A PowerPoint template has three layers. The theme defines colours, fonts and effects. The slide master carries what every slide shares — background, logo, the position and style of titles and text. The layouts below the master define each slide type: title, section, two columns, picture. A slide in your deck is built on one layout, and anything that comes from the layout or master cannot be clicked on the slide itself — which is why a logo “won’t move”.
Editing a template therefore means editing those layers, not the slides. A change there flows to every slide that uses them; a change on a slide affects only that slide and is lost when someone resets it.
Open the Slide Master
Get into the master viewWindows and Mac
Open the view
Choose View → Slide Master. The left pane shows the master at the top (the large thumbnail) and its layouts indented below it.
View → Slide Master See which layouts are used
Hover over a layout thumbnail: a tooltip says which slides use it (“Title and Content Layout: used by slides 2–9”). Layouts used by no slide can usually be deleted.
Spot a second master
Scroll down. If there is another large thumbnail, the file has several masters — common in inherited decks. Edit the one your slides use, or delete the unused one with right-click → Delete Master.
Close when done
Choose Close Master View on the Slide Master tab to return to your slides.
Change the colours and fonts
The fastest and cleanest edits are to the theme. Everything that uses theme colours and fonts — text, shapes, tables, charts, SmartArt — follows at once.
Edit the theme colours and fontsWindows and Mac
Change the colours
In Slide Master view choose Colors → Customize Colors (outside the master: Design → Variants → Colors). Replace the accents with your colours by hex code under More Colors, name the set and save.
Slide Master → Colors → Customize Colors Change the fonts
Choose Fonts → Customize Fonts and set the Heading font and Body font. Every text that uses the theme fonts switches.
Fonts → Customize Fonts Fix texts that do not follow
Texts formatted with a fixed font ignore the theme. Close the master, then Home → Replace → Replace Fonts (Mac: Format → Replace Fonts) swaps a font everywhere in the deck.
Change the logo and background
Replace the logo and backgroundWindows and Mac
Find the logo
Click the master (top thumbnail). If the logo is there, it is on every layout. If not, look on the individual layouts; title layouts often have their own.
The logo on the slide master Replace it
Right-click the logo and choose Change Picture → From a File (Mac: Change Picture). The new logo takes the old one’s position and size; adjust the proportions if needed.
Change the background
Select the master or a layout and choose Background Styles → Format Background. Pick a solid fill or a picture, and Apply to All for every layout of the master.
Hide background graphics on one layout
If a decoration should not appear on a specific layout (say, a clean picture layout), select that layout and tick Hide Background Graphics on the Slide Master tab.
Edit, add and delete layouts
- Move or resize placeholders on a layout, and every slide using it follows (unless the slide’s own placeholder was moved by hand).
- Add a placeholder with Insert Placeholder — Content, Text, Picture, Chart, Table — and draw it.
- Add a layout with Insert Layout, or right-click a layout and choose Duplicate Layout to start from a similar one.
- Rename a layout with right-click → Rename Layout, so users can find it in Home → Layout.
- Delete unused layouts to keep the choice clear (PowerPoint will not delete one that is in use).
Make existing slides follow the template
After editing the master, some slides may still look old: their placeholders were moved or formatted by hand, or their content was pasted as loose text boxes.
Reset slides to their layoutWindows and Mac
Reset
Select the slides in the slide list and choose Home → Reset. Placeholders return to the layout’s position, size and formatting; your text stays.
Home → Reset Reapply a layout
If a slide uses the wrong layout, choose Home → Layout and pick the right one. Content in placeholders moves into the new layout’s placeholders.
Move loose text into placeholders
Text in plain text boxes ignores the layout. Cut it and paste it into the slide’s placeholder, then delete the empty box.
To move a whole deck onto a different template, open the deck and choose Design → Themes → Browse for Themes, pick the .potx or .pptx of the new template, and then reset the slides. Slides built on custom layouts may need their layout chosen again.
Why can’t I select or move something?
| Symptom | Cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Logo cannot be selected | It is on the master or layout | Edit it in View → Slide Master |
| Background cannot be changed per slide | Background graphics come from the master | Format Background, or Hide Background Graphics on the slide |
| Footer text appears on every slide | Footer placeholder on the master | Insert → Header & Footer, or edit the master’s footer |
| Shape is stuck | It is locked (Microsoft 365) or under another object | Right-click → Unlock, or use Home → Arrange → Selection Pane |
Editing a template in Google Slides
Google Slides puts the master and layouts in the theme builder: choose Slide → Edit theme. Click the top thumbnail to edit what all layouts share, or a layout below. Change theme colours with the Colours button in the builder’s toolbar and text styles by editing the master’s placeholders. Close the builder; slides follow. Slide → Change theme applies another theme to the whole deck, and right-click → Apply layout resets a slide’s layout.
Before you edit a downloaded template
Templates from the web vary a lot in how they are built. Five minutes of inspection tells you whether to edit it or to look for another one:
- Does it use placeholders? Add a new slide with Home → New Slide. If the layouts come out empty and grey, with “Click to add text”, the template is built properly. If the designer built every slide from loose text boxes, every slide will need manual work.
- Are the colours in the theme? Open Design → Variants → Colors: the first set should be the template’s own. If the slides use colours not found there, changing the theme will not recolour them.
- Which fonts? Home → Replace → Replace Fonts lists every font in the file. Fonts that are not installed show as substitutes; download them from their source or replace them now.
- What is a picture? Click decorative elements. Shapes can be recoloured; pictures of shapes cannot.
- What licence? Free templates often require attribution or forbid resale. Read the terms before you use one for a client.
Delete the sample slides you will not use before you start editing, and save your version under a new name. Keep the original file untouched, so you can go back if an edit to the master goes wrong.
Designs for this kind of deck
Every design brings its own colours, fonts and layouts to the whole deck.
Designs that need no master view
In ExpertSlides there is no Slide Master to edit. A deck is built in a design whose layouts are part of the design, and every text, shape, table and chart takes its colour and font from the deck’s three colours and two fonts by role. Changing them in the Design tab of the side panel — or picking another of the design’s palettes — changes every slide at once, with nothing locked and nothing left behind in a fixed colour.
If you have a corporate template, a brand kit (Pro and Business) reads its colours, fonts and logo from the .pptx, a PDF brand guide or your website and dresses new decks in them. Your own PowerPoint files open on My Projects with Upload PPTX and become editable decks. When the deck must go back to PowerPoint, the export (Pro and Business) writes editable objects in the deck’s fonts and colours.
Read on: make your own PowerPoint template, templates and backgrounds and fonts in PowerPoint. Browse our PowerPoint templates page and the Design Templates.
Questions, answered
How do I edit a PowerPoint template?
Choose View, Slide Master. Change theme colours and fonts with Colors and Fonts, edit the logo and background on the master, adjust placeholders on the layouts, then close the master view and reset slides with Home, Reset.
Why can’t I move the logo in my PowerPoint template?
It sits on the slide master or a layout. Open View, Slide Master, select the master or the layout that holds it, and move or replace it there.
How do I change the colours of a PowerPoint template?
In Slide Master view or on the Design tab, open Colors, Customize Colors, set your colours and save. Everything that uses theme colours changes at once.
How do I apply a new template to an existing presentation?
Choose Design, Themes, Browse for Themes and select the template file, then select all slides and choose Home, Reset so placeholders follow the new layouts.
Do ExpertSlides designs have a Slide Master?
No. Layouts belong to the design, and colours and fonts are set for the whole deck in the Design tab. Brand kits bring your company colours, fonts and logo.
