s attention right away with compelling statistics wrapped up in interactive and engaging data visualizations. Also, the design needs to look and feel dynamic with smooth transitions and fitting visuals, like images, stickers, and GIFs.

persuasive presentation design

How to design a presentation

When you first open a blank presentation page, you might need some inspiration to start creating your design. For this reason, we created a simple guide that’ll help you make your own presentation from scratch without headaches.

1. Opt for a motion-based presentation

You can make an outstanding presentation using Prezi Present, a software program that lets you create interactive presentations that capture your viewer’s attention. Prezi’s zooming feature allows you to add movement to your presentation and create smooth transitions. Prezi’s non-linear format allows you to jump between topics instead of flipping through slides, so your presentation feels more like a conversation than a speech. A motion-based presentation will elevate your content and ideas, and make it a much more engaging viewing experience for your audience.

Watch this video to learn how to make a Prezi presentation:

2. Create a structure & start writing content

Confidence is key in presenting. You can feel more confident going into your presentation if you structure your thoughts and plan what you will say. To do that, first, choose the purpose of your presentation before you structure it. There are four main types of presentations: informative, instructive, motivational, and persuasive. Think about the end goal of your presentation – what do you want your audience to do when you finish your presentation – and structure it accordingly.

Next, start writing the content of your presentation (script). We recommend using a storytelling framework, which will enable you to present a conflict and show what could be possible. In addition to creating compelling narratives for persuasive presentations, this framework is also effective for other types of presentations.

Tip: Keep your audience in mind. If you’re presenting a data-driven report to someone new to the field or from a different department, don’t use a lot of technical jargon if you don’t know their knowledge base and/or point of view.

3. Research & analyze 

Knowing your topic inside and out will make you feel more confident going into your presentation. That’s why it’s important to take the time to understand your topic fully. In return, you’ll be able to answer questions on the fly and get yourself back on track even if you forget what you were going to say when presenting. In case you have extra time at the end of your presentation, you can also provide more information for your audience and really showcase your expertise. For comprehensive research, turn to the internet, and library, and reach out to experts if possible.

woman doing an online research

4. Get to design

Keeping your audience engaged and interested in your topic depends on the design of your presentation.

Now that you’ve done your research and have a proper presentation structure in place, it’s time to visualize it.

4.1. Presentation design layout

What you want to do is use your presentation structure as a presentation design layout. Apply the structure to how you want to tell your story, and think about how each point will lead to the next one. Now you can either choose to use one of Prezi’s pre-designed templates that resemble your presentation structure the most or start to add topics on your canvas as you go. 

Tip: When adding content, visualize the relation between topics by using visual hierarchy – hide smaller topics within larger themes or use the zooming feature to zoom in and out of supplementary topics or details that connect to the larger story you’re telling.

4.2. Color scheme

Now it’s time to choose your color scheme to give a certain look and feel to your presentation. Make sure to use contrasting colors to clearly separate text from the background, and use a maximum of 2 to 3 dominating colors to avoid an overwhelming design.

4.2. Content (visuals + text)

Add content that you want to highlight in your presentation. Select from a wide range of images, stickers, GIFs, videos, data visualizations, and more from the content library, or upload your own. To provide more context, add short-format text, like bullet points or headlines that spotlight the major themes, topics, and ideas in your presentation. 

Also, here you’ll want to have a final decision on your font choice. Select a font that’s easy to read and goes well with your brand and topic.

Tip: Be careful not to turn your presentation into a script. Only display text that holds significant value – expand on the ideas when presenting. 

presentation design tips

4.3. Transitions

Last but not least, bring your presentation design to life by adding smooth, attractive, and engaging transitions that take the viewer from one topic to another without disrupting the narrative. 

On Prezi, you can choose from a range of transitions that take you into the story world and provide an immersive presentation experience for your audience. 

For more practical tips read our article on how to make a presentation . 

Presentation design tips

When it comes to presentations, design is key. A well-designed presentation can communicate your ideas clearly and engage your audience, while a poorly designed one can do the opposite.

To ensure your presentation is designed for success, note the following presentation design tips that’ll help you design better presentations that wow your audience.

women working on her laprop

1. Keep it simple

Too many elements on a slide can be overwhelming and distract from your message. While you want your content to be visually compelling, don’t let the design of the presentation get in the way of communicating your ideas. Design elements need to elevate your message instead of overshadowing it. 

2. Use contrasting text colors

Draw attention to important points with contrasted text colors. Instead of using bold or italics, use a contrasting color in your chosen palette to emphasize the text.

3. Be clear and concise. 

Avoid writing long paragraphs that are difficult to read. Limit paragraphs and sections of text for optimum readability.

4. Make sure your slide deck is visually appealing

Use high-quality images and graphics, and limit the use of text to only the most important information. For engaging and diverse visuals, go to Prezi’s content library and discover a wide range of stock images, GIFs, stickers, and more.

5. Pay attention to detail

Small details like font choice and alignments can make a big difference in how professional and polished your presentation looks. Make sure to pay attention to image and text size, image alignment with text, font choice, background color, and more details that create the overall look of your presentation.

6. Use templates sparingly

While templates can be helpful in creating a consistent look for your slides, overusing them can make your presentation look generic and boring. Use them for inspiration but don’t be afraid to mix things up with some custom designs as well. 

7. Design for clarity

Create a presentation layout that is easy to use and navigate, with clear labels and instructions. This is important for ensuring people can find the information they need quickly and easily if you end up sharing your presentation with others.

8. Opt for a conversational presentation design

Conversational presenting allows you to adjust your presentation on the fly to make it more relevant and engaging. Create a map-like arrangement that’ll encourage you to move through your presentation at your own pace. With a map-like design, each presentation will be customized to match different audiences’ needs. This can be helpful for people who have different levels of expertise or knowledge about the subject matter.

9. Be consistent 

Design consistency holds your presentation together and makes it easy to read and navigate. Create consistency by repeating colors, fonts, and design elements that clearly distinguish your presentation from others.

10. Have context in mind

A great presentation design is always dependent on the context. Your audience and objective influence everything from color scheme to fonts and use of imagery. Make sure to always have your audience in mind when designing your presentations.

For more presentation tips, read the Q&A with presentation design experts and get valuable insights on visual storytelling.

Presentation templates

Creating a presentation from scratch isn’t easy. Sometimes, it’s better to start with a template and dedicate your time to the presentation’s content. To make your life easier, here are 10 useful and stunning presentation templates that score in design and engagement. If you want to start creating with any of the following templates, simply go to our Prezi presentation template gallery , select your template, and start creating! Also, you can get inspired by the top Prezi presentations , curated by our editors. There you can discover presentation examples for a wide range of topics, and get motivated to create your own. 

Business meeting presentation

The work desk presentation templates have a simple and clean design, perfectly made for a team or business meeting. With all the topics visible from start, everyone will be on the same page about what you’re going to cover in the presentation. If you want, you can add or remove topics as well as edit the visuals and color scheme to match your needs.

Small business presentation

This template is great for an introductory meeting or pitch, where you have to summarize what you or your business does in a few, highly engaging slides. The interactive layout allows you to choose what topic bubble you’re going to select next, so instead of a one-way interaction, you can have a conversation and ask your audience what exactly they’re interested in knowing about your company.

Mindfulness at work presentation

How can you capture employees’ attention to explain important company values or practices? This engaging presentation template will help you do just that. With a wide range of impactful visuals, this presentation design helps you communicate your ideas more effectively. 

Business review template

Make your next quarterly business review memorable with this vibrant business presentation template. With eye-capturing visuals and an engaging layout, you’ll communicate important stats and hold everyone’s attention until the end.

History timeline template

With black-and-white sketches of the Colosseum in the background, this timeline template makes history come alive. The displayed time periods provide an overview that’ll help your audience to grasp the bigger picture. After, you can go into detail about each time frame and event.

Storytelling presentation template

Share stories about your business that make a lasting impact with this stunning, customizable presentation template. To showcase each story, use the zooming feature and choose to tell your stories in whatever order you want.

Design concept exploration template

Not all meetings happen in person nowadays. To keep that face-to-face interaction even when presenting online, choose from a variety of Prezi Video templates or simply import your already-existing Prezi template into Prezi Video for remote meetings. This professional-looking Prezi Video template helps you set the tone for your meeting, making your designs stand out. 

Employee perks and benefits video template

You can use the employee benefits video template to pitch potential job candidates the perks of working in your company. The Prezi Video template allows you to keep a face-to-face connection with potential job candidates while interviewing them remotely.

Sales plan presentation template

Using a clear metaphor that everyone can relate to, this football-inspired sales plan presentation template communicates a sense of team unity and strategy. You can customize this Prezi business presentation template with your brand colors and content.

Flashcard template

How can you engage students in an online classroom? This and many other Prezi Video templates will help you create interactive and highly engaging lessons. Using the flashcard template, you can quiz your students, review vocabulary, and gamify learning.

Great presentation design examples

If you’re still looking for more inspiration, check out the following Prezi presentations made by our creative users.

Social media presentation

This presentation is a great example of visual storytelling. The use of visual hierarchy and spatial relationships creates a unique viewing experience and makes it easier to understand how one topic or point is related to another. Also, images provide an engaging and visually appealing experience.

