{"slug": "10-cool-things-copilot-can-do-in-powerpoint", "title": "10 cool things Copilot can do in PowerPoint", "summary": "Microsoft's Copilot AI assistant in PowerPoint can automate presentation creation, generating first-draft slides in minutes and helping users edit them. Individuals with a Microsoft 365 Personal, Family, or Premium subscription have access to Copilot, while business users at organizations with over 2,000 users need additional Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses. The Copilot sidebar includes an agent mode for direct action on presentations and a choice of AI models including Anthropic Claude and OpenAI GPT.", "body_md": "Building a presentation can take lots of time. There are design choices to figure out: the slide layouts, fonts, theme colors, and so on. You can use a template to skip this hassle, but you still have to paste your text and other content into the slides and edit it all so that the results are visually appealing.\n\nIn PowerPoint, Microsoft’s Copilot AI assistant can now automate the heavy lifting of presentation creation. It can generate a first-draft presentation in minutes, then help you edit it. You can also prompt Copilot to help you quickly understand the contents of a presentation and glean insights from it. Use the tips in this guide to save oodles of time as you create and work with presentations.\n\nIndividuals with a [Microsoft 365 Personal, Family, or Premium](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365-copilot/pricing/individuals) subscription have access to Copilot from within PowerPoint and other Microsoft 365 apps. Users with a Premium plan have [higher Copilot usage allowances](https://support.microsoft.com/en-US/Microsoft-365-Copilot/ai-credits-and-limits-for-microsoft-365-subscriptions) and access to advanced AI features.\n\nFor business users, it’s more complicated. Organizations with more than 2,000 users must pay for [Microsoft 365 Copilot](https://www.computerworld.com/article/1629974/m365-copilot-microsofts-generative-ai-tool-explained.html) licenses for their users in addition to their regular Microsoft 365 licenses. Users at organizations with fewer than 2,000 users can use Copilot within M365 apps even without the M365 Copilot add-on licenses, but there are [limitations](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365-copilot/how-copilot-chat-works-with-and-without-a-microsoft-365-copilot-license) in usage, speed, and feature availability.\n\nTo see what kind of access you have, log in to Microsoft’s [Copilot Chat web hub](https://m365.cloud.microsoft/) and look for your name in the lower left corner. If you see “M365 Copilot (Premium)” under your name, you can use Copilot in M365 apps with priority access and advanced features. “M365 Copilot (Basic)” means you can use Copilot in M365 apps with lower-priority access and limited features. If you see “Copilot Chat (Basic)” or nothing below your name, you can’t use Copilot in M365 apps.\n\n*(Copilot Chat Basic users do get some Copilot functionality, including the ability to generate presentations, via the Copilot Chat hub. See our Copilot Chat tutorial for details.)*\n\nFirst, let’s quickly go over the notable settings of the Copilot sidebar.\n\nWhen you have a presentation open in PowerPoint, click the Copilot icon; it may be floating at the lower-right corner of your PowerPoint window or parked at the right end of the Ribbon toolbar. The Copilot sidebar will open along the right of the page. You’ll type your prompts to Copilot inside the chat window in this pane.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\n**Agent mode:** By default, Copilot can build a new presentation or make changes to an existing one in the main PowerPoint window. This is known as “agent mode.” To change this so that Copilot can’t take direct action on a presentation (all its responses appear in the sidebar), click the *Allow editing* button above the chat window and change it to *Chat only*.\n\nThe tips in this guide require that Copilot be in agent mode, so make sure you see *Allow editing* above the chat window.\n\n**Choice of AI model:** Behind the scenes, Copilot has access to various genAI models, including different versions of Anthropic Claude and OpenAI GPT. By default, it decides which model to use based on your prompt. You can set it to use a particular model: click *Auto* at the upper right of the Copilot pane and select a model from the dropdown that opens.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nThe tips in this guide should work fine on the default *Auto* setting. But feel free to experiment switching to specific models to see which give you the best results for particular tasks.\n\n**Important:** Remember that [generative AI output often includes errors](https://www.computerworld.com/article/4059383/openai-admits-ai-hallucinations-are-mathematically-inevitable-not-just-engineering-flaws.html), so always check Copilot’s output for accuracy. (Also see our [tips for reducing hallucinations in Copilot](https://www.computerworld.com/article/4067372/how-to-curb-hallucinations-in-copilot-and-other-genai-tools.html).) You’ll likely want to rewrite it in your own voice as you’re reviewing it.\n\nFor many people, the hardest part of creating a presentation is getting started. What types of information should be included on the slides, and in what order? Copilot can give you a leg up by creating the type of presentation you need, with placeholder data that you can later replace with your own.\n\nStart a new presentation, open the Copilot sidebar, and type your prompt into the chat window. It’s best to provide very specific details in your prompt. The more context or details you provide, the more likely Copilot will generate a presentation template that suits your needs.\n\nA good prompt should contain the slide count, subject, audience, and tone. Example:\n\nCopilot may ask a series of follow-up questions, such as your preferred visual style and desired level of detail. Then it will generate a presentation template.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nYou can optionally prompt Copilot for revisions, and when you’re happy with the template, swap in your own data.\n\nYou can attach a document (such as a Word document, Excel spreadsheet, or PDF) and prompt Copilot to generate a presentation based on its contents. This works best with a structured-format document (such as a business plan, project proposal, or summary report) that contains sections with headings.\n\nCopilot can extract the document’s text and structure to generate the slide content for the new presentation. This can especially be useful for quickly turning a long report into a visually appealing presentation.\n\nIn the Copilot pane, click the *+* icon at the bottom of the chat window. A list of documents that you’ve recently accessed appears. Select the one that you want Copilot to use. Alternatively, click the magnifying glass icon and inside its search box, type a few letters of the filename for the document you want. (Business users with an M365 Copilot license can select up to five files for Copilot to pull from when creating a presentation.)\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nThen in the chat window, you can enter a prompt that’s as simple as “*Create a presentation*,” although as always, providing more details and context is better. This is especially important for corporate users who reference multiple source files. It’s useful to tell Copilot what data to pull from each document.