Animate Ungrouped Tables in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows

Animating table components is something that you cannot do in PowerPoint. You can either set to animate the entire table at a time, or can't animate it at all. The solution is to first ungroup the table using the workaround explained in our Ungroup a Table in PowerPoint 2013 for Windows tutorial and then animate the ungrouped components as required. When you ungroup a table the output will be a bunch of rectangles and text boxes, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Ungrouped table

These table components are not bound to each other, so you can make them to animate in any manner as you wish -- row by row, or column by column, or in any other way you want. However, you should be cautious enough to make it sure that the animation is relevant to the data that the table represents. In this tutorial we will show you how to animate this ungrouped table row by row in PowerPoint 2013. Follow these steps to learn more:

1. Duplicate the slide containing the ungrouped table so that you can get it back in its original state, in case if something goes wrong.
   
   
2. Deselect the table components by clicking outside the ungrouped table. Then, click just beneath the table in the area where a horizontal line was visible when table components were selected, as you can see in Figure 1, above. This will select the box that contains the table components, as shown in Figure 2. Delete this box.
   
   Figure 2: Box containing the table components selected
   
   
3. Now you are left with just individual table cells and the text boxes, as shown in Figure 3.
   
   
   Figure 3: Table cells and the text boxes
   
   
4. Since we are animating the table row by row, let us group the table row components. Start with selecting the components within first row for grouping. Drag and draw a marquee over the first row -- make sure to cover a little extra area around the row, as shown in Figure 4 -- but not so much extra so that you end up selecting components within adjacent rows!
   
   
   Figure 4: Marquee drawn over the first row
   
   
5. As soon as you release the mouse button, you will see that all table components within the first row are selected, as shown in Figure 5.
   
   Figure 5: First row of table components selected
   
   
6. Now group all selected table components within the first row, as shown in Figure 6.
   
   
   Figure 6: Table components within the first row being grouped
   
   
   Tip: Use the Ctrl+G keyboard shortcut to group. Want more keyboard shortcuts? Explore our PowerPoint Keyboard Shortcuts E-Book.
   
   
   
7. Similarly, group the components within the other rows of the table.
   
   
8. After grouping to create individual rows, it's time to animate them. Start with applying an animation to the first table row. In Figure 7 you can see that we have selected Wipe, which is one of the Entrance Animations that PowerPoint provides.
   
   
   Figure 7: Wipe animation being applied to the first table row
   
   
9. After applying the animation, access the Effect Options button within the Animations tab of the Ribbon to bring up a drop-down gallery that has options pertaining to the selected animation type. In Figure 8 you can see that we set our Wipe animations to play From Left.
   
   
   Figure 8: Wipe animation set to play From Left
   
   
10. Then, set the animation event and speed as required. In Figure 9, you can see the animation event set to After Previous (highlighted in red) and Duration (speed) set to 1.50 seconds (highlighted in blue).
    
    
    Figure 9: Animation event and speed set for the table row
    
    
11. You can also try some other options to make the animation more effective. To learn more about various animation options, explore our Animation and Transitions page. Figure 10 shows the first row of our sample table after being applied with animation.
    
    Figure 10: First table row animated
    
    
12. Similarly, select other grouped table rows and add animation as required.
    
    
13. Save your presentation often.