It is the right thing to do. Accessibility is equal access and making sure people can access the content you create. By creating accessible slides your audience can fully engage with and learn from your content.

PowerPoint has built-in slide designs that contain placeholders for text, videos, pictures, and more. They also contain all the formatting, such as theme colors, fonts, and effects. To make sure that your slides are accessible, the built-in layouts are designed so that the reading order is the same for people who see and people who use technology such as screen readers.

1. From the View tab, select Normal view.

2. In the Thumbnail pane, right-click and choose New Slide.

3. Go to the Design tab, expand the Themes gallery, and select the layout you want. PowerPoint will automatically apply it to the new slide.

• Avoid using all capital letters in your text.
• Choose a sans serif font (like Arial or Calibri) and set the size to larger than 18 points.
• Make sure any embedded or linked media is accessible (e.g., includes captions or transcripts).
• Ensure the slide order matches the intended reading order for users, especially screen readers.
• Add a unique title to every slide for better navigation.
• Leave ample white space between sentences to improve readability.
• Use bold text for emphasis instead of excessive italics or underlining.
• Use accessible templates. Visit the Branded Assets site and select the Southern New Hampshire PowerPoint template.

• Always run the Accessibility Checker before finalizing your presentation.

   

To learn more, review the following articles:

• How to change the reading order in PowerPoint
• How to make your PowerPoint accessible

• Word and PowerPoint Accessibility Evaluation Checklist
• How to Video for Using Built-In Accessible Slide Designs in PowerPoint (00:01:07)
• Make your PowerPoint presentations accessible to people with disabilities - Microsoft Support
• Microsoft PowerPoint Video Accessibility Training - Microsoft Support
• SNHU Accessibility and Assistive Technology Resources