A presentation often needs a life beyond the room it was first shown in, whether that is a paper copy for people to scribble on or a file sent to someone who could not attend. By the end of this page you will know how to print tidy handouts, save your deck as a PDF, and share it with others.
A slide designed to be glanced at on a screen is not automatically a good thing to hand someone on paper. Powerpoint's Print options include a specific Handouts layout built for exactly this: several slides printed neatly on one page, usually with space alongside for notes, so people can follow along and write comments without needing a full page per slide.
To print handouts, go to File > Print, and under Settings, where it normally says Full Page Slides, click the dropdown and choose an option under Handouts, such as 3 Slides. The 3-slides-per-page layout is popular because it leaves ruled lines beside each slide for the audience to jot notes. Also on that Print screen, look for the Color setting and switch it to Grayscale (or Pure Black and White) if you are printing on a black-and-white printer or simply want to save coloured ink; Powerpoint will convert the slide colours to shades of grey for printing without changing the actual file.
- Switches from full slides to handouts
- Saves ink on a black-and-white printer
- Prints once settings are right
If you need to send the presentation to someone rather than print it, a PDF is often the safest format, because it looks the same on any device and cannot easily be edited by accident. Go to File > Save As, choose where to save it, and in the 'Save as type' box choose PDF before clicking Save. To share the working Powerpoint file itself, either attach the .pptx file to an email, or if it is saved to OneDrive, click the Share button in the top-right corner of the Powerpoint window to send a link instead of a file, which also lets several people view or edit the same copy.
Try it yourself
Go to File > Print, click the Full Page Slides dropdown, and choose 3 Slides under the Handouts section.
This switches the print layout from one slide per page to a tidy multi-slide handout with note space.
On the same Print screen, change Color to Grayscale.
Grayscale saves coloured ink and often prints more clearly on an ordinary office printer.
Preview the layout on the right-hand side of the Print screen before printing, to check the slides are still readable at that smaller size.
Some slides with small text or intricate charts become hard to read once shrunk to three per page, and it is easier to fix that now than after printing.
Go to File > Save As, choose a location, set 'Save as type' to PDF, and click Save.
A PDF keeps the layout fixed no matter what device or software opens it, which is ideal for sending to someone else.
If the file is saved to OneDrive, click Share in the top-right corner, enter an email address, and send the link.
Sharing a link keeps everyone looking at the same up-to-date copy, rather than several different attachments floating around.
Words people use
Knowing these few options means the end of a presentation is never a scramble. Whether someone needs a paper copy to mark up during the meeting or a clean file afterwards, you already know exactly which menu to open.
Check yourself
If you can say yes to each of these, you are ready for the next lesson.
- I can print handouts with several slides per page and space for notes.
- I can switch printing to greyscale to save ink.
- I can save my presentation as a PDF using Save As.
- I can share my presentation by email attachment or by sending a OneDrive link.