Working with text in PowerPoint seems pretty easy and straightforward. But there's a lot of PowerPoint features you may not be using.
In this tutorial, we'll teach you how to highlight text in PPT and use other text effects in PowerPoint. We'll also provide a curated list of some of our most popular PowerPoint templates available on Envato Elements.
Jump to content in this section:
- Featuring Enjoy PowerPoint Template
- How to Insert Text and Change Fonts in PowerPoint
- How to Highlight Text in Microsoft PowerPoint
- How to Add Animation to Your Text
- PowerPoint Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
- Learn More About Working With PowerPoint
- A Curated List of the Best PowerPoint Templates (Envato Elements)
- More Slideshow Templates You Can Customize in MS PowerPoint
- Thousands of PowerPoint Templates on Envato Elements
Featuring Enjoy PowerPoint Template
Before we get into highlighting text in PPT, let's take a look at the template we'll be using. For this tutorial, we're going to use Enjoy PowerPoint Template available on Envato Elements.
Enjoy PowerPoint template is a minimalistic premium template that can be used for various purposes. Here are some features of this template:
- 100 unique slides
- comes with free fonts
- includes built-in animations and transitions
- comes in a 16:9 format
How to Insert Text and Change Fonts in PowerPoint
Now that we've discussed where to find high-quality premium templates, let's explore how to add text in PowerPoint.
1. Insert Text on PowerPoint
PowerPoint has what we call text placeholders where you can insert any text you want to add. All you need to do is click Insert and click the Text Box option.
The text placeholders look like empty boxes and have cues such as "Click to add title." If you chose a pre-made PowerPoint presentation, they include starter text, which you can replace or customize.
To add more text outside a placeholder you've created or a pre-built one, the trick there is to add a new text box inside that slide.
After that, click and drag the text box in your slide to the point where you want the text to be. Then, you can type your text and customize how it looks. In the example below, we used the font size 48.
2. Change What Your Font Looks Like
When you add the font inside the text box, you can always change how it looks like by choosing one of the 15 font tools in PowerPoint.
Select the text you want to make font changes to. From the Home tab, select the font option you want to apply. Click on the option to apply the change.
Options include:
- Bold. Makes your font look thicker.
- Italic. Makes your text look like it's leaning. This is perfect for creating captions and annotations.
- Underline. As the name suggests, it underlines your text. This is a good choice for your titles and headings.
- Shadow. Adds more contrast to your text to make it stand out. It can also make it more readable. (This may not appear in some versions of PowerPoint)
- SuperScript. Allows you to add a character above the text.
- Subscript. Allows you to add a character below the text.
- Strikethrough. This effect makes your text looks like it's been crossed out.
- Text Color. This option allows you to change the color of your text.
- Font. You can change your font from the wide range of typefaces in this option.
- Font Size. Allows you to increase or decrease your text size. A higher number makes the text large and a smaller number makes it small.
- Increase/Decrease Text Size. This is similar to the font size option.
- Change Case. This option converts your text into different cases to make it more natural. You can choose from three options: uppercase, lowercase, sentence case.
- Character Spacing. This allows you to adjust the space between each character in your text.
- Clear Formatting. This resets everything and clears all the text options you used on your text.
How to Highlight Text in Microsoft PowerPoint
Now, let's learn how to highlight text in PowerPoint.
1. Insert a Shape
First, go to Insert and the Shapes. Choose the rectangle.
Draw the shape on the word or words you want to highlight.
The shape will basically cover the word. Right-click the shape and choose Send to Back.
Now click Shape Outline and check No Outline to remove the border from your highlight. You can also change the color of your highlight by clicking Shape fill.
Aside from highlighting text in PowerPoint, you can power up your text further with the built-in text style or you can customize them if your creative juices are still up to it.
2. Use Built-in Text Effects
Start by selecting your text. Click Shape Format. You'll see Word Art Styles where you can select the style you want for your text.
3. Customize Your Text
Aside from the pre-programmed effects, PowerPoint also has features that allow you to customize the text effects.
You can do that through a hidden PowerPoint feature called Format Text Effects. To access this, highlight the text you want to customize first.
Right-click the highlighted text and you'll be able to see menu. Choose Format Text Effect. When you click that, a menu will appear on the right that allows you to customize your text.
There are basically three main categories under the Text Options menu: Text Fill & Outline, Text Effects, and Textbox.
4. Use Text Fill & Outline
This is the first option where you've got different options to fill and outline your text. You can choose gradient, picture, or pattern to fill your text or outline it. The sample below used a solid fill.
5. Use Text Effects
You can further customize your text by applying different effects to it.
Under Text Effects, you've got:
- Shadow
- Reflection
- Glow
- Soft Edges
- 3-D Format
- 3-D Rotation
In the screenshot below, you can see how the text looks when you use Reflection. You can further customize the way an effect is applied.
