Presentations and
PowerPoint glossary.

Custom fonts are fonts that don’t come built into PowerPoint, they’ve been added separately. For them to show up properly, they need to be installed on your computer.

Heads up: custom fonts often don’t play nicely with PowerPoint Live or online versions of PowerPoint. If your presentation uses them, stick to presenting from the desktop app to avoid any formatting mishaps.

“Deck” is just another word for a presentation: a collection of slides you show in a slideshow. Some decks are built from scratch, others use a template in the background to help keep things consistent. Same content, same purpose, just a different name.

Embedded fonts are custom fonts that have been saved into the PowerPoint file itself. This means your slides will look the same on someone else’s device, even if they don’t have the font installed.

Sounds handy, right? It is, but not all fonts can be embedded. Some are restricted by licensing, some become read-only, and a few only work on PC or Mac, not both. If you’re using custom fonts, it’s always worth checking how they behave before sending or presenting your deck.

A layout is like a blueprint for a slide. It’s a pre-designed format with placeholders for things like titles, text, images, or charts, so your content fits the design perfectly.

When you add a new slide in PowerPoint, you’re really picking a layout to drop in and fill out. Layouts live in the Slide Master, but you won’t see them until they’re added to your deck. Common examples include Title slides, Agenda pages, or a Chart with Text.

A placeholder is a pre-formatted box that holds your content, like text, images, charts, or tables. Each one is styled to match your design, so all you have to do is drop in the content and you’re good to go. They keep everything looking tidy and on-brand without the faff.

PowerPoint Live lets you present your slides directly in Microsoft Teams, without sharing your screen. It runs through PowerPoint for the web (also known as PowerPoint Online), which is a lighter version of the desktop app.

Because it’s web-based, PowerPoint Live can struggle with large files, custom fonts, or complex animations. For smoother performance, especially with big or animated decks, we recommend presenting from the full desktop app and using screen share instead.

A slide is one “page” of your presentation, the space where your content lives. Once you pick a layout and add it to your deck, it becomes a slide. Think of it as your canvas for telling the story, one idea at a time.

The Slide Master is the behind-the-scenes boss of your presentation. It sets the overall look and feel, things like fonts, colours, spacing, and how shapes and text behave across your slides.

Every layout in your deck follows the Slide Master’s lead. Change the Slide Master, and those changes ripple through all the linked layouts. You can even have multiple Slide Masters in one file if you need different sub-designs that still feel part of the same brand family.

System fonts come built into PowerPoint, so they’ll work on any device with PowerPoint installed, even in PowerPoint Online. They’re the safest bet if you want your slides to look consistent, no matter who’s opening them or where.

A template is your ready-made starting point for a presentation. It includes a Slide Master, layouts, brand colours, fonts, and formatting, all set up so you don’t have to start from scratch every time. Just drop in your content and go. It keeps things consistent, saves time, and makes your slides look slick without the stress.

Template design services

Template work example

A transition is the visual effect that plays when you move from one slide to the next. It can be simple, like a fade, or a bit flashier, like a morph, where objects smoothly shift between slides. Transitions help keep your presentation feeling polished and dynamic (just don’t go overboard).