Working with Custom Groups in Ribbon Tabs in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows

All Ribbon tabs in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows may have any number of buttons. These buttons represent commands. You'll see that these buttons are not scattered all over the tab area. In fact, all of them are neatly arranged together in Groups. Each of these Groups has a name that describes what commands within that Group do.

For example, the Slide Show tab in the Ribbon has a group named Set Up, this contains all commands that help you set up your slide show, such as changing show settings, hiding slides, rehearsing and recording slide shows, etc.

It is only sensible to imagine that you should use this Group concept while creating custom Ribbon tabs. In fact, PowerPoint will not let you add any command anywhere else other than within a Group.

Note that a Group is a part of a Ribbon tab, we have already shown you how to add a new Ribbon tab. You can see the Slide Show Ribbon tab, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 1, below, and its three default Groups, as shown highlighted in blue within Figure 1.

Figure 1: Groups within the Slide Show tab

These Groups can be customized, and also when a new Ribbon tab is added, it contains a blank new group. This is because all your commands within a tab need to reside in a group. You can opt to rename the new Ribbon tab and the custom Group as well.

Now, follow these steps to learn how to work with custom groups within Ribbon tabs:

1. You first need to bring up the PowerPoint Options dialog box. There are two ways to access these options. The easiest way is to right-click anywhere on the Ribbon and to select the Customize the Ribbon option from the resultant menu, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 2, below.
2. 
   Figure 2: Customize the Ribbon option
3. Alternatively, choose the File menu to bring up Backstage view, as shown in Figure 3, below. Now, select Options, as shown highlighted in blue within Figure 3.
4. 
   Figure 3: Options within File menu

PowerPoint Options with a Keyboard Shortcut

Also, if you are a keyboard aficionado, you can quickly press the Alt + F keys together and then press T.


PowerPoint Keyboard Shortcuts

Do you want more keyboard shortcuts?

Explore our PowerPoint Keyboard Shortcuts and Sequences Ebook that is updated for all PowerPoint versions.

2. Either way, you end up with the PowerPoint Options dialog box, as shown in Figure 4, below. Make sure you choose the Customize Ribbon option within the sidebar. Doing so shows the relevant options on the right side of the PowerPoint Options dialog box, as shown in Figure 4. Note that we added new Ribbon tab. This contains a new Group, as shown in highlighted in red within Figure 4. Now, we will similarly add a new group to the Slide Show tab. Note that this is one of the default tabs of the Ribbon. You add groups to both default and custom Ribbon tabs in the same way.
3. 
   Figure 4: PowerPoint Options dialog box showing Custom group within new Ribbon tab
3. To add a new group, select the tab to which you want to add a new group. For our example, we selected the Slide Show tab, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 5, below, and clicked the New Group button, as shown highlighted in blue within Figure 5.
4. 
   Figure 5: Add a new group within a default tab
4. This adds a new group, as shown in highlighted in red within Figure 6, below.
5. 
   Figure 6: New group added
5. Select and right-click the custom Group, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 6, above. Doing so will bring up a contextual menu, as shown in Figure 7, below.
6. 
   Figure 7: Right-click the Custom Group to get a contextual menu
7. There are seven options within the contextual menu, as shown in Figure 7, above. These options are explained below:

i. Add New Tab

8. This option will add a new Ribbon tab in the Main Tabs list. Learn more in our Add and Rename Ribbon Tabs tutorial.

ii. Add New Group

9. This will add a new custom group within the selected Ribbon tab.

iii. Rename

10. Enables you to rename the selected custom group. You can learn how to rename a Ribbon Tab in our Add and Rename Ribbon Tabs tutorial. Renaming Groups works in the same way.

iv. Remove

11. This option will remove the selected custom group.

v. Hide Command Labels

12. Each new group, when added has a symbol associated with it, you are asked to choose this symbol when you add a new Group. This option hides the symbol for the selected group.

vi. Move Up

13. Use this option to reorder the placement of the selected group. Doing so will move the selected group upwards (leftwards in the Ribbon tab).

vii. Move Down

14. Use this option to reorder the placement of the selected group. This action will move the selected group downwards (rightwards in the Ribbon tab).
15. Note that the same options such as New Tab, New Group, Rename, and Move Up/Move Down can also be found outside the right-click menu within the PowerPoint Options dialog box, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 8, below.
16. 
    Figure 8: Custom Groups options within the PowerPoint Options dialog box
6. Select the options as required. When done, click the OK button within the PowerPoint Options dialog box to get back to the PowerPoint 2013 interface. Figure 9, below, shows a new custom group added within the Slide Show tab (compare Figures 1 and 9). Earlier it contained three default groups, as shown in Figure 1, previously on this page, but now there are four.
7. 
   Figure 9: Custom group added
8. Note that there are no commands within the new custom group, we'll explore adding commands in our Adding Commands to Custom Groups tutorial.