Handout Master View in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows

Handouts are documents you can print from within PowerPoint that include slide representations from your presentation. PowerPoint lets you include as many as 9 slides on each Handout page. Of course, with 9 slides on a page, your slides will look more like thumbnails. You can also choose to print just one slide on every handout page, so then your Handout pages will look like individual slides printed on a page.

Most Handouts are created to be printed, and the look and feel of these printed Handouts is determined by the Handout Master. To access and make edits to the Handout Master, you need to get to the Handout Master view in PowerPoint 2016. Changes you make in this view influence the look and layout of printed Handouts. You can change or edit the background, the header, and the footer of printed Handouts.

To access the Handout Master view, you can choose either of these options:

1. Access the View tab on the Ribbon, and click the Handout Master button (highlighted in red within Figure 1).
2. 
   Figure 1: Handout Master button
2. Shift-click the Slide Sorter view button on the Status Bar (highlighted in red within Figure 2).

Either option gets you to the Handout Master view, that you can see in Figure 2 below. Note that the Handout you see in Figure 2 contains 6 slides. Your Handout may contain more or less slides. We will explore this aspect later in this tutorial.

Figure 2: Handout Master view in PowerPoint 2016

You can format and reposition the Handout's Header and Footer placeholders, as also the placeholders used for the Date (and Time), and Slide Numbers. You can also add objects, such as a picture (useful to add a logo to all your printed handouts) or a background.

The Handout Master tab of the Ribbon (highlighted in green within Figure 2 above) provides several layout options for the number of slides that you want to print on each handout page. Locate the Page Setup group in this tab, and then choose the option called Slides Per Page. This opens a drop-down gallery that you can see in Figure 3, below.

Figure 3: Slides Per Page drop-down gallery

Here are some guidelines about the number of slides you add on each Handout page:

• You can choose the number of slides per Handout page. Options include 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, and 9 slides per page.
• If you choose to have two slides, your handout will contain two large slides on each handout page.
• Similarly, if you choose the option for 6 slides, you'll end up with six smaller slide previews on each handout page.
• These individual slide placeholders that you add for 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, or 9 slides cannot be repositioned or resized. You can however choose from the layout options. So if you wanted larger slide previews, you would choose to have 1 or 2 slides per handout page.
• You can also choose an option called Slide Outline that prints the entire outline of a presentation on a handout page.

To go back to Normal view from Handout Master, choose any of these options:

1. Access the Handout Master tab on the Ribbon. Within the Close group, click the Close Master View button (highlighted in blue within Figure 2, shown earlier on this page).
2. Access the View tab on the Ribbon, locate the Presentation Views group, and click the Normal button.
3. You can also click the Normal button located on the Status Bar, just before the Slide Sorter view button.