Creating a PowerPoint presentation means juggling a lot of pieces — moving, formatting, and editing objects such as AutoShapes, pictures, text boxes, and the slides themselves. It’s not always immediately apparent how to select one of these items or how to navigate within it. Here are a few indispensable keyboard shortcuts that will quickly become second nature, saving you and your users a significant amount of time.
Note: A comprehensive list of PowerPoint shortcuts is available as a PDF download.
| Action | Shortcut |
| Select the next object on a slide | Shift + Tab |
| Select all the text within a selected object (a selected object has a dotted border) | Enter |
| Select all the objects on a slide | Ctrl + A in Slide View |
| Select all the slides in a presentation | Ctrl + A in Slider Sorter View or on the Slides tab |
| Select all the text in a presentation | Ctrl + A on the Outline tab |
| Move to the beginning of a line in a text box | Home |
| Move to the end of a line in a text box | End |
| Move to the beginning of a text box | Ctrl + Home |
| Move to the end of a text box | Ctrl + End |
| Move to the next text box on a slide; when you reach the last one, this shortcut will insert a new slide with the same layout as the current slide | Ctrl + Enter |
