How to Save PowerPoint as Video? A Step-by-Step Guide
(Note: This tutorial on how to save PowerPoint as Video is suitable for PowerPoint 2013 and later versions including Office 365)
PowerPoint presentations are a powerful technique to showcase your ideas effectively. But, do you know what’s even more effective than a PowerPoint presentation? A video presentation.
Yes, videos help engage the audience and connect with them on a deeper level.
Furthermore, if your presentation has too many slides, it’d be hard to move the slides one after the other, especially when the slides are maximized. You can also make your presentation into a video if the presentation does not need a lot of explaining.
In this article, I will tell you how to effectively save your PowerPoint presentation as video.
You’ll Learn:
Watch this short video on How to Save PowerPoint as Video
Why Convert PowerPoint to a Video?
There are a lot of times when converting your PowerPoint presentation to video proves to be useful.
For example, you might have successfully created an effective presentation and want to share it with your colleagues and teammates. But unfortunately, they don’t have PowerPoint to view the file. In such cases, converting your presentation to a video will be easy for the user to view. Viewing the video doesn’t need PowerPoint or any additional software and can be played on built-in media players or any third-party software.
When creating a video, you can emphasize certain areas and slides, include effects and transitions. What’s more is that, you can make voice narrations, use laser points to highlight important areas, and note important points on the slide itself. This will especially help you make an impact when you have to present online to several audiences.
You can easily attach the video to an e-mail and upload them to be streamed online. Also, converting Powerpoint presentations to videos is easy. You don’t need any additional software to convert and save Powerpoint as video.
How to Save PowerPoint as Video?
Before you create a video from a presentation, make sure you have created and curated all the slides, transitions, and effects in your presentation.
- Navigate to File. Under Export, click on Create a Video.
- This opens the Create a Video pane on the right side of the window.
- Click on Create Video.
- This opens up a Save As dialog box. Rename the file, choose the destination and file format, and click on Save.
Note: There are two video formats when you save Powerpoint as video, namely .mp4 and .wmv formats. The difference between the two formats is that in MPEG-4 (.mp4) Video file format can be easily compressed when you want to reduce the file size, but the quality takes a hit. On the other hand, the Windows Media Video (.wmv) file format retains the same quality even when the file is compressed.
- After you click on Save, you can see the video being exported at the bottom of the Powerpoint window. If you want to make some additional changes or you don’t want to export the file, click on Cancel.
- Now, navigate to the storage location and play the video.
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Customize the Video
You can save PowerPoint as video with the default settings. But, this will make the video look plain. Also, there is no emphasis on slides and each slide will be displayed for a set number of seconds.
There is so much more you can do before you export your presentation as a video. Let us see how.
Resolution of the Video
When exporting the presentation to a video, you can choose the resolution of the video depending on your purpose.
Microsoft Powerpoint offers 4 types of resolution namely:
- Ultra HD (3840×2160)
- Full HD (1920×1080)
- HD (1280×720)
- Standard (852×480)
Choose the resolution depending on your preferences. The greater the resolution, the greater will be the size and the time taken to export. For optimal results, choose the Full HD(1080p) resolution as the quality is better and it works on all devices.
Recorded Timings and Narrations
Did you know, you can narrate and explain each slide when you save Powerpoint as video?
By default, Don’t Use Recorded Timings and Narrations will be selected. This means that, when you save the video, the slides will just roll over one after the other for a set number of seconds. And, all the slides will have the same time spent on each slide.
You can change the time spent on each slide by using the text box below.
But, this has some drawbacks as there are no emphasis on certain slides. Also, there might be some information that you can deliver to make the audience understand the slides even better. In such cases, you can create narrations or just let the slides do the talking.
By default, the Use Recorded Timings and Narrations option will be grayed out. This means that you haven’t recorded any video or narrations in the presentation.
To enable this option, click on the Record a Video option from the same dropdown to create a narration.
If you don’t want to record the video at the last moment when you export, you can create your narrations beforehand.
- Navigate to Slideshow and click on Record.
- This opens up the Record window.
- Click on Record and start your narration as you speak.
- After you have made the recording, click on Close. This saves the recording.
- To preview the recording, click on Preview Timings and Narrations from the dropdown.
- Once you have checked and made corrections, click on Create Video.
Note: When you save a presentation as a video, all the inserted files and macros will not work.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why am I not able to save my presentation as video?
You might not be able to save your presentation as a video when some background apps are preventing PowerPoint from exporting the video. Applications such as antivirus or defenders might prevent you from recording and saving your presentation.
How to save recording and narration without audio or video?
When you click on Record, disable the microphone and video camera in the bottom right of the window. This way, you can use the laser pointer to point to the slide, and use pens to make any cues on the slides. You can also add notes to the recording without having to speak or show your face.
Can we increase the time spent on slides for a particular slide?
No. You cannot increase the time spent on one particular slide. However, you can record a video, mute the audio and video, and then show emphasis on particular slides.
Closing Thoughts
If you are looking to engage the audience with presentations, videos are an excellent way to achieve that.
In this article, we saw how to save PowerPoint as video in an easy way. There are two ways you can do that: You can either export the slides into a video with a set time on each slide. Or, create narration and add necessary cues to add additional leverage to your videos. You can choose the method depending on your preference and purpose.
If you need more high-quality PowerPoint guides, please check out our free resources center.
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Simon Calder
Chris “Simon” Calder was working as a Project Manager in IT for one of Los Angeles’ most prestigious cultural institutions, LACMA.He taught himself to use Microsoft Project from a giant textbook and hated every moment of it. Online learning was in its infancy then, but he spotted an opportunity and made an online MS Project course - the rest, as they say, is history!
