Info Tab of Backstage View in PowerPoint Online

Editing options available within PowerPoint Online are limited compared to the desktop versions of PowerPoint. When you explore options within Backstage View of PowerPoint Online, you can find that there’s almost no feature to control interface elements. The options here mainly accomplish basic tasks such as sharing, saving, downloading, etc. In this tutorial, let us explore the options within the Info pane of PowerPoint Online's Backstage view.

To access the Info pane, click the File tab of the Ribbon, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 1.

Figure 1: File tab of the Ribbon

This brings up the Backstage View in PowerPoint Online as shown in Figure 2. Select the Info Pane (highlighted in blue within Figure 2).

Figure 2: Info Pane of the Backstage View

The two options within the Info Pane of Backstage View are explained below:

Open in PowerPoint

1. Clicking this option brings up the Launch Application window as shown in Figure 3. Select the desktop version of PowerPoint you want to open the online presentation within, and click the Open link button highlighted in red within Figure 3).
2. 
   Figure 3: Launch Application window
2. You may get to see a message window, as shown in Figure 4. Just click the OK button, shown highlighted in red within Figure 4.
3. 
   Figure 4: Do you want to open this file?
3. Normally, when you use this option, the appropriate PowerPoint desktop application opens the selected file, and you can take advantage of all the extra features in the desktop applications. When you save the file, it’s stored back to your OneDrive folder.

Previous Versions

1. Clicking this option brings up a pane with a list of all previously saved versions of the open presentation, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 5. Notice that each of the older versions is named after the date and time when it was saved.
2. 
   Figure 5: Select a previous version
2. If you want to view any of the previously saved versions of the open presentation, click the name (date and time) of that version. as shown in Figure 6.
3. 
   Figure 6: Do you want to restore or Download
3. This brings up the selected version of the presentation as you can see towards the right, and also provides you with two options (highlighted in red within Figure 6):
4. Restore: Click this option to overwrite the current version of the file with the selected version.
5. Download: Click this option to download the selected version to your local drive.