Leadership books presentation

Do you want to share your learnings? This interactive presentation offers great insights in an entertaining and visually compelling way. Instead of compiling leadership books in a slide-based presentation, the creator has illustrated each book and added a zooming feature that allows you to peek inside of each book’s content.

Remote workforce presentation

This is a visually rich and engaging presentation example that offers an interactive experience for the viewer. A noteworthy aspect of this presentation design is its color consistency and matching visual elements.

A presentation about the teenage brain 

Another great presentation design example that stands out with an engaging viewing experience. The zooming feature allows the user to dive into each topic and choose what subject to view first. It’s a great example of an educational presentation that holds the students’ attention with impactful visuals and compelling transitions.

Remote work policy presentation

This presentation design stands out with its visually rich content. It depicts exactly what the presentation is about and uses the illustrated window frames in the background image as topic placements. This type of presentation design simplifies complex concepts and makes it easier for the viewer to understand and digest the information.

Everyone can create visually-appealing presentations with the right tools and knowledge. With the presentation design tips, templates, and examples, you’re equipped to make your next presentation a success. If you’re new to Prezi, we encourage you to discover everything it has to offer. With this presentation design guide and Prezi, we hope you’ll get inspired to create meaningful, engaging, and memorable content for your audience!  

designing presentation slides

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17 PowerPoint Presentation Tips From Pro Presenters [+ Templates]

Jamie Cartwright

Published: April 26, 2024

PowerPoint presentations can be professional, attractive, and really help your audience remember your message.

powerpoint tricks

If you don’t have much experience, that’s okay — I’m going to arm you with PowerPoint design tips from pro presenters, the steps you need to build an engaging deck, and templates to help you nail great slide design.

→ Free Download: 10 PowerPoint Presentation Templates [Access Now]

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Buckle up for a variety of step-by-step explanations as well as tips and tricks to help you start mastering this program. There are additional resources woven in, and you’ll find expert perspectives from other HubSpotters along the way.

Table of Contents

How to Make a PowerPoint Presentation

Powerpoint presentation tips.

Microsoft PowerPoint is like a test of basic professional skills, and each PowerPoint is basically a presentation made of multiple slides.

Successful PowerPoints depend on three main factors: your command of PowerPoint's design tools, your attention to presentation processes, and being consistent with your style.

Keep those in mind as we jump into PowerPoint's capabilities.

Getting Started

1. open powerpoint and click ‘new.’.

A page with templates will usually open automatically, but if not, go to the top left pane of your screen and click New . If you’ve already created a presentation, select Open and then double-click the icon to open the existing file.

designing presentation slides

10 Free PowerPoint Templates

Download ten free PowerPoint templates for a better presentation.

  • Creative templates.
  • Data-driven templates.
  • Professional templates.

You're all set!

Click this link to access this resource at any time.

Creating PowerPoint Slides

3. insert a slide..

Insert a new slide by clicking on the Home tab and then the New Slide button. Consider what content you want to put on the slide, including heading, text, and imagery.

designing presentation slides

  • Finally, PowerPoint Live is a new tool that enables you to do more seamless presentations during video calls and may be a better overall match for doing presentations remotely. Check out this video:

11. Try Using GIFs.

designing presentation slides

12 Free Customizable Resume Templates

Fill out this form to access your free professionally-designed templates, available on:

  • Microsoft Word
  • Google Docs
  • Microsoft PowerPoint
  • Google Slides

15. Embed multimedia.

PowerPoint allows you to either link to video/audio files externally or to embed the media directly in your presentation. 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).

If you use PowerPoint for Mac it gets a bit complicated, but it can be done:

  • Always bring the video and/or audio file with you in the same folder as the PowerPoint presentation.
  • Only insert video or audio files once the presentation and the containing folder have been saved on a portable drive in their permanent folder.
  • If the presentation will be played on a Windows computer, then Mac users need to make sure their multimedia files are in WMV format.
  • 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. The easiest fix? Just bring along your own laptop when you're presenting.

The next easiest fix is to upload your PowerPoint presentation into Google Slides as a backup option — just make sure there is a good internet connection and a browser available where you plan to present.

Google Slides is a cloud-based presentation software that will show up the same way on all operating systems.

To import your PowerPoint presentation into Google Slides:

  • 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.
  • 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.

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.

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

Now that you have these style, design, and presentation tips under your belt, you should feel confident to create your PowerPoint presentation.

But if you can explore other resources to make sure your content hits the mark. After all, you need a strong presentation to land your point and make an impression.

With several templates to choose from — both in PowerPoint and available for free download — you can swiftly be on your way to creating presentations that wow your audiences.

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

Blog - Beautiful PowerPoint Presentation Template [List-Based]

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Blog Data Visualization 18 Presentation Design Tips For Success

18 Presentation Design Tips For Success

Written by: Midori Nediger May 15, 2023

presentation design

Bad presentations. We’ve all had to sit through them.  Heck, we’ve probably all given one or two. I know I have.

You know the type: twice as long as they need to be, slides chock-full of text, no visuals in sight. 

How can you ensure you don’t fall victim to these presentation faux-pas when designing your next presentation for your team, class, or clients?

In this blog, I’ll walk you through tips on how to design an impactful presentation along with presentation templates that can help you deliver it with style to leave a lasting impression.

Tips for designing and delivering an impactful presentation

What makes a presentation memorable?

It usually comes down to three things:

  • The main idea.
  • The presenter.
  • The visuals.

All three elements work together to create a successful presentation. Just like how different presentation styles serve different purposes, having a good presentation idea will give the audience a purpose for listening.

Here are some top tips to consider to help you design and deliver an impactful presentation:

  • Include less text and more visuals in your presentation design
  • Identify one core message to center your presentation design around
  • Eliminate any information that doesn’t immediately support the core message
  • Create a strong presentation outline to keep you focused
  • Use text to reinforce, not repeat, what you’re saying
  • Design your presentation with one major takeaway per slide
  • Use visuals to highlight the key message on each slide
  • Use scaffolding slides to orient your audience and keep them engaged
  • Use text size, weight, and color for emphasis
  • Apply design choices consistently to avoid distraction
  • Split a group presentation by topic
  • Use a variety of page layouts to maintain your audience’s interest
  • Use presentation templates to help you get started
  • Include examples of inspiring people
  • Dedicate slides to poignant questions
  • Find quotes that will inspire your audience
  • Emphasize key points with text and images
  • Label your slides to prompt your memory

1. Include less text and more visuals in your presentation design

According to David Paradi’s annual presentation survey , the 3 things that annoy audiences most about presentations are:

  • Speakers reading their slides
  • Slides that include full sentences of text
  • Text that is too small to read

The common thread that ties all of these presentation annoyances is text. Audiences are very picky about the text found in presentation slide decks .

In my experiences speaking at conferences and in webinars over the past few years, audiences respond much more positively to presentations that use visuals in place of text.

Audiences are more engaged, ask more questions, and find my talks more memorable when I include lots of visual examples in my slide decks. 

I’m not the only one who has found this. We recently surveyed nearly 400 conference speakers about their presentation designs and found that 84.3% create presentations that are highly visual.

A great example of a high visual presentation is the iconic AirBnB pitch deck design , which includes no more than 40 words per slide. Instead of repeating the speaker’s script on the slides, it makes an impact with keywords, large numbers, and icons:

designing presentation slides

Learn how to customize this presentation template:

To help you take your presentations to the next level, I’d like to share my process for creating a visually-focused presentation like the one above. I’ll give you my top presentation design tips that I’ve learned over years of presenting:

  • Class presentations
  • Online courses

You can then apply this process to our professional presentation templates  or pitch decks , creating unique presentation decks with ease! Our user-friendly editor tools make customizing these templates a breeze.

To leave a lasting impression on your audience, consider transforming your slides into an interactive presentation. Here are 15 interactive presentation ideas to enhance interactivity and engagement.

We’ll cover the most important steps for summarizing lengthy text into a presentation-friendly format. Then we’ll touch on some presentation design tips to help you get visual with your slide decks. Read on for the best creative presentation ideas .

2. Identify one core message to center your presentation design around

We know from David Paradi’s survey that audiences are easily overwhelmed with lots of text and data, especially when presentations are long.

confused woman meme

(You when you see a presentation with lots of text and data and it’s long)

So unlike in a white paper , report , or essay , you can’t expect to tackle many complex ideas within a single presentation.

That would be a recipe for disaster.

Instead, identify a single central message that you would like to communicate to your audience. Then build your presentation around that core message.

By identifying that core message, you can ensure that everything you include in your presentation supports the goal of the presentation .

As seen below, a great presentation tells you exactly what you’re going to learn (the core message), then gets right to the facts (the supporting information).

Nutrition Creative Presentation Template

To ensure you create an asset that’s clear, concise, impactful, and easy to follow, design your presentation around a single core message.

3. Create a strong presentation outline to keep you focused

Think of your outline as a roadmap for your presentation. Creating a strong presentation outline straight away helps make sure that you’re hitting all of the key points you need to cover to convey a persuasive presentation .

Take this presentation outline example:

  • Introduction and hellos
  • Vision and value proposition
  • Financial profit
  • Your investment
  • Thanks and questions

These are all things that we know we need to talk about within the presentation.

Creating a presentation outline makes it much easier to know what to say when it comes to creating the actual presentation slides.

