Reset Slides in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows

Sometimes, we come across slides that are simply hard to look at. One glance at a slide like the one in Figure 1, below, and it almost doesn’t matter how strong the content is.

Figure 1: A slide that is hazardous to our vision

OK, this slide is an exaggeration, and you will seldom encounter something so terrible. And even the content on the slide is not amazing. However, this example works for us, because if you can set this slide to become something usable, then you can make any slide better: ) As in this slide, when too many elements compete for attention, the audience stops listening and starts trying to make sense of the screen. In those moments, the message takes a back seat.

And to be fair, this isn’t always your doing. You may be asked to present slides created by someone else. When that happens, you inherit not just the content, but also the design choices, good or bad, that shape how your audience responds.

At this stage, the priority is to remove unnecessary formatting and restore simplicity to the slide. This may also require adjusting the position, size, and text layout of the placeholders to re-establish structure and clarity. Fortunately, PowerPoint provides a straightforward, one-click solution to bring the slide back under control: the Reset option.

Follow these steps to reset all changes made on a slide in PowerPoint 2016 for Windows:

1. Select the slide which you want to reset, as shown in Figure 1, above. Alternatively, select all, one, or some of your slides in Slide Sorter view, as shown in Figure 2, below.
2. 
   Figure 2: Slide selected within the Slide Sorter view
2. Access the Home tab of the Ribbon, locate the Slides group, and click the Reset button, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 3, below.
3. 
   Figure 3: Reset button within the Slides group of Home tab
4. Alternatively, if you need to reset just the active slide, you can click the same Reset button without selecting any slides. You can also right-click on an empty area of the slide to bring up the contextual menu, and then choose the Reset Slide option, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 4, below.
5. 
   Figure 4: Reset Slide option within the context menu
3. Selecting either of these options resets the position, size, and any other formatting of the text placeholders to their default settings, as specified in the template and Slide Master. Figure 5, below, shows the same slides that you saw in Figure 2, previously on this page, after applying the Reset option. Compare it with Figure 2, and you will find that all the extra formatting has been removed.
4. 
   Figure 5: Slide is reset to its default settings
5. Your slide may not look the same as the slide shown in Figure 5. Your post-Reset look depends on the Theme applied to the presentation. Do you notice that one of slides still looks horrible even after using the Reset option? To know the reason, take a look at the Reset Backgrounds section, later on this page.
4. Save your presentation often.

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