\n\nAnswer any follow-up questions that Copilot asks, and it will then generate the presentation.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nNote: Your marketing department may have created one or more [branded company templates for Copilot to work from](https://support.microsoft.com/en-US/PowerPoint/copilot/keep-your-presentation-on-brand-with-copilot). If that’s the case at your organization, simply open the appropriate company template as your first step. Then you can upload docs and type a prompt as described above. Copilot will create a presentation using the branded template.\n\nManually copying text or other content from a document and pasting it into a new slide is a chore. Instead, you can prompt Copilot to extract information directly from a Word document, Excel spreadsheet, or PDF to create new slides.\n\nIn the Copilot pane, attach the document using the same steps described in tip 2, then tell Copilot to create a slide from the document. As always, it helps to provide details such as the new slide’s focus or what data to include:\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nA presentation should be visual and display only the core message. Conciseness and proper writing tone are essential for your slides, so that they don’t lose the attention of your audience.\n\nYou can prompt Copilot to refine text on an individual slide in various ways, such as rewriting it in a more professional tone or making it more concise. Highlight the text inside a text box on the slide. On the toolbar that appears over the highlighted text, click *Edit with Copilot*.\n\nOn the menu that opens, you can select a preset prompt to refine the text, such as *Condense* or *Make professional*. Or, at the top of this menu, you can type a prompt to rewrite the highlighted text.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nNote that this feature affects all the text inside the text box. To rewrite only a portion of text inside a text box, you must split that portion out into a separate text box.\n\nAlternatively, you can prompt Copilot to analyze your entire presentation and tighten up the wording throughout all of its slides. For example:\n\nIf you have Copilot generate a presentation from an existing Word document that contains images, it will incorporate those images into the presentation. If there are no images in the source document, you can ask Copilot to find or create one and add it to a slide.\n\nTo add a stock image or an image from your organization’s brand library, tell Copilot what you’re looking for:\n\nTo have Copilot create an image using Microsoft’s Designer image generation tool, describe your desired image. As always, specificity is helpful:\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nJust as you need to review any text output from Copilot, take a close look at generated images to be sure nothing looks off.\n\nAlso note that Copilot image generation isn’t always reliable in PowerPoint. For some time during our testing for this story, Copilot said it couldn’t create an image because “the image generation service is returning a server error on every attempt.” After about a day and a half, the service began working again.\n\nAs you’re building your presentation, you may find that it’s become text heavy. Or perhaps it could use more visually oriented slides to break things up and make its progression flow better. Copilot can generate and insert new slides that are based on the content of the slides already in the presentation.\n\nIn the Copilot pane, specify exactly where you want the new slide to go. This helps Copilot to analyze the content of the slides before and after where you want the new slide. Then it can generate a slide to bridge between the two slides. Examples:\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nMaybe you need a quick refresh of your presentation before an important meeting. Or maybe a co-worker has sent you a presentation that’s packed with lots of slides. You can prompt Copilot to generate a summary of the presentation’s overall messaging.\n\nIn the Copilot pane, just type “*summarize this presentation*.” You can also have Copilot flag key slides that contain important information: “*show me key slides*.”\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nAs you’re reviewing a presentation, especially one that you didn’t create and are not familiar with, you can get Copilot to pull key data points from its slides.\n\nIn the Copilot pane, type specific informational questions. Examples:\n\nIf Copilot can’t find the exact answer to the question you ask, it will provide related information from the presentation.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nThis method can also help you validate that your presentation includes everything you want it to. If you ask Copilot about the action items in a presentation and it can’t find any, you know you need to add them. (Copilot will likely offer to generate them for you based on the rest of the slides.)\n\nIn the business world, presentations with dozens of slides are not uncommon, such as for financial reports or project documentation. Trying to find a specific slide or multiple slides can be tough. Copilot can help you navigate such a presentation.\n\nIn the Copilot pane, prompt Copilot to find slides based on specific topics. Example:\n\nCopilot will analyze the presentation and reply with a list of links to the relevant slides. Click one of these to jump directly to that slide.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nHere’s a great timesaver when you’re preparing to show your presentation to an audience: Copilot can automatically generate suggested speaker notes for you, based on the content of your slides. Example prompt:\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry\n\nIn a related feature, Copilot can create a frequently asked questions list (FAQ) for you to consult in your speaker notes or to present as a slide:\n\nCopilot will ask where you want the questions and answers added — as a new slide at the end, integrated into the speaker notes of relevant slides, or somewhere else that you designate. Make a selection, and Copilot will generate the FAQ based on the content of your presentation.\n\nHoward Wen / Foundry", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/10-cool-things-copilot-can-do-in-powerpoint", "canonical_source": "https://www.computerworld.com/article/4194634/10-cool-things-copilot-can-do-in-powerpoint.html", "published_at": "2026-07-22 11:00:00+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-07-22 11:10:54.822292+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "generative-ai", "ai-tools", "ai-products"], "entities": ["Microsoft", "Copilot", "PowerPoint", "Microsoft 365", "Anthropic", "Claude", "OpenAI", "GPT"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/10-cool-things-copilot-can-do-in-powerpoint", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/10-cool-things-copilot-can-do-in-powerpoint.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/10-cool-things-copilot-can-do-in-powerpoint.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/10-cool-things-copilot-can-do-in-powerpoint.jsonld"}}