Corporate pitch deck template

You could even include your presentation outline as a separate slide so that your audience knows what to expect:

Topics of discussion presentation outline example template

The opening moments of your presentation hold immense power – check out these 15 ways to start a presentation to set the stage and captivate your audience.

4. Eliminate any information that doesn’t support the core message

Next, use that core message to identify everything that doesn’t belong in the presentation.

Aim to eliminate everything that isn’t immediately relevant to the topic at hand, and anything remotely redundant. Cut any information that isn’t absolutely essential to understanding the core message.

By cutting these extra details, you can transform forgettable text-heavy slides:

Infographic Presentation Template

Into memorable slides with minimal text:

Infographic Presentation Template

Here’s a quick checklist to help you cut out any extra detail:

Get rid of:

  • Detailed descriptions
  • Background information
  • Redundant statements
  • Explanations of common knowledge
  • Persuasive facts and figures
  • Illustrative examples
  • Impactful quotes

presentation design

This step may seem obvious, but when you’re presenting on a topic that you’re passionate about, it’s easy to get carried away with extraneous detail. Use the recommendations above to keep your text in check.

Clarity is key, especially if you’re presenting virtually rather than in-person. However, Lisa Schneider (Chief Growth Officer at Merriam-Webster) has had plenty of experience making that adjustment. She recently shared her tips for adapting in-person presentations into virtual presentations on Venngage that you can check out. 

Watch: How to design a presentation [10 ESSENTIAL TIPS]

5. Use text to reinforce, not repeat, what you’re saying

According to presentation guru  Nancy Duarte , your audience should be able to discern the meaning of your slides in 6 seconds or less.

Since your audience will tend to read every word you place on each slide, you must keep your text to an absolute minimum. The text on your slides should provide support for what you’re saying without being distracting.

Never write out, word for word, what you’re going to be saying out loud. If you’re relying on text to remember certain points, resist the urge to cram them into your slides. Instead, use a tool like Venngage’s speaker notes to highlight particular talking points. These can be imported into PowerPoint — along with the rest of your presentation — and will only be viewable to you, not your audience.

Speaker notes by Venngage

For the actual slides, text should only be used to reinforce what you’re saying. Like in the presentation design below, paraphrase long paragraphs into short bulleted lists or statements by eliminating adjectives and articles (like “the” and “a”).

designing presentation slides

Pull out quotes and important numbers, and make them a focus of each slide.

designing presentation slides

6. Design your presentation with one major takeaway per slide

As I mentioned above, audiences struggle when too much information is presented on a single slide.

To make sure you don’t overwhelm your audiences with too much information, spread out your content to cover one major takeaway per slide.

By limiting each slide to a single simple statement, you focus your audience’s attention on the topic at hand.

My favorite way to do this is to pick out the core message of whatever I’m talking about and express it in a few keywords, as seen in this presentation slide below.

designing presentation slides

This helps ensure that the visuals remain the focus of the slide.

designing presentation slides

Using the text in this way, to simply state a single fact per slide, is a sure-fire way to make an impact in your presentation.

Alternatively, pull out a significant statistic that you want to stick in your audience’s minds and make it a visual focus of the slide, as seen in this popular presentation by Officevibe .

presentation design

This might mean you end up with a slide deck with a ton of slides. But that’s totally ok!

I’ve talked to many professionals who are pressured by their management teams to create presentations with a specific number of slides (usually as few as 10 or 15 slides for a 30-minute presentation).

If you ask me, this approach is completely flawed. In my mind, the longer I spend sitting on a single slide, the more likely I am to lose the interest of my audience.

How many slides should I use for a 10 minute presentation?

A good rule of thumb is to have at least as many slides as minutes in your presentation. So for a 10 minute presentation you should have at least 10 slides .

Use as many slides as you need, as long as you are presenting a single message on each slide, (as seen in the lengthy presentation template below). This is especially important if you’re presenting your business, or delivering a product presentation. You want to wow your audience, not bore them.

designing presentation slides

7. Use visuals to highlight the key message on each slide

As important as having one major takeaway per slide is having visuals that highlight the major takeaway on each slide.

Unique visuals will help make your message memorable.

Visuals are a great way to eliminate extra text, too.

You can add visuals by creating a timeline infographic to group and integrate information into visual frameworks like this:

designing presentation slides

Or create a flowchart  and funnels:

designing presentation slides

Or by representing simple concepts with icons, as seen in the modern presentation design below. Using the same color for every icon helps create a polished look.

Using visuals in this way is perfect for when you have to convey messages quickly to audiences that you aren’t familiar with – such as at conferences. This would also make the ideal interview presentation template.

designing presentation slides

You can alternatively use icons in different colors, like in the presentation templates below. Just make sure the colors are complimentary, and style is consistent throughout the presentation (i.e. don’t use sleek, modern icons on one slide and whimsically illustrated icons on another). In this example, presentation clipart style icons have been used.

designing presentation slides

Any time you have important stats or trends you want your audience to remember, consider using a chart or data visualization to drive your point home. Confident public speaking combined with strong visualizations can really make an impact, encouraging your audience to act upon your message.

One of my personal favorite presentations (created by a professional designer) takes this “key message plus a visual” concept to the extreme, resulting in a slide deck that’s downright irresistible.

presentation design

When applying this concept, don’t fall into the trap of using bad stock photos . Irrelevant or poorly chosen visuals can hurt you as much as they help you.

Below is an example of how to use stock photos effectively. They are more thematic than literal and are customized with fun, bright icons that set a playful tone.

designing presentation slides

The content and visual design of a presentation should be seamless.

It should never seem like your text and visuals are plopped onto a template. The format and design of the slides should contribute to and support the audience’s understanding of the content.

Impactful presenation templates

8. Use scaffolding slides to orient your audience and keep them engaged

It’s easy for audiences to get lost during long presentations, especially if you have lots of slides. And audiences zone out when they get lost.

To help reorient your audience every once in a while, you can use something I like to call scaffolding slides. Scaffolding slides appear throughout a presentation to denote the start and end of major sections.

The core scaffolding slide is the agenda slide, which should appear right after the introduction or title slide. It outlines the major sections of the presentation.

At the beginning of each section, you should show that agenda again but highlight the relevant section title, as seen below.

designing presentation slides

This gives audiences the sense that you’re making progress through the presentation and helps keep them anchored and engaged.

Alternatively, you can achieve a similar effect by numbering your sections and showing that number on every slide. Or use a progress bar at the bottom of each slide to indicate how far along you are in your presentation. Just make sure it doesn’t distract from the main content of the slides.

designing presentation slides

You can imagine using this “progress bar” idea for a research presentation, or any presentation where you have a lot of information to get through.

Leila Janah, founder of Sama Group, is great at this. Her  Innovation and Inspire  talk about Sama Group is an example of a presentation that is well organized and very easy to follow.

Her presentation follows a logical, steady stream of ideas. She seems comfortable talking in front of a crowd but doesn’t make any attempts to engage directly with them.

9. Use text size, weight and color for emphasis

Every slide should have a visual focal point. Something that immediately draws the eye at first glance.

That focal point should be whatever is most important on that slide, be it an important number, a keyword, or simply the slide title.

presentation design

We can create visual focal points by varying the size, weight, and color of each element on the slide. Larger, brighter, bolder elements will command our audience’s attention, while smaller, lighter elements will tend to fade into the background.

designing presentation slides

As seen in the presentation template above, this technique can be especially useful for drawing attention to important words within a long passage of text. Consider using this technique whenever you have more than 5 words on a slide.

And if you really want your audience to pay attention, pick a high-contrast color scheme like the one below.

presentation design

When picking fonts for your presentation, keep this technique in mind. Pick a font that has a noticeable difference between the “bold” font face and the “regular” font face. Source Sans Pro, Times New Roman, Montserrat, Arvo, Roboto, and Open Sans are all good options.

Presentation Fonts

The last thing to remember when using size, weight, and color to create emphasis on a slide: don’t try to emphasize too many things on one slide.

If everything is highlighted, nothing is highlighted.

10. Apply design choices consistently to avoid distraction

Audiences are quick to pick out, and focus on, any inconsistencies in your presentation design. As a result, messy, inconsistent slide decks lead to distracted, disengaged audiences.

Design choices (fonts and colors, especially), must be applied consistently across a slide deck. The last thing you want is for your audience to pay attention to your design choices before your content.

To keep your design in check, it can be helpful to create a color palette and type hierarchy before you start creating your deck, and outline it in a basic style guide like this one:

designing presentation slides

I know it can sometimes be tempting to fiddle around with text sizes to fit longer bits of text on a slide, but don’t do it! If the text is too long to fit on a slide, it should be split up onto multiple slides anyway.

And remember, a consistent design isn’t necessarily a boring one. This social media marketing presentation applies a bright color scheme to a variety of 3-column and 2-column layouts, remaining consistent but still using creative presentation ideas.

designing presentation slides

11. Split a group presentation by topic

When giving a group presentation it’s always difficult to find the right balance of who should present which part.

Splitting a group presentation by topic is the most natural way to give everybody the chance to attempt without it seeming disjointed.

designing presentation slides

When presenting this slide deck to investors or potential clients, the team can easily take one topic each. One person can discuss the business model slide, and somebody else can talk about the marketing strategy.

