Skip to Content

Text Styles in PowerPoint – Here’s How to Get Them!

Text Styles in PowerPoint – Here’s How to Get Them!

Wait, what! There are text styles in PowerPoint? I’m sure that’s what you might be asking when you see the title of this article. Although the option is not available in PowerPoint by default, there is a workaround to fix this problem!

Text styles are not present in PowerPoint by default. However, you can create your own text style. Open a text placeholder with a bullet list in the slide master, and customize the formatting of text at each bullet level. Then, go back to the normal view and increase indent to apply the text style.

In this article, I’ll be sharing with you an ingenious way in which you can create a text style for your PowerPoint presentation and easily apply it to your slides.

Needless to say, such a method is useful only when you have a ton of text on your slides – you know the kind that you have to squint to read!

[Please note – I don’t recommend creating text-heavy presentations. But if you have to, then this article can help you make it look better!]

So, without any further delay, let’s get started!

1. How to Create a Custom Text Style in PowerPoint

In PowerPoint, you don’t have an option to choose the heading styles and paragraph styles just the way you do in Microsoft Word. And, there is a good reason for that. PowerPoint is designed to be a visual tool and not a tool to show a ton of text!

That said, there are situations where you simply can not avoid having a lot of text on your presentation. In such a scenario, you will need to create your own custom text style in PowerPoint.

Using this method, you can create a “Heading Style” in PowerPoint as well as “Paragraph Style” for the slides in your presentation.

To do that, we will need to take the help of the “Slide Master” in PowerPoint.

Let’s take a look at the steps involved.

Step 1 – Open the Slide Master

The first step of the process is to open the slide master view in PowerPoint. To do that, first, click on the “View” tab. Then, from the ribbon, click on the “Slide Master” option.

This will open the slide master view in PowerPoint.

Step 2 – Insert a New Slide Layout

Next, since we need to create a custom, we will need to insert a new slide layout in the slide master in PowerPoint.

To do that, click on the “Insert Layout” button on the ribbon. Depending on your presentation, inserting a new slide layout may open a layout with a title and text placeholder on it by default.

However, you may even get a blank slide layout. If so, you can easily add placeholders in PowerPoint. Click on the “Insert Placeholder” button. Then, from the dropdown, click on the “Text” option to add a text placeholder on the slide layout.

Then, just as you usually add text box in PowerPoint, drag and add the text placeholder on the slide.

Step 3 – Remove the Bullets

In the next step, select all the text in the placeholder and remove all the bullets from the text. Doing so will allow us to leverage the “Increase Indent” option and trigger a different text style.

To remove the bullets from the text, click on the “Home” tab in PowerPoint. Then, click on the “Bullets” option. You’ll see that the bullet points get completely removed.

Step 4 – Align All Text to the Left

Once all the bullet points have been removed from the text placeholder, move all the text to align all of it together to the left.

To do that, place your cursor at the beginning of the text. Then, drag the position marker all the way to the left (as indicated in the image above).

Repeat this step for all the levels of text in the placeholder.

Step 5 – Change the Text Styles

This step is crucial as we will create a custom text style by changing the font styles for each level.

First, highlight all the text of the first level. Then, from the “Home” tab, format the text to create a text style. Feel free to change the font type, increase or decrease the font size, make the font bold or thin, or any other changes as per your preference.

For paragraph text style, I’d recommend using a font of 16 points and a thin font style such as “Calibri light” or “Lato Thin”. To get the best effect, you may even choose to change the color of the font and make it dark grey instead of black.

Step 6 – Create Text Styles for All the Levels

Now repeat the step for the text for all the levels in the text placeholder.

Keep in mind that you should at least have one paragraph style, and two to four heading styles.

I personally like to keep the paragraph style on the first level. I also usually prefer to keep the Heading 1, and Heading 2 (or sub-heading) styles on level 2 and level 3 respectively.

I’d also recommend going with one font style for a quote, but this is completely optional.

Step 7 – Save the Slide Layout

Once you have created all the text styles for various levels, click on the “Slide Master” tab.

Now, make sure to save this slide layout and rename it so that it is easy to find when we try to apply the slide layout.

To do that, click on the “Rename” option from the ribbon. In the pop-up that appears, give the slide layout an appropriate name and click on “OK“.

Finally, click on “Close Master” to exit the slide master and go back to the normal view in PowerPoint.

2. How to Apply Text Styles in PowerPoint

Once you have created the custom text styles as a paragraph style and the heading styles, now it is time to apply these styles in your presentation.

There are a few things that we need to understand when we are applying the custom text style that we just created in PowerPoint.

One thing to understand is that we will only be able to use the custom text style as long as we are using the specific slide layout for the slide.

Let’s see how to do all of that and the remaining steps to apply the custom text style in PowerPoint –

Step 1 – Insert a New Slide

Click on the “Home” tab, and click on the “New Slide” option to insert a new slide in your PowerPoint presentation.

Step 2 – Apply the Custom Slide Layout

Next, we want to apply the slide layout that we created to the new slide that we have just added in our presentation.

To apply the slide layout, first, click on the “Home” tab. Then, click on the “Layout” option. From the dropdown that appears, click on the custom slide layout that we just created.

In this example, we will click on the “Custom Styles in PowerPoint” slide layout to the slide.

Step 3 – Add Text to the Slide

In the next step, let us add some text to the slide. For the sake of this example, I’ve added some dummy text to the slide.

However, please feel free to go ahead and add the relevant text to your slide.