6. Apply the Textbox Feature
This feature allows you to control how text in PowerPoint behaves by resizing the shape to fit the text or shrinking the text on overflow among others. Look at the example in the screenshot below:
How to Add Animation to Your Text
If you want your text to look even fancier, PowerPoint also has features and options that allow you to do that. Adding animation to your text allows you to send your text on or off the slide.
After you selected text click Animations, which is one of the topmost options on PowerPoint. Once you click that, you'll be given more options as to what type of animation you want to use.
Options include:
- Appear
- Blinds
- Checkerboard
- Dissolve
- Fly in/Out
- Peek In/Out
- Random Bars
- Spiral In/Out
- and many more
This tutorial explains how to use animations in more detail:
PowerPoint Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Now that you’ve learned how to highlight words in PPT, let’s learn more about PowerPoint. Here are some frequently asked questions and their answers:
1. How Can I Make a Good Presentation?
You can follow rules that will make your presentation look more professional. One of these rules is the rule of threes. To learn more about the rule of threes and PowerPoint rules, read this article:
2. Can I Add a Timer to My Slide?
Adding a timer to your PowerPoint presentation can help you keep track of time. It can also show your audience how much time you're going to allow in a Q&A section. For more information on how to add a timer to PowerPoint, read this tutorial:
3. How Can I Make My Slide Background More Interesting?
Adding a gradient background to your PowerPoint slide is a great way to add visual interest to your slide without distracting your audience. You can create your gradient background, or you can use a template. For more information, read this article:
4. What Is a Placeholder in PowerPoint?
A placeholder is a preformatted container where you can put text, images, or video without ruining your slide layout. Many placeholders come with directions such as “insert image here.” These titles help you know what type of placeholder it is. To learn more about placeholders, read this article:
5. How Do I Keep My Audience Engaged?
There are several ways that you can keep your audience engaged. You can make your presentation interactive by asking the audience questions. You can also use props to help get your point across. For more ideas, read this article:
Learn More About Working With PowerPoint
The tips we've given here are just the surface of how you can use PowerPoint. There are still many tricks for those who want to bring their presentations a notch higher. If you want to learn more about PowerPoint, a more in-depth understanding, here are more resources to learn from:
How to Add Text to PowerPoint & Make Amazing Text Effects (+Video)
How to Quickly Make Simple PowerPoint Presentations
How to Learn PowerPoint Quickly (Complete 2025 Beginner''s Guide + Video)
A Curated List of the Best PowerPoint Templates (Envato Elements)
These pre-built PowerPoint templates offer awesome visuals and slides designs. Use them to powerfully convey the ideas you want into your presentations.
Pay one tiny subscription fee and get access to unlimited digital assets including thousands of well-designed PowerPoint templates through Envato Elements. Here a few of the PPT templates trending on Elements:
1. Infographic PowerPoint Template
This template comes with 170 professional slide designs including graphics, diagrams, and charts.
2. PPTx Infographics Template
It's got a wide range of infographic options and other features. You can easily change the color of your vector graphics and fully customize them to fit your project.
3. Tech - Multipurpose PowerPoint Presentation
It's got handmade infographics and 100 slides that are easy to edit and customize.
More Slideshow Templates You Can Customize in MS PowerPoint
PowerPoint has a lot of wonderful features to help you create a presentation that'll rock your audience. Because of that, it's the go-to tool for a lot of professionals when it comes to presentations.
Its popularity has made way to the development of different slideshow templates giving users more options and flexibility in their projects. Below are some examples of awesome slideshow templates you can use.
39 Best Infographic PowerPoint Presentation Templates for 2025 (Giant List)
34 Simple PowerPoint (PPT) Templates to Design Basic Presentations Quickly
25 Creative PowerPoint Templates: PPT Slides to Present Innovative Ideas (2025)
Thousands of PowerPoint Templates on Envato Elements
Before going to the tutorial, browse the different high-quality PowerPoint templates are available from Envato Elements. It is a marketplace for creative assets, such as graphics, design templates, logos, templates, and more.
Envato Elements offers unlimited downloads of templates and other design assets for a low monthly fee. Your subscription gives you complete access to the vast library of digital assets. There are around a million items in the growing library with new categories like music tracks and sound effects.
Some of the digital assets included in an Envato Elements subscription are:
- PowerPoint templates
- Fonts
- Images
- Audio
- Much more
Download a PPT Template and Start Highlighting Text in PPT Today
PowerPoint is indeed different than Excel or Word and it's got its own features and tools. They might seem overwhelming learning it at first, especially if you're an ultimate beginner. Learning and discovering each of these features and tools one by one will soon make you an expert at creating awesome presentations.
Why not download a professionally-designed template from Envato Elements? You can start adding special effects to your templates today, including highlighting text in PPT.
Editorial Note: This tutorial was originally published February of 2019. It's been completely reviewed for accuracy and relevancy by Sarah Joy.
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