Top tips for group presentations:

  • Split your group presentation by topic
  • Introduce the next speaker at the end of your slide
  • Become an ‘expert’ in the slide that you are presenting
  • Rehearse your presentation in advance so that everybody knows their cue to start speaking

12. Use a variety of page layouts to maintain your audience’s interest

Page after page of the same layout can become repetitive and boring. Mix up the layout of your slides to keep your audience interested.

In this example, the designer has used a variety of combinations of images, text, and icons to create an interesting and varied style.

Yellow start up pitch deck presentation template

There are hundreds of different combinations of presentation layers and presentation styles that you can use to help create an engaging presentation . This style is great for when you need to present a variety of information and statistics, like if you were presenting to financial investors, or you were giving a research presentation.

Using a variety of layouts to keep an audience engaged is something that Elon Musk is an expert in. An engaged audience is a hyped audience. Check out this Elon Musk presentation revealing a new model Tesla for a masterclass on how to vary your slides in an interesting way:

13. Use presentation templates to help you get started

It can be overwhelming to build your own presentation from scratch. Fortunately, my team at Venngage has created hundreds of professional presentation templates , which make it easy to implement these design principles and ensure your audience isn’t deterred by text-heavy slides.

Using a presentation template is a quick and easy way to create professional-looking presentation skills, without any design experience. You can edit all of the text easily, as well as change the colors, fonts, or photos. Plus you can download your work in a PowerPoint or PDF Presentation format.

After your presentation, consider summarizing your presentation in an engaging manner to r each a wider audience through a LinkedIn presentation .

14. Include examples of inspiring people

People like having role models to look up to. If you want to motivate your audience, include examples of people who demonstrate the traits or achievements, or who have found success through the topic you are presenting.

15. Dedicate slides to poignant questions

While you might be tempted to fill your slides with decorative visuals and splashes of color, consider that sometimes simplicity is more effective than complexity. The simpler your slide is, the more you can focus on one thought-provoking idea.

designing presentation slides

16. Find quotes that will inspire your audience

A really good quote can stick in a person’s mind for weeks after your presentation. Ending your presentation with a quote can be a nice way to either begin or finish your presentation.

A great example of this is Tim Ferriss’ TED talk:

tim ferriss inspiration presentation example

Check out the full talk below.

17. Emphasize key points with text and images

When you pair concise text with an image, you’re presenting the information to your audience in two simultaneous ways. This can make the information easier to remember, and more memorable.

Use your images and text on slides to reinforce what you’re saying out loud.

Doing this achieves two things:

  • When the audience hears a point and simultaneously read it on the screen, it’s easier to retain.
  • Audience members can photograph/ screencap the slide and share it with their networks.

Don’t believe us? See this tip in action with a presentation our Chief Marketing Officer Nadya gave recently at Unbounce’s CTA Conference . The combination of text and images on screen leads to a memorable presentation.

Nadya Unbounce Presentation Example

18. Label your slides to prompt your memory

Often, presenters will write out an entire script for their presentation and read it off a teleprompter. The problem is, that can often make your presentation seem  too  rehearsed and wooden.

But even if you don’t write a complete script, you can still put key phrases on your slides to prompt jog your memory. The one thing you have to be wary of is looking back at your slides too much.

A good presentation gets things moving! Check out the top qualities of awesome presentations and learn all about how to make a good presentation to help you nail that captivating delivery.

Audiences don’t want to watch presentations with slide decks jam-packed with text. Too much text only hurts audience engagement and understanding. Your presentation design is as important as your presentation style. 

By summarizing our text and creating slides with a visual focus, we can give more exciting, memorable and impactful presentations.

Give it a try with one of our popular presentation templates:

presentation design

Discover popular designs

designing presentation slides

Infographic maker

designing presentation slides

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designing presentation slides

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designing presentation slides

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designing presentation slides

Flyer maker

designing presentation slides

Timeline maker

designing presentation slides

Letterhead maker

designing presentation slides

Mind map maker

designing presentation slides

Ebook maker

A Beginner’s Guide To Presentation Design [+15 Stunning Templates]

A Beginner’s Guide To Presentation Design [+15 Stunning Templates]

Table of Contents

  • What Is Presentation Design? 

What Is the Significance of Presentation Design?

Understanding various forms of presentations.

  • 10 Tips to Create a Compelling Presentation Design 

5 Inspirational Presentation Design Trends

  • 15 Best Presentation Design Templates to Consider 
  • Key Takeaways 
  • Conclusion 

Once you’ve mapped out your presentation, it’s time to tackle the intimidating task of creating a visually stunning presentation design . Creating an excellent presentation design becomes simpler by learning and adhering to fundamental presentation design standards. Here is a presentation design guide to creating an engaging and well-designed presentation,  regardless of the kind of project you are putting together. 

What Is Presentation Design?

Presentation design focuses on the visual facet of your presentation to captivate your audience. An outstanding presentation design may significantly impact your target audience, whether it is investors, employees, collaborators, or potential customers. The design must ideally complement the material of your presentation to help get your views across and convince your audience.

Creating a presentation for the first time to present in a professional setting or to a large audience might feel challenging. This guide to presentation design will walk you through the elements required for building a visually appealing presentation. 

designing presentation slides

A presentation is much more than just a layout of slides with text and graphics on them. You need to make sure it’s visually appealing too. It is mainly because visuals are much more engaging than written words in your presentation slides. Presentation design is crucial because it allows you to combine your ideas, narrative, graphics, facts, and statistics into one cohesive tale that drives your audience to the decision you desire.

A robust presentation design may unlock doors you never imagined could be opened. An effective design is much simpler to understand and earns a lot of credibility for your brand. You can communicate your message effectively, encourage your audience to take subsequent actions, and get them to engage with what you’re saying with excellent presentation design.

You have the potential to communicate your point of view, create a brand identity, and get your audience to see and hear you loud and clear when you build a presentation with impeccable design. The material of your presentation is crucial to your project’s success, but a poor design may divert the listener’s attention (and not for a good reason). Don’t let a lousy presentation design force you to lose out on a huge business opportunity.

Creating a winning presentation design involves combining design components to produce slides that will neither bore nor exhaust your audience. Instead, it will engage and inspire them effectively. So, instead of creating a lousy presentation using shoddy designs, it is significant to master the fundamentals of creating the best presentation design.

Presentations may be used for several purposes and can come in different forms. A quarterly sales presentation with your team will not be the same as a presentation focused on employee training. 

In the first scenario, you’ll strive to advance your team to achieve targeted sales growth. In the second, you’ll focus on imparting essential knowledge and skills to your employees. Looking at some of the most prevalent presentation types can give you a better idea about presentation design and when to begin constructing your own.

1. Investor pitch presentation

Using facts to convince rather than enlighten is the primary goal of this presentation style, as indicated by the name. If you’re a startup or a small firm looking for investment, you’ll need to use this form of presentation to your advantage. An investor pitch presentation will be required when you’re explaining your company’s user acquisition growth rate to prospective investors. Such presentations are created using the classic pitch deck concept to make the perfect, thoroughly professional pitch.

2. Educational presentations

Educational presentations are sometimes misunderstood as informative presentations since they are designed to teach viewers new skills and educate them on a new subject. You may need to produce a presentation for a school for various reasons, such as presenting an idea or providing an academic report.

Academic and corporate training programs often employ this presentation format. A video tutorial with comments and suitable themes may be added to the slides to improve them. Educators are always looking for new and unique methods to provide engaging and enthralling presentations for their students. Using an educational presentation template may guarantee that your presentation is visually appealing as well as easily comprehensible.

3. Webinar presentations

Webinar presentations are the newest craze, and they’re a win-win for presenters and the audience alike. A webinar refers to an online presentation, but unlike a video posted elsewhere, the webinar takes place in real-time and with the active participation of the audience. There are several themes and settings for which webinar presentations might be utilized. 

Short surveys, quizzes, and Q&A sessions let participants feel more involved in the webinar. Most commonly, a webinar is meant to disseminate information, but it may also act as a marketing tool, a source of leads, or a way to generate new sales and sign-ups.

4. Report presentations

A report presentation is intended to offer the necessary information to those engaged in a process or project. Report presentations are critical in ensuring these stakeholders that the procedures that must be followed for the project’s completion are effectively planned and executed. Sample reports are also accessible to these stakeholders. 

A report presentation may take numerous forms, such as a business report or an infographic. Reports on sales and marketing performance, website statistics, income, or any other data that your team or supervisors wish to know about can be presented during the report presentation.

5. Sales presentations

Sales presentations are often the initial phase in the sales cycle, and are, therefore,  critical. A sales presentation, often known as a sales pitch deck, is a form of presentation you would need to provide a prospective customer or client with when pitching a product or service.

Not every sales presentation is designed to close a deal right away. The goal might be to pique the curiosity of the people concerned. Sales presentations often include your company’s unique selling proposition (USP), product price points, and testimonials. Your sales presentation must be engaging and successful in influencing potential customers, using a well-thought-out approach.

6. Inspirational presentations

An inspiring presentation is a standard tool used by managers, team leaders, motivational speakers, and business owners to stimulate and encourage their audience. Inspirational presentations are essential to influencing others and achieving your individual and business goals. 