Remember, the custom text styles that we created are best suited for verbose slides.

Step 4 – Add Column to Text Box

This step is completely optional. However, adding column to text box in PowerPoint is a great way to break the text monotony on the slide.

You can easily add columns in a text box in PowerPoint. Click on the link to checkout my other article on how to add text to columns in a step-by-step manner.

Step 5 – Apply the Text Styles in PowerPoint

Now, highlight the text where you want to apply the custom text styles that we created.

Then, click on the “Home” tab and from the “Paragraph” options on the ribbon, click on the “Indent More” option.

You will notice that the formatting of the text style for the next level will be applied.

Step 6 – Apply Text Styles to Throughout the Slide

Now, select the sentences where you want to apply a different text style and use the “Indent More” and “Indent Less” buttons to apply the various text styles throughout the slide.

The indent more button will move the text style to the next level. Whereas, clicking on the indent less button once will move the text style up one level. If you want to move more than one level up or down, click on the “Indent” button more than once.

This way, you can easily format the slide using the custom text styles on the slide. The above image shows an example of how the slide looks once the text styles are applied.

3. Changing the Master Text Styles in PowerPoint

If you wish to change the style of all the text in your PowerPoint presentation, you can easily do so by changing the master text styles.

You don’t need to create a new slide layout for that. But the changes that you make need to be made to the text placeholder on the “Master Slide“.

Remember – changes that we make on the master slide will be applied to all the slide layouts in the slide master.

Step 1 – Open the Slide Master in PowerPoint

To open the slide master in PowerPoint, first, click on the “View” tab. Then, click on the “Slide Master” option just as we did before.

Step 2 – Edit the Master Text Style

In the next step, first, click on the “Master Slide” i.e. the first slide in the thumbnail view on the left part of the screen. The master slide is larger thumbnail as compared to the other slide layouts in the sequence.

The changes that you make on the master slide are applied to all slides on the presentation. So, for instance, if you were to add a logo to the slide master, it will be visible on all slides layouts and subsequently on all slides in the normal view.

Now, select the text within the text placeholder to edit the master text styles. Highlight all the text.

Then, just as we did earlier in the article, click on the “Home” tab and format the text in order to make the desired changes to the master text style.

Step 3 – Exit the Slide Master View

The last step in the process is to exit the slide master view.

To do that, first, click on the “Slide Master” tab. Then, click on the “Close Master” option and you will return to the “Normal” view in PowerPoint.

4. How to Change the Default Font of Your PowerPoint Presentation?

If you want to change just the type of font used in your PowerPoint presentation instead of changing the master text styles, you can do that too.

To change the default font in PowerPoint, first, click on the “View” tab. Then, click on the “Slide Master” option. In the “Slide Master View”, click on the “Fonts” option. From the dropdown, choose the font as per your desire. Finally, click on “Close Master” to exit the slide master view.

Once again, you will need to open the slide master to change the default fonts for your complete PowerPoint presentation.

Let’s take a look at how it needs to be done –

Step 1 – Open the Slide Master View in PowerPoint

By now, you must be well-versed with opening the slide master in PowerPoint. Simply, click on the “View” tab and then on the “Slide Master” option to open the slide master view in PowerPoint.

Step 2 – Change the Font

The next step is to change the font for your presentation.

Open the master slide in the slide master view. Then, click on the “Fonts” option from the ribbon. Simply click on the font that you wish to go with. You will notice that the fonts immediately change within the slide master.

The final step is to exit the slide master view by clicking on the “Close Master” option.

5. Using Font Styles in PowerPoint

In Microsoft PowerPoint, there are four basic font styles (not to be confused with “Font Type”) available in addition to the master text styles. The font styles basically are used for formatting the text in PowerPoint.

To access those styles, you have to first select the text on the slide.

Then click on the “Home” tab in the menu bar located at the top of the screen. You will find the font style options in the “Font” section of the “Home” menu.

Let’s take a look at all the four font styles in PowrePoint –

5.1 Bold

The “Bold” option makes the text heavier and darker than the normal text. To make the selected text bold, click on the “Bold” icon which is the letter “B” in the “Font” section.

Alternatively, you can press the “Ctrl+B” keys on your keyboard.

5.2 Italics

The “Italics” font style can be used for making a word stand out in a sentence or paragraph on the slide. To italicize a selected text, click on the “Italics” option that looks like the letter “I” in the “Fonts” sections.

You can alternatively press the “Ctrl+I” keys on your keyboard.

5.3 Underline

Underlining a word or a portion of text can add more emphasis to it. To underline a text, you have to first select it. Then click on the “Underline” icon which looks like an underlined letter “U”.

Alternatively, you can press the “Ctrl+U” keys on your keyboard.

5.4 Strikethrough

The “Strikethrough” option adds a strike across your text. To use this font style, select the preferred text and click on the “Strikethrough” option which is the letters “ab” icon in the “Font” section.

5.5 How to Clear Formatting of Font Styles in PowerPoint

Microsoft PowerPoint has a simple feature that allows you to clear the formatting of texts with a single click. You can learn all about the “Clear All Formatting” option in my article here.

To clear the formatting of font styles, all you have to do is select the text on the slide. Then click on the “Home” tab in the menu ribbon and click on the “Clear All Formatting” option in the “Font” section. The “Clear All Formatting” icon is a letter “A” with an eraser beside it.

Credit to nakaridore (on Freepik) for the featured image of this article (further edited)