Populate Tables with Content in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac

After inserting a blank table on your PowerPoint slide, the very next task you would want to do is to fill empty cells with required content. There are plenty of ways to do so. In this tutorial, we will explore these ways.

First, let us explore how you can navigate from cell to cell in a table in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac:

1. In a table, click on a particular cell to select it.
2. You can use the Up, Down, Left, and Right arrow keys to move between table cells.
3. Pressing the Tab key will take you to the next cell in the row within a table.
4. When you have selected the last cell in a row (which is not within the last row of the table), pressing the Tab key will take you to the first cell in the next row.
5. If you press the Tab key while the active cell is the last cell at the bottom-right corner (last row, last cell) in the table, you will end up adding a new row to your table.

Next, let us explore ways to populate table cells with content:

1. Type content directly into your table cells

Position your cursor within the table cell in which you want to enter data, and then, click once. Doing so will place an insertion point inside the table cell, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 1, below. Now, start typing your content.

Figure 1: Click inside the table cell to establish the insertion point

2. Copy content and paste into table cells

You can copy content from somewhere else and then paste it into the table cell at the insertion point. Often, pasting content will result in the formatting of the original content being copied as well. To avoid this problem, you can use the Paste Special option rather than using the regular Paste option. Follow these steps to learn more:

1. Copy text content from the original location, that could be an Excel sheet, a Word document, a web site, an email, or anywhere else. Make sure the content you copy is intended to be pasted in a single cell of your PowerPoint table.
2. Place your cursor in the cell of your PowerPoint table where you want to paste the copied content. Choose the Edit | Paste Special menu option. The keyboard shortcut for Paste Special is ⌘ + Control + V.
3. In the resultant dialog box, choose the Unformatted Text option, and click the OK button.

PowerPoint Keyboard Shortcuts

Do you want more keyboard shortcuts?

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

3. Take entire content from the table created outside PowerPoint and use as a PowerPoint table

If you have created a table outside PowerPoint, you can use the content within a PowerPoint table. To learn more, explore our Use Excel Data within Tables in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac tutorial.

After populating the table with the content, you can format content as required, using options within the Formatting Toolbar. To learn more about this toolbar, refer to our Formatting Toolbar in PowerPoint 2011 for Mac tutorial.

Make sure you save your presentation often.