To get a desirable result from this kind of presentation, elicit an emotional response from the audience and motivate them to act. Using a presentation template that has been professionally developed provides you with an advantage over others. 

7. Keynote presentations

Keynote presentations are given in front of a larger audience. A good example can be those shown at TED Talks and other conferences. While the presenter gives the entire speech, there are advantages to using slides, such as keeping an audience engaged and on track.

10 Tips to Create a Compelling Presentation Design

If your presentation is lousy, you might come across as unprepared, uninterested, and lacking any credibility. A well-designed presentation makes you appear reliable and competent. Here are some fantastic points to help you develop the best presentation design.

1. Outline your content and fine-tune the message

It’s crucial to prepare your content and fine-tune your main message before you begin developing your presentation. Try to figure out what your target audience wants to know, what they may already know, and what will keep them engaged. Then, when you create your presentation’s content, keep those things in mind and furnish designs accordingly. It is vital to remember the key takeaway of each deck you create.

Too much information shown on a single slide is difficult for most viewers to comprehend. Make sure you don’t overwhelm your viewers; each presentation slide should include no more than one key point. Make your information as brief as possible, yet make it detailed enough and valuable.

2. Use more visuals and less text in your decks

Your audience recalls information considerably better when images complement it because they can better understand visual features than simple text. Presenters that employ images instead of words get more favorable feedback from their audience than those who rely only on text.

designing presentation slides

Using visual examples in slide decks increases audience engagement, encourages more questions, and registers your message in the minds of your audience. Remove any unnecessary text from your slides and replace it with visuals that will engage your audience.

You may use various methods for adding images, but the most common is using your data’s visual representation. It’s important to note that adding visuals does not mean sprinkling fancy images and symbols across your slides. Relevant images and iconography are a must.

3. Limit the use of fonts and colors

It is vital to pay attention to color schemes and other design components, such as fonts, to ensure your presentation succeeds. Although it may be thrilling to employ as many fonts and colors as possible, the best presentation design practices imply that you should only use two or three colors overall. Also, make sure the content in your slides is of a different font than the headers.

When it comes to color schemes, certain combinations work better than others. When choosing colors, keep in mind that they should not detract from the message you want to convey. Add an accent color to one or two of your primary hues for a cohesive look. It’s critical that the colors you choose complement one another and communicate your purpose effectively. Headers should be in one typeface, while body content should be in another. Add a third font for the accents, if you’d like. 

4. Create a visual hierarchy

Visual hierarchy is an important consideration when including text in a presentation. Visual hierarchy is one of the most significant but underappreciated presentation design principles. Color, size, contrast, alignment, and other aspects of your slide’s elements should all depend on their value.

When creating a visual hierarchy, you must clearly understand the story and its structure. Your audience’s attention should be drawn to the most critical components first, then to the second-most essential aspects, and so on. When creating your presentation, think about the story you want to tell and the visual hierarchy you need to support it. If you do this, the essential ideas you wish to convey will not be lost on your audience. 

5. Incorporate powerful visuals

It is important to use visual aids to make a compelling presentation: think images, icons, graphics, films, graphs, and charts. You should also ensure your slides’ aesthetics accurately portray the text they contain. Alternatively, if you don’t have words on the slide, make sure the visuals mirror the words you’re saying in your speech.

Visual aids should enhance your presentation. In addition, you’ll want to ensure that your slide has some form of visual representation so that you’re not just dumping a bunch of text onto a slide.

6. Avoid using bullet points

These days, any excellent presentation design instruction would encourage you to avoid bullet points as much as possible. They’re dull and old-fashioned, and there are more effective methods to display your material. 

A slide consisting of icons, images, and infographics is more exciting and conversational than one written in list form. Using bullet points for each slide’s primary theme is a standard PowerPoint design recommendation that you should refrain from while designing your presentation.  

7. In group presentations, segregate slides by theme

While making a group presentation, finding an appropriate balance of who should be demonstrating which presentation segment is often challenging. Arranging a group presentation by topic is the most natural technique to ensure that everyone has an opportunity to speak, without the presentation becoming incoherent. Your group presentation should be divided into sections based on the subject.

Prepare your presentation ahead of time so that everyone understands when it’s their turn to talk. It’s up to each person in the group to pick one thing to talk about when they give this presentation to investors or potential customers. For instance, the business model slide may be addressed by one person, while another can discuss the marketing approach.

8. Maintain consistency

Consistency is essential when you work on the design of your presentation. Your presentation is still one presentation, no matter how many slides it has. Design elements, color schemes, and similar illustrations can all be used to achieve design consistency.

Although some of the slides in your presentation may appear to be styled differently than the others, the overall presentation must be held together by a single color scheme. To ensure that your viewers don’t lose track of what you’re saying, make sure each of your slides is visually connected.

9. Emphasize important points

It is pertinent to use shapes, colorful fonts, and figures pointing to your material. They help emphasize vital information to make it stand out. This not only keeps the reader’s attention on the page but also makes your design more streamlined. Emphasizing the point you’re trying to put across with visual elements makes it easier for your audience to grasp what you’re saying.

10. Integrate data visualization

Consider utilizing a chart or data visualization to drive your argument home, especially if you have vital figures or trends you want your audience to remember. This might be a bar graph or a pie chart that displays various data points, a percentage indication, or an essential value pictogram. 

Confident public speaking mixed with good visuals may greatly influence your audience, inspiring them to take action. The use of design features makes it simpler for your audience to grasp and recall both complex and fundamental data and statistics, and the presentation becomes much more enjoyable too. 

Even though trends come and go, effective presentation design paired with some inspiration to get you started will always be in style. Think about what’s current in the world of graphic design before you create a staggering presentation deck for a creative proposal or a business report. To help you better, we’ve come up with a list of the most popular presentation design concepts. 

1. Dark backdrops with neon colors

While white backgrounds have long dominated web design, the advent of “dark mode” is gradually altering that. Designers may use dark mode to play with contrast and make creative things stand out.

designing presentation slides

This is a great way to get your audience’s attention and keep them interested in what you have to say. The key is to pick one or two bright colors and utilize them as highlights against a dark backdrop, rather than using an abundance of them.                                                                                            

2. Monochromatic color schemes

In recent years, color schemes originating from one base hue, such as monochromatic color schemes, have been given a subdued pastel makeover. The usage of monochromatic color schemes in presentation design is always seen as clean and professional. It’s ideal for pitch decks and presentations since monochrome is generally utilized to assist people in concentrating on the text and message, rather than the colors inside a design.

3. Easy-to-understand data analysis

The fundamentals of data visualization should be restored. In other words, even the most complicated measurements may be made easy to grasp via effective design. Designers, marketers, and presenters are generating snackable stats in the same way infographics have found a place on visual-first social networks.

Create a dynamic proposal or presentation with the help of an infographic template that is easy to use. You can create distinctive slides with animations and transitions to explain your point more effectively. With the help of templates, you can convert your data into bar graphs, bar charts, and bubbles that represent your idea simply, guaranteeing that every data point is simple to comprehend.

4. Straightforward minimalism

Minimalism is a design trend that will probably never go out of style. It has always been a show-stopper. Each slide should offer just enough information to let the reader comprehend what’s going on. You should use a color palette that isn’t distracting. Your simple presentation will enthrall your audience if you boldly highlight your most significant points and use trendy fonts.

5. Geometric structures

There’s a good reason why designers are so fond of geometric patterns, 3D objects, and asymmetrical layouts. They’re basic yet stunning, making them perfect for times you want to make a lasting impression with the information you’re sharing. 

More cutting-edge components, such as 3D shapes and floating objects, are used in presentation graphics these days. Go for a presentation template that contains editable slides that enable you to easily add your visuals and material to brighten your presentation. 

15 Best Presentation Design Templates to Consider

In the case of presentation designs, you should never sacrifice quality. Ideally, you should have a design that improves your brand’s image, amplifies your message, and enables you to deliver various content forms efficiently. 

The problem is, it’s pretty challenging to locate premade themes and templates of this merit. We’ve made it easy for you by putting together a list of the best 15 presentation design templates out there. These presentation design suggestions are a great place to start.  

1. Business plan presentation template

This is a crucial business presentation template with a significant emphasis on visualizations and graphics. To create a business strategy, you need this presentation template. It consists of several crucial elements, such as a mind map, infographics, and bar graphics. Replace the placeholder text with your own to complete the presentation.

designing presentation slides

2. Pitch deck template

Startups seeking financing require a clean and eye-catching pitch deck design to impress investors. You may use it to present significant aspects and achievements of your company to investors. You can include slides for mockups, testimonials, business data like statistics, and case studies.

designing presentation slides

The pitch deck presentation template is excellent for your next client pitch, as it allows you to pick from a range of different startup tales to showcase the most crucial features of your firm.

3. Brand guidelines presentation template

Creating a bespoke presentation talking about the company dos and don’ts may be a terrific approach to discuss your brand rules with your team and stakeholders. You can easily show off your brand’s typeface and color schemes using this presentation template.

designing presentation slides

4. Marketing plan presentation template

Marketing is a vast concept, and the slides included in this design stock set reflect that broadness. A well-executed marketing strategy is essential to the success of any team. A marketing plan presentation template should ideally include slides for charts, timelines, and competition research. You can create executive summaries or mission statements with the below-mentioned presentation’s elegant and minimalistic slides.

designing presentation slides

5. Keynote presentation template

This keynote template has a lovely color scheme that is equal parts captivating and professional. You can employ a keynote presentation template if you’re going to be a keynote speaker at an upcoming event and want to ensure that your design stands out.

designing presentation slides

In addition to several slides, the template comes with various predefined color schemes. This template is perfect for any business presentation requiring a well-designed layout.

