Chart Styles in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac

Adding charts and editing them is a much more intuitive and easy task in PowerPoint 2011 than it used to be using older versions of PowerPoint. PowerPoint now makes repetitive formatting easy and consistent with the Chart Styles option. There are some pre-defined styles that contain combinations of formatting elements such as fills, outlines, and effects. PowerPoint provides various such styles to choose from -- and all these styles are based on Office Themes. Just a couple of clicks can make your chart look great.

To apply a Chart Style, you first need to have a chart in your presentation. Insert a chart, and then follow these steps to apply Chart Styles in PowerPoint 2011:

1. Select the chart on your slide to which you want to apply a style, as shown in Figure 1.
   
   
   Figure 1: Chart selected
2. Within the Charts tab of the Ribbon, you can see the Chart Styles group as shown in Figure 2. Hover the cursor on any of the Chart Style previews in this group and you will see a downward pointing arrow (More button) appearing (highlighted in red within Figure 2) -- click this More button.
   
   
   Figure 2: Chart Styles group within Charts tab
3. This opens the Chart Styles drop-down gallery, as shown in Figure 3. The style preview thumbnail highlighted within the yellow rectangle is the current style applied to your selected chart.
   
   
   Figure 3: Chart Styles drop-down gallery
4. To apply a new style, click on any other style preview thumbnail of your choice, as shown in Figure 4 (highlighted in red).
   
   
   Figure 4: New style selected within the Chart Styles gallery
5. Figure 5 shows the selected chart with a new chart style applied (compare with Figure 1).
   
   
   Figure 5: New chart style applied to the selected chart
6. Save your presentation.