How to Add Music to PowerPoint?

Whether you are a college-going student or a busy working professional, you will need PowerPoint presentations for assignments, corporate presentations, and more. Out of the many easy-to-implement functionalities that PowerPoint offers, adding music to the presentation is the one that is always searched for. Here’s us breaking all of it down for you – Adding music to PowerPoint.

List of contents:

• How to insert music into PowerPoint?
• How to record audio from PowerPoint?
• What should be done once the audio is added to PowerPoint?
• How to make audio play automatically on PowerPoint slides?
• How to play music across multiple slides in PowerPoint?
• What are the different types of audio edits you can make in PowerPoint presentations?
  How to skip a part of long audio in PowerPoint?
  How do you start a song at a certain point in PowerPoint?- Trim a music clip on PowerPoint
  How to add Fade-in audio effects on PowerPoint? How to add Fade-out audio effects on PowerPoint?
  How do I adjust the audio volume in PowerPoint?
  How to delete audio in PowerPoint?
• How to add music from YouTube on PowerPoint?
• How to save an audio file in PowerPoint?
• What type of music files does PowerPoint support?

How to insert music into PowerPoint?

The very first step in adding music to a PowerPoint presentation is to open your Microsoft PowerPoint and click on the Insert tab from the tools and functions section. On the right-hand side, you will find the function Audio which will let you insert:

1. Audio from your PC
2. Record audio from PowerPoint

To insert audio into PowerPoint from your PC, click on the first option under the Audio function which says – Audio on My PC. This opens the Windows file picker on your PC; browse & click on the audio file and finally, click on the insert button. This is useful when you already have the audio you wish to use ready on your PC.

How to record audio from PowerPoint?

To record audio from PowerPoint, click on the second option under the Audio function which says – Record Audio. This opens a dialog box that will let you record the audio seamlessly with buttons to play, stop, and record. You can straightaway start with naming the audio file and speak to record the audio. Use the Stop and Play options to review your recording. Further, you will be able to re-record by clicking on Record if you aren’t satisfied with the output.

What should be done once the audio is added to PowerPoint?

Once the music is inserted either by adding audio from your PC or by recording one from PowerPoint, an audio icon will appear on the slide. This icon is movable and hence you can place it wherever you want to. In addition to that, you can make the icon appear appealing by selecting Audio Format, which lets you control the brightness and contrast of the icon. It has options to sharpen and soften the icon, apply different colours to it, apply various artistic effects or even set it to a different picture and implement different styles to it.

Simply adding the audio on PowerPoint may not be giving you the output that you had in mind. You will see that the audio plays only when you click on the Play button, and the audio gets limited to just the single slide on which you added it. Well, these issues can be resolved. Read on.

How to make audio play automatically on PowerPoint slides?

To make the audio play automatically on PowerPoint slides, click and select the audio icon that’s already placed on the slide. This will open the Audio Tools tab, under which there is an option to select Playback.

The functions under this tab have an option to decide how the audio should be played, namely – In Click Sequence (to play the audio file automatically with a click), Automatically, & When Clicked On (to play audio only when the icon is clicked on). Select Automatically to make your audio play on its own.

Also, if you would like to have multiple songs played in succession, use a free online audio editor (like Audacity) and combine all the audio files you want within the PowerPoint presentation. But, remember to arrange all the audio bits such that the final output doesn’t feel odd to the listener with awkward pauses and awkward transitions.

How to play music across multiple slides in PowerPoint?

To play music across multiple slides in PowerPoint, you can select the Play in Background option that comes under the Playback tab (when the audio icon is selected). Now, this will start the audio automatically during a slide show spanning all the slides.

What are the different types of audio edits you can make in PowerPoint presentations?

Just adding music to your PowerPoint presentation isn’t sufficient for a seamless audio output. You will need to control the volume in certain parts of the presentation, fading out the audio might make the final experience a better one, etc. These can be implemented easily if you are familiar with a few functions.

• How to skip a part of long audio in PowerPoint?

Sometimes, you would want to skip a certain portion of long audio on PowerPoint. You can skip a part of long audio in PowerPoint by clicking on the point where the skip action should occur on the audio progress bar. And then selecting Add Bookmarks under the Playback ribbon will set the bookmark point (and a yellow dot will appear on that point). Once it is done, you can use it by either clicking the dot or by using the shortcut Alt+Home or Alt+End to Skip.

• How do you start a song at a certain point in PowerPoint?- Trim a music clip on PowerPoint

You can trim audio on PowerPoint by selecting the Trim Audio option under Playback. This opens a dialog box that has a seek bar and boxes to input values for setting the starting point and the ending point from the original audio that was inserted. It also has controls to play and fast forward.

• How to add Fade-in audio effects on PowerPoint? How to add Fade-out audio effects on PowerPoint?

Microsoft PowerPoint has options to fade duration. This means you can avoid abrupt cuts of audio (that is jarring to the listener) by using fading out and fading in effects. The fade-in and fade-out options can be seen under Fade Duration from the Playback ribbon. There are boxes to set the timestamps where the fading should happen along with it.

• How do I adjust the audio volume in PowerPoint?

Next to the Fade Duration section under the Playback ribbon, you can find the Volume function which would let you set the audio to Low, Medium, High volume, or even Mute it. This function would be helpful in cases where you have slides with videos on the PowerPoint presentation that should be inaudible because of the audio playing at High volume, which is the default setting.

• How to delete audio in PowerPoint?

Simply click on the audio icon and press delete to remove the audio.

How to add music from YouTube on PowerPoint?

PowerPoint allows you to add music from YouTube and other sites. This can be easily done by first inserting the video into PowerPoint and then working around it. So, how to insert a video from YouTube on PowerPoint? In the Insert ribbon, click on Video, which opens a drop-down menu. Click on Online Video and insert the video by entering the YouTube video URL on the dialog box that appears next. As the video loads on the slide, minimize its size and place it outside the visible part of the slide.

Just like the way you set the audio to play automatically, set the video to start automatically using similar settings. Now, you can use the YouTube video’s audio just like any normal audio.

How do I save an audio file in PowerPoint?

At times, you will want to reuse the audio that you created for a PowerPoint presentation in the future. In such cases, you can save the clip as a separate media file. Simply right-click on the audio icon and select Save Media As. A dialog box will appear further, where you can choose a folder and name the media file. Finally, click Save to complete the action.

What type of music files does PowerPoint support?

Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 supports audio files in .wav, .wma formats and the newer versions support .m4a files encoded with AAC audio.

Conclusion

Adding music to your PowerPoint presentation can make a whole lot of difference to the final output. Try using all the functions mentioned in this article to make your college or office PowerPoint presentation more engaging. Cheers!