6. Training manual presentation template

A training manual presentation template may be used to convey new hire training to your workforce. It is essential for the design to be as clean and straightforward as possible.

designing presentation slides

These training material decks created with a predesigned template make it easy for new employees to learn the ins and outs of their jobs. 

7. Case study presentation template

A case study is an excellent way to illustrate a point in your presentation. The best way to attract new consumers using a case study presentation is to show them how your existing customers are using your product or service. Make sure to highlight how your product solved their pain points.

designing presentation slides

8. Interactive brief presentation template

It’s common to provide a creative brief when working with a contractor, freelancer, or designer to ensure everyone involved understands what the final product should look like.

designing presentation slides

An interactive presentation template like a creative brief is a terrific concept for absorbing and memorizing that information.

9. Workforce handbook presentation template

When hiring a new employee, your company needs to create an employee handbook to ensure they know the company’s objective and general working norms. You may connect this presentation to your intranet or website, or just distribute the digital version through a password-protected or private link.

designing presentation slides

10. Ignite presentation template

Using this template as a starting point for an Ignite presentation would be ideal. An Ignite presentation is a five-minute presentation consisting of 20 slides, compelling the speaker to speak fast and concisely. As a result, an Ignite presentation template prevents you from using too much text on any slide. 

designing presentation slides

11. Informative presentation template

The need to create an educational presentation may arise due to several reasons, such as onboarding new hires, explaining a concept to students, and more. An informative presentation template is a suitable solution in all cases.

Regardless of who they are meant for, presentations are the optimal format for sharing information with any audience. Create an educational presentation that you can embed in a blog post or publish on several platforms online. Make presentations to provide knowledge at conferences and other meetings.

designing presentation slides

12. SWOT analysis presentation template

A strength, weakness, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analysis is a valuable tool for gauging where your business stands, and how your strategic planning measures are paying off. This presentation template is an excellent tool for SWOT analysis or refining your marketing strategy.

designing presentation slides

It comes in several formats; circular design and hexagonal shapes being two of them. You may modify the colors as desired.

13. Competitor analysis presentation template

Knowing your competition and what they offer is essential for a successful business. Competitor analysis means researching your competitors’ key strengths and weaknesses, which can, eventually, help you define your goals and USPs more clearly. 

designing presentation slides

There are built-in interactive elements in this competitor analysis presentation template, which can help hook your audience. 

14. Bold presentation template

Ideal for non-corporate sales presentations, a bold and daring presentation template includes slides with a vibrant, attention-grabbing theme that is neither overbearing nor distracting. The color combination is striking without being oppressive.

designing presentation slides

15. Company overview template

Creative presentation templates are all the rage today. Using a lot of negative space will allow your audience to take a breath and direct their attention to the most crucial parts of your presentation. It is suitable for corporate presentations, since it doesn’t stick out more than is necessary.

designing presentation slides

Key Takeaways

  • Audiences tend to forget a large percentage of what was addressed before the presentation is through. This is why it is important to create a presentation design that is memorable.
  • A presentation is much more than just a layout of slides with text and graphics on them. You need to make sure it’s visually appealing too. 
  • Use a wide range of best presentation design tools, components, and styles until you discover the one that resonates with your target audience. 
  • Consider the most recent trends and best practices, and dedicate time to thoroughly crafting every presentation.
  • Fine-tuning your message, avoiding the use of bullet points, incorporating visual hierarchy, and incorporating data visualization are a few design tips to create a winning presentation. 

Both your presentation style and design are crucial. You can deliver more dynamic, memorable presentations by creating visually pleasing decks. It’s advisable to create a resourceful presentation design if you want to elevate your personal as well as professional credibility.

Take cues from some popular presentation templates, and enhance one little aspect at a time. Now is the time to practice everything you’ve learned in this presentation design guide. As with any other visual communication, creating the best presentation design requires time, effort, and patience. Never be afraid to try something new; you’ll quickly see the benefits a strong presentation can have on your project.

A presentation design puts ideas, tales, words, and pictures into a series of slides that convey a narrative and engage your audience.

A presentation design template is used to achieve a uniform look for your slides. Templates are pre-made presentations into which you may insert your data.

People remember images and words better than just words. The design of your slides should be simple and consistent. This way, your audience will focus on the most important points.

Use high-quality images to back your message, but don’t use too many special effects. Make sure you don’t read from your slides.

A well-presented, memorable introduction and conclusion are two essential parts of a presentation. Don’t forget them when you write your outline.

Presentation design is essential, because it helps you weave your ideas, narrative, images, facts, and statistics into a unified story that leads your audience to the choice you want them to make.

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Best practices for designing presentation slides

September 20, 2018 - Gini Beqiri

When designing presentation slides, you need to find a balance between keeping the interest of your audience and maintaining their attention, while not distracting them from your key message.

The aim of presentation slides is to enhance learning and understanding, by supplementing what you’re saying (not be the main focus of your talk).

Below we discuss the best practices for designing presentation slides.

Keep it simple

If your slides are more important than what you’re saying then your message will lose impact. Your slides must be an accompaniment and not distract from your words.

  • Avoid slides with lots of text, especially if it’s just a repetition of what you’re saying. The audience may be reading rather than listening to you. If you need text-heavy slides then gradually reveal the text when needed.
  • Ideally you should only include main speaking points in the form of short and concise bullet points on your slides. This is far less dull for the audience and the best slides have no text – some speakers just use images.
  • Don’t fill up empty spaces with unnecessary elements as this won’t help the audience understand what you’re saying. The less clutter there is on a slide the more impact your visual message will have.
  • The design elements should be kept to a minimum to prevent distraction, such as, ensuring you have a clear and simple background.

Decide your presentation’s slides ratio

You must decide which  ratio for your slides  will best suit the context of the presentation:

  • A 4:3 ratio if beneficial for presentation slides that need to be viewed across multiple devices.
  • A 16:9 ratio should be used conference presentations.

Consider creating your presentation slides in both sizes to be prepared.

Presentation slide ratio, 4:3 ratio vs 16:9 ratio

Have a title page that stands out

Create a visually engaging title page so the audience is interested and ready to listen before you begin speaking.

Limit transitions and animations

Using lots of animations is distracting and amateurish. It doesn’t add much meaning to your presentation and it’s boring for the audience if they are watching constant animation. It can also be problematic and frustrating to view the presentation on different devices due to this.

  • Only use animations for a purpose, such as, to reveal the stages of a process.
  • Your animations should subtle and professional, for example, “Wipe” is effective for introducing bullet points but “Move” and “Fly” are too slow.
  • Don’t animate every element in your slide.
  • Avoid using animations between every slide and don’t use more than three different types of animations for this.

Use visual aids

Visual aids are chosen depending on their purpose, for example, you may want to:

  • Summarise information.
  • Reduce the amount of spoken words.
  • Clarify and show examples.
  • Create more of an impact by making the audience feel a certain emotion.
  • Emphasise what you’re saying.
  • Make a point memorable.
  • Enhance your credibility.
  • Engage the audience and maintain their interest.
  • Make something easier for the audience to understand.

Jill Bolte using a visual aid in her presentation

We go into detail on specific visual aids later in the article but here are some general tips for using visual aids:

  • Think about how can a visual aid can support your message. What do you want the audience to do?
  • Ensure that your visual aid follows what you’re saying or this will confuse the audience.
  • Avoid cluttering the image as it may look messy and unclear.
  • Visual aids must be clear, concise and of a high quality.
  • One message per visual aid.
  • Use visual aids in moderation – they are additions meant to emphasise and support main points.
  • Ensure that your presentation still works without your visual aids in case of technical problems.

Read our article on  Using visual aids during a presentation  for more information.

Use high-quality graphics

If you want your presentation slides to look professional then you need to use high-quality graphics. Main points can be illustrated with images but these images shouldn’t be a stretched low-resolution photo as this will look sloppy. Also, avoid using Clip Art as it’s likely the audience has already seen the images and it generally looks unprofessional.

Photographs are particularly valuable to enhance understanding because they allow the audience to see what you’re saying. Ensure that you use simple photos that relate closely with your speech.

Find free stock photos here:

Alter images to focus on elements

If an image is not the focal point consider decreasing its opacity and if it’s the current focus then make the image more pronounced. Masking can be a useful way of achieving these results and it can also be used to direct attention to something important within an image. It looks more professional than highlighting or using arrows etc.

Use panning for large images

You may want to show a large image in your presentation, such as, a web page. Consider using the Chrome extension to capture this. This will prevent you from scaling the image and distorting it. Instead you’ll be able to pan as you talk about it.

Use suitable charts and diagrams

Present data using charts and diagrams because they display data in a visually compelling way and you’ll avoid overwhelming the audience compared to, for example, presenting a list of statistics. Select data most relevant to the points you’re making and ensure that your charts are necessary.

