Microsoft Is Retiring PowerPoint’s Reuse Slides Feature

What It Means for Your Team

Sometimes technology updates don’t feel like upgrades.

Microsoft has officially retired PowerPoint’s long-standing Reuse Slides feature, and for teams that build presentations regularly, this is a noticeable change.

If your business creates sales decks, proposals, board reports, or training materials, there’s a good chance Reuse Slides quietly saved your team hours of work.

Why Reuse Slides Mattered

Reuse Slides was one of those behind-the-scenes features that made things simpler.

It allowed you to:

• Open a side panel inside PowerPoint

• Browse another presentation file

• Select only the slides you needed

• Choose whether to keep the original formatting

For businesses focused on brand consistency, this was incredibly useful. Logos, color schemes, templates, and layouts stayed aligned without rebuilding everything from scratch.

Instead of recreating slides, teams could pull from existing materials and stay efficient.

Why Microsoft Removed It

Microsoft has stated that the feature was removed because other methods now exist that accomplish the same outcome. In their view, maintaining overlapping functionality didn’t make sense long-term.

Technically, that’s true.

But from a workflow perspective, many users appreciated the simplicity of having one clearly labeled button designed specifically for reusing slides.

Convenience matters, especially in fast-moving business environments.

What Are the Alternatives?

You can still reuse slides. The process just looks a little different now.

Option 1: Drag and Drop

Open both PowerPoint files at the same time and drag slides from one presentation into the other.

This usually preserves formatting, animations, and embedded media, though small adjustments may be needed afterward.

Option 2: View > New Window

Selecting View > New Window opens a duplicate of your presentation, allowing you to create variations without affecting the original file.

Both methods work. They just require an extra step or two compared to the old feature.

Why This Matters for Businesses

Changes like this may seem minor, but they can impact:

• Workflow efficiency

• Brand consistency

• Team productivity

• Onboarding for new employees

• Internal documentation processes

Small feature removals often create small frustrations, and over time, those frustrations add up.

That’s why it’s important for businesses to stay informed about platform updates and adapt proactively.

Our Perspective at Soarin Group

Microsoft continues to streamline its tools and reduce overlapping features. While that can create short-term inconvenience, it also reflects a broader push toward simplification and tighter integration across Microsoft 365.

The key isn’t resisting change, it’s staying ahead of it.

At Soarin Group, we help businesses navigate Microsoft updates, adjust workflows when needed, and ensure productivity tools continue to support your goals, not slow them down.

If your team uses PowerPoint regularly and needs guidance adapting to this change, we’re here to help.

Because even small tech updates can have real business impact.