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How to add music to your powerpoint presentation.
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Adding music to your presentation.
There are many ways to improve your PowerPoint presentation---adding animations to objects, customizing slide transition styles, and using interesting themes to name a few. In addition to all that, you can also add music to your presentation.
PowerPoint makes it very simple to add music to your presentation. Adding music to your presentation may be a great idea, but there are also cases where it may be considered unprofessional. We’re not here to tell you when to do it, just how to do it, but make sure it’s appropriate for the situation.
Switch to the "Insert" tab and then click the “Audio” button.
A menu will appear, giving you the option to either upload music from your PC or record your own audio track.
If you’d like to record your own audio, select “Record Audio,” and the “Record Sound” window will appear. Go ahead and give your audio a name, then click the “Record” icon when you’re ready to start.
After the “Record” icon is selected, a timer will start which gives you the total length of the sound being recorded. Once you’re ready to stop recording, press the “Stop” icon. To listen to your recording, you can press the “Play” icon. If you’re happy with what you're recording, select “OK” to insert it into your presentation.
If you prefer to upload music from your PC instead, go back to the audio options menu and select “Audio on My PC.” This will open your PC’s directory. Locate the audio file you’d like to use, then select “Insert” at the bottom-right of the window. PowerPoint supports several popular formats, like MP3, MP4, WAV, and AAC.
Now you’ll see a speaker icon appear in your presentation. Here, you can play the audio, control the volume, and move the audio back or forward 0.25 seconds.
Additionally, the “Playback” tab appears in the ribbon. By default, the “Audio Style” is automatically set to “No Style.” This means that the audio will only play on the slide where you insert it, the icon will appear in the presentation, and the audio will only begin once you click that icon.
But you can change all that. You can use the options here to adjust the default playback volume, choose whether the music starts automatically or on a click, whether it plays across other slides, whether it loops until you stop it, and so on.
We’re going to change this by selecting “Play in Background” in the “Audio Styles” section.
There are a few other options available to you, as well. You can add (or remove) bookmarks for specific times in your audio clip, trim parts of the audio, and give your audio a fade in/out effect.
Use these tools to customize the perfect audio for your presentation.
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5 ways to add music to PowerPoint
If you're using Microsoft PowerPoint to create a slideshow, music might be the perfect addition. You may want a fun upbeat song on a slide or a soft subtle melody throughout the presentation.
Upload a song from your computer
Download free music, record music while creating the slideshow, add an offscreen video, play the song or use as background music.
We’ll show you how to add music to PowerPoint a few different ways and then use a single song on a slide or play background music from start to finish.
What You Need
Microsoft PowerPoint
Probably the easiest way to add music to your slideshow is to upload a song from your computer. This can be a tune you’ve saved and listen to often or one from a playlist.
Step 1: Open your PowerPoint presentation and select a slide to add the music.
Step 2: Go to the Insert tab and choose the drop-down arrow for Audio on the right side of the ribbon.
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Step 3: Pick Audio on my PC , browse for the music file, and select Insert .
Step 4: You’ll then see an audio icon on your slide for the song.
Step 5: Use the Play button to listen and the Playback tab to adjust the playback options.
Maybe you have the type of song in mind you want, but don’t have a copy saved to your computer. There are a few online resources for obtaining royalty-free songs for presentations at no cost.
Fesliyan Studios Inc. : Choose a genre at the top such as commercial, happy, sad, or relaxing. Press the Play button to listen, then check out alternate versions where available. Choose Download to get the song.
Chosic : You’ll see a slew of songs for presentations from upbeat to soft. When you hear the song you want, select Download > Free Download .
SoundCloud : If you’re already a SoundCloud listener, this is a good option for presentation music. Type “free downloads” or similar into the search box and review the results. When you find the song you want, select More or the three dots to download the tune.
If you can find royalty-free music on YouTube as well, there are a number of ways to download MP3s from YouTube .
Once you download one of these songs, save it to your device and simply upload it to the slideshow as described above.
If you’re lucky enough to be gifted with musical talent, you can use your skills to record a song directly in PowerPoint. Warm up your vocal cords or grab your guitar and make your own presentation music.
Step 1: Open your PowerPoint presentation and select a slide to record the music.
Step 3: Pick Record audio . Note: You must have either a built-in or external microphone for your computer.
Step 4: When the Record Sound box appears, select the red, round Record button to start recording.
Step 5: Press the square Stop button when you finish. To listen to the recording, press the green Play button.
Step 6: When you finish, select OK to insert it onto the slide.
Step 7: You’ll then see the audio icon just like with an inserted audio file. Press the Play button to hear the recording.
Sometimes the ideal song for a situation is attached to a video. While you can’t currently just play the audio and you probably don’t want the video as part of your presentation, there’s a workaround to get that tune in your show.
Step 1: Open your PowerPoint presentation and select a slide to add the video.
Step 2: Go to the Insert tab and choose the drop-down arrow for Video on the right side of the ribbon.
Step 3: Pick This Device , Stock Videos , or Online Videos and follow the prompts to insert the video.
Step 4: When the video appears on the slide, drag a corner or edge to make it smaller and then drag it off of the slide to one of the sides.
This allows you to play the video to hear the audio but not see the video in your slideshow.
Step 5: Select the video and use the Playback tab to adjust the options for playing it when clicking the slide or automatically.
You can also fully embed a video within a PowerPoint presentation .
Once you add the music to PowerPoint, you can set it to play on a single slide or last the duration of the presentation.
Step 1: Go to the slide containing the music and select it.
Note: If you want the music to play in the background throughout the slideshow, you’ll likely want the file on the first or second slide per your preference.
Step 2: Head to the Playback tab and choose to play the song with the slide or as background music.
Step 3: To play the song only on that slide, choose the Start drop-down box in the Audio options section of the ribbon and pick how you want the music to begin. You can select In click sequence , Automatically , or When clicked on . When you advance to the next slide, the song stops playing.
Step 4: To play the song throughout the presentation, select Play in background in the Audio styles section. This automatically checks the boxes for Play across slides and Loop until stopped . You can also choose an option in the Start drop-down box for how to begin playing the song.
Keep in mind this only works with audio files, not the video file method described above.
Step 5: Adjust any other options on the Playback tab per your preference. You can increase or decrease the volume, rewind the song after it plays, or add a fade in or out effect.
It isn't only music you can add to your presentations. Here's how to add different types of audio to Microsoft PowerPoint .
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