  • Horizontal bar charts should be used for comparing quantities.
  • Vertical bar charts are for displaying changes in quantities over a length of time. There should be a maximum of eight bars.
  • Pie charts highlight percentages. They should include a maximum of six segments.
  • Line charts show trends.
  • Tables are useful for side-by-side comparisons of quantitative date but charts are generally better as they are quicker to understand and they clearly emphasise significance.

Use suitable charts and diagrams in presentation

Use video or audio

Using videos and audio clips are a great wait to engage the audience and increase their interest because they introduce a change of pace and they enhance understanding.

  • Ensure that any videos or audio clips used are relevant to the presentation’s content.
  • Only play as much of the clip as necessary.
  • Never show a really long clip.
  • Video and audio can be difficult to fit into the structure of a presentation so ensure that you tell that audience why you’re playing them a clip and tell them what to look for or listen out for.

Avoid using autoplay for videos

With autoplay it can take a moment for a video to start playing which can lead to the speaker clicking in this time. This causes the slideshow to move on to the next slide rather than playing the video. Instead of allowing autoplay ensure that you have to click something for the video to play as this will give you more control.

Research suggests that using colour increases people’s motivation to read and their enthusiasm for a presentation. Colours also evoke emotions and can improve understanding by, for example, highlighting certain themes in specific colours.

Using the colour wheel can help when choosing your presentation’s colours: insert picture of colour wheel

  • Colours opposite each other in the wheel are complementary and they create contrast. Using complementary colours makes your text more readable and it allows you to draw the audience’s attention towards desired elements.
  • Colours next to each other are analogous and they are harmonious. Using analogous colours makes your presentation more unified.

Avoid using too many colours in your presentation as this can look cluttered and unprofessional and keep your colour themes continuous, for example, if you use the colour blue to highlight all the key words on your second slide continue to do this throughout the presentation. Also be careful with colour associations, for example, in many cultures red is linked to danger. Try to represent your words and topics with “appropriate” colours that make sense.

Many people are blue-green or red-green colour-blind so avoid putting these colours next to each other in, for example, a graph. If you cannot avoid placing these colours next to each other then use text to clearly label items.

There are websites that can help you pick colour schemes, such as,  Adobe Color CC  shown below.

Adobe Color CC colour wheel

Choose fonts carefully

Use the same clear fonts throughout your slideshow and use no more than two fonts that go well together. Avoid using Serif fonts, such as Time New Roman because: they’re designed to be used in text-heavy documents, they’re easier to read in smaller sizes and they cannot be seen well when projected. San-serif fonts, such as Arial are usually better for presentations.

A popular choice of font is Gill Sans but whatever font your choose make sure it looks professional and can be read from the back of the room.

Avoid using custom fonts that are unlikely to be on all computers because this can be problematic on the day of your presentation.

Use large font sizes

Your font size should be a  minimum of 24pt  so everything can be easily read. Ensure that you keep font sizes consistent throughout the slides or it can look messy.

Create consistent slides

The slides should have the same design, including colour scheme, font size, font type, etc. This makes the presentation flow better and emphasises that each slide is part of same story you’re telling so this consistency will help with understanding and it’s less frustrating for the audience.

However, some speakers like to have one style for the main slides and other styles for transitions between topics, for example, you may switch around the background and text colours for transition slides so it feels like part of the same presentation but it shows the audience that you’re moving on to a new theme or subject.

Sort your slides

Use the  Slide Sorter view  to confirm that your presentation’s structure is effective. Slide Sorter shows you how logical the flow of your presentation is and it’s easy to re-arrange your slides in this view.

Sort your slides with Slide Sorter view

Include white space on your slides

Empty space is needed on your slides or it will look too cluttered. Make sure that you have empty space between each element in your slides. Don’t try to fill the white space unnecessarily or you’ll reduce the significance of your points.

Premade templates

Experts do not agree on the use of premade templates but if you do use a premade template, ensure that there is consistency and that it looks professional.

  • Presentation templates  which you can download and use

Presentation slides come last

Design your presentation slides after deciding on your message and your supporting evidence. Remember that the slides enhance the experience but the actual speech needs to stand out on its own.

10-20-30 slideshow rule

Guy Kawasaki, an entrepreneur and author, suggests that slideshows should follow a  10-20-30 rule :

  • There should be a maximum of 10 slides – people rarely remember more than one concept afterwards so there’s no point overwhelming them with unnecessary information.
  • The presentation should last no longer than 20 minutes as this will leave time for questions and discussion.
  • The font size should be a minimum of 30pt because the audience reads faster than you talk so less information on the slides means that there is less chance of the audience being distracted.

10-20-30 slideshow rule

The above are common preferences rather than absolute suggestions – you have to design your presentation slides in a way that works best for you and the situation.

You must take into account the type of person you are, the characteristics of the audience, your topic, the context of your presentation etc. All of this will affect what you find suitable for your presentation’s design.

How to Design a Professional PowerPoint Presentation

Our series of tips on presentation design outlined some generic rules and ideas that you can live by to create better, more professional presentations. Today we want to follow that up by taking you through the actual process of designing a presentation from start to finish.

We’ll break down every step of the design process, from choosing colors and images to using whitespace properly. After reading through this you should be all set to design your own beautiful presentation slides that will put your coworkers to shame.

Using a pre-built PowerPoint template can be a good starting point for many people (we collected some of the best PowerPoint templates for you!). But if you’re wanting to design your own from start-to-finish, you’re in the right place!

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A Word About Content

I usually make a big deal about content preceding design, and presentations are no exception. Ideally, you’ll have the topic and much or all of the content outlined before you even think about design. This will in every way shape the appearance of your design, which is why working from pre-built templates isn’t always the best move (though generic templates can and do work great in some circumstances).

The reason that I bring this up is that I don’t really have an actual presentation in mind for this project. I’ll be running with a basic theme, but the textual information will be entirely placeholder copy. Your image, font, color and layout selection shouldn’t necessarily match mine but instead reflect the topic and content you’re working with.

Choosing A Color Scheme

Before I even open Photoshop (yes, I design PowerPoint/Keynote slides in Photoshop and drop them in), I want to find a color scheme on which to base my entire design. When I need to quickly find several colors that go together I usually start with Adobe Color CC . Not only is it a great way to build your own color schemes, it’s an outstanding source to find schemes built by others that you can just grab for your projects.

As luck would have it, I liked the very first color scheme I saw upon opening Color. This scheme was featured on the home page and looked like a great place to start for our presentation design.

designing presentation slides

Now, if you wanted to get everything exactly right, you could make a list of the RGB or Hex values, but I prefer a quicker, more direct route. What I usually do is snap a screenshot of the color scheme, paste it into my document and stretch it across the canvas on its own layer for easy access. This way I can quickly activate the layer, eyedropper the color I want, then hide the layer and get back to work. It’s a bit like having a palette of colors to dip your paintbrush in.

Designing Your Cover Slide

Now that we have a color scheme, the design work is going to be much simpler. One trick that designers often use in presentations is to leverage the color scheme as heavily as possible. If you’re new to design, you’ll likely think that this is too easy, too plain or even that it’s cheating somehow, but trust me, it’ll be much more attractive and professional than that horrid Microsoft clipart library you love so much.

To start, simply grab one of your colors from the scheme you chose and flood the background of your slide with it (I chose #631c25). Good job, there’s your background. Don’t freak out. It’ll look great. Now let’s throw in some typography.

Choosing a Font

Font choice is a major issue for non-designers. The tendency is to think that most fonts are “boring” and to look around for something exciting and fun. This inevitably leads to the use of Comic Sans or some other equally hideous font.

designing presentation slides

Unless you’re an elementary school teacher, your presentations should never look like this. Instead, why don’t you try one of those “boring” fonts to see if you can come up with something you like.

Combining fonts can be a tricky task and can take a trained eye to pull off. Fortunately, font designers have already created collections that work well together and if you’re not a designer, they make it easy to pull off great typography. The trick is to just stay in a family. Again, I know this sounds lame, but it works really well if you make sure the two styles you choose are very different.

For instance, I chose a Helvetica Bold Condensed and a Helvetica Light for my cover slide. Notice how different the fonts are from each other in terms of thickness. Choosing two styles that are relatively close causes visual confusion and should be avoided as a general rule of thumb. Instead, what you want is contrast and plenty of it.

designing presentation slides

Alignment and Layout

Notice a few things about the way I set up this slide. First, I used a strong left alignment for the text. As I say in just about every design article I write, center alignment should be a last resort, not a first. It tends to be the weakest text alignment that you can choose, having a hard edge increases readability considerably (notice that book pages aren’t center-aligned).

Also, notice the generous whitespace that I used. Remember that you don’t have to eat up every inch of space. Giving your text room to breathe helps your layout immensely and gives the design a clean look.

Adding an Image

At this point you might be wondering why you wasted your time reading so I could give you such plain advice. The truth is, most people that create presentations could improve them by 100% from following the advice above. However, I realize minimalism may be too extreme for some folks so let’s throw in an image to make it look nice.

Since our text is on the left, I wanted to find something a little heavy on the right. The general theme that I’ll go for is “City photos” assuming I had some sort of architecture or city-centric presentation to give. Again, you’ll have to choose iamges relevant to your own topic.

I grabbed this Flickr Creative Commons image from photographer Ben Spreng .

designing presentation slides

Now, if we just made this image our background, the text would become unreadable and we would be ditching our color scheme. What we’re going to do instead is set it on top of the colored slide and set our blending mode to Overlay. Then throw your opacity to around 45%.

designing presentation slides

As you can see, this helps the slide look much more interesting but keeps the text and colors fairly intact. It’s a simple solution that adds a lot of interest to an otherwise plain design.

Adding Content Slides

The cover may seem like it’s only a tiny part of the battle, but you’ve actually already set the tone for the entire presentation. You’ve got your theme, color scheme and fonts already in place. Now you just need to set up a few different layouts for your content.

The thing to keep in mind is to keep everything extremely simple, and that includes the level of content that you include. Apart from design, these are just good presentation tactics that you’ll learn in every public speaking class. Filling your slides with everything you’re going to say makes you unnecessary. You could just email everyone the slides and shut up.

Instead, the slides are merely meant to be a visual aid. Show a slide with your overall topic or main point, then speak the rest, without reading. Nothing is worse than watching a guy read his note cards word-for-word for thirty minutes, except perhaps watching a guy turn his back to the audience so he can actually read his slides out loud to you the whole time! You may laugh, but I’ve seen it happen folks.

For our first content slide, we’ll grab another Flickr photo and set it to the bottom portion of our slide at full bleed. Then we’ll set the top to another color from our scheme and toss in some text using the same exact formatting that we used on the cover.

screenshot

See how this closely resembles the theme we’ve already established while still looking significantly different? This is they key to good presentation design: cohesiveness without redundancy.

Now for our third slide, we can simply do the inverse of the second slide with a new color and a new image .

screenshot

Adding Informational Elements

It would be nice if every slide ever presented could work in a full bleed image, but the truth is that this simply isn’t practical. It will often be the case that you’re presenting graphical information or some other item that isn’t necessarily a photo.

My advice here is to try to stick as close to your theme as possible. For the slide below I flooded the entire background with a solid color from our original scheme and made a quick 3D graph with white columns (I drew a few flat boxes in Illustrator and applied a 3D effect).

screenshot

As you can see, this slide is very information-focused and yet it doesn’t sacrifice the aesthetics and simplicity we’ve already established.

You’re All Set

From here you might come up with one or two more alternate slide designs and then rotate between them for the duration of your speech. The result is a presentation that is beautiful, very readable and highly professional. The bonus is that the simple, straightforward design will probably result in less work than a clip-art-filled horror show.

Most of the time, great design doesn’t mean being particularly artistic or knowing how to create amazing complex layouts. Instead, it’s about presenting information in an attractive and user-friendly way. With this goal in mind you realize that you’re probably trying way too hard if your end result is ugly. Try cutting out half or more of the elements on one of your slides and giving what’s left a strong left or right alignment with plenty of whitespace.

I hope this article has convinced you to abandon that clip art gallery once and for all. The benefits of clean, minimal design in presentations are clear: the information is easier to take in and the end result is more professional than the mess of information you typically see in presentation slides.

Of course, if you’re looking to get started quickly, flick through our collection of the best PowerPoint templates to find a beautiful set of pre-made designs!

Find the perfect PowerPoint presentation template

Bring your next presentation to life with customizable powerpoint design templates. whether you're wowing with stats via charts and graphs or putting your latest and greatest ideas on display, you'll find a powerpoint presentation template to make your ideas pop., presentations.

Help your data, insights, and recommendations make a statement with beautiful and easily customizable presentation templates.

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Elevate your storytelling

Tips, tricks, and insider advice from our business and design experts

A quick way to create beautiful, powerful PowerPoint presentations

Create captivating, informative content for PowerPoint in just a few minutes—no graphic design experience needed. Here's how:

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1. Find the perfect PowerPoint template

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2. Customize your creation

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3. Show it off

Let's create a powerpoint design, frequently asked questions, where can i find slide templates and themes that i can customize.

To find customizable slide templates and themes, you can explore the business presentations templates or search by PowerPoint templates . Once you find a template that resonates with you, customize it by changing its color scheme, add in your own photos, and swap out the font.

How do I use pre-made PowerPoint templates?

After you've chosen a PowerPoint template to use, customize it. Explore [design tips] on how to customize a deck that resonates with your brand while putting emphasis on the topic at hand. Play with other design elements, like photo shapes, to make each slide unique.

How can I make or edit my own custom PowerPoint templates?

Start from scratch by creating your own PowerPoint template . Follow tips for designs and business presentations so that your unique template is cohesive and relevant to your brand. Incorporate your brand's color scheme and graphics so that all your slides aren't text only.

What kinds templates can I get online for PowerPoint?

You can get PowerPoint templates that have modern designs, animated ones, or even hand-drawn art in each slide. The color schemes range from bold to subtle. Each template's slides are also organized based on what you may want to include in your presentation . You can use the template as a starting point and customize its specific details from theme.

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Pick from over 17,000 high-quality fonts from Adobe Fonts to make your information organized and easy to read. User-friendly font styles make slides simpler to digest.

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Find inspiration with Stock assets. Use Stock photos for stunning background images or transitional slides, and use Stock to find a presentation template as a basis for your custom design.

How to design a presentation from scratch.

With some creativity, and these simple steps, you can create a custom presentation with InDesign.

  • Find the right page size. Whether you’re presenting a keynote on a massive screen or creating for mobile devices, start by selecting the dimensions you’ll use for your presentation.
  • Choose your background. Pick a striking background image that works with text overlay. The deck’s title can also become part of the background.
  • Create paragraph styles. Create no more than three text styles so you can keep the title font, body font, and footnote font consistent throughout the presentation. Set paragraph styles to change font and size with a click of a button.
  • Set up master pages. Create a few master pages to help ensure your presentation looks professional and well designed. Add image and text frames to the master pages so you can drop your content in later without having to overthink the layout.
  • Add images and text. Drag and drop Photoshop (PSD) files, PDFs, Illustrator (AI) files, JPEGs, PNGs, or GIFs into the image frames. To add text, just copy and paste text files or select the Type tool from the toolbar and type directly into the text frame.
  • Add page numbers. Insert page numbers to keep you and your audience on the same page. InDesign can automatically number the slides.
  • Add finishing touches. From movies and sound clips to hyperlinks, cross references, and page transitions, you’ve got plenty of interactive options to make your story more compelling.
  • Export your slide deck. The final step is to export your presentation in a format that can be projected or distributed in any presentation program. Exporting as Adobe PDF (Interactive) lets you play or click through interactive content in real time during the presentation.

Discover more presentation design skills.

Explore these tutorials to start mastering design tools and techniques to help you create beautiful presentations with InDesign.

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Create stylish layouts.

Learn how to design slide layouts with text and graphics that will effectively deliver information and impress your audience in projected or online presentations.

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Keep it organized.

Enhance your slideshows with tables that clearly display information and can be adjusted to different sizes with ease.

Enhance your slideshows with tables

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Take the snooze out of your PowerPoint presentations

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  • Information Overload : Too much information crammed onto slides.
  • Lack of visual appeal : Generic templates, clip art, and low-quality graphics.
  • Poor Design Choices : Inconsistent fonts, colors, and formatting, along with cluttered layouts
  • Reading from Slides : Presenters who read directly from their slides instead of engaging with the audience contribute to the phenomenon of Death by PowerPoint. This approach fails to add value beyond what is already on the slide.
  • Overuse of Bullet Points : Bullet points can be effective for organizing information, but overusing them leads to text-heavy slides that overwhelm audiences.
  • Lack of Interaction : Presentations that lack opportunities for audience interaction or participation feel one-sided and impersonal.

Use the strategies below to enhance your next presentation and to save your audience from “Death by PowerPoint.”

  • Use Visual Elements : Incorporate visuals such as images, icons, charts, and graphs to enhance understanding and add visual interest to your slides. Visuals can help break up text-heavy slides and make complex information more digestible. You can find images at Pixabay and Adobe Stock .
  • Limit Bullet Points : While bullet points can be an effective way to organize information, avoid overcrowding slides with too many bullet points. Instead, use them sparingly to highlight key points or list items. Consider breaking up lists into multiple slides for better readability.
  • Use White Space : Embrace white space in your slide design to create breathing room and improve readability. White space helps reduce visual clutter and directs attention to important elements on the slide. Don’t be afraid to leave areas of the slide blank to allow content to stand out.
  • Emphasize Visual Hierarchy : Establish a clear visual hierarchy on each slide to guide your audience’s attention. Use font size, color, and formatting to differentiate between headings, subheadings, and body text. Ensure that important information stands out visually.
  • Use Color Strategically : Strategically incorporate color to enhance visual appeal. Stick to a cohesive color palette and avoid using too many colors that may distract from the content. Use color to emphasize key elements or highlight important information.
  • Embrace Slide Efficiency : Each slide should convey a single idea or concept, allowing for deeper engagement and understanding.
  • Seek Feedback : Before finalizing your presentation, seek feedback from colleagues or peers on your slides’ visual design and readability. Their input can help identify areas for improvement and ensure that your presentation effectively communicates your message.
  • Practice : Use PowerPoint’s Speaker Coach feature to practice your presentation.

By implementing these tips, you can create a more impactful presentation.

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