How to add subtitles and live translations to make your PowerPoint presentations better

PowerPoint for Microsoft 365 makes it easier for people who are deaf or have language barriers to access your presentation. These features not only improve accessibility, but also make your presentations clearer and more inclusive for everyone. Luckily, they're easy to set up!

How to add automatic subtitles in PowerPoint presentations

Always make your presentation more inclusive for your hearing impaired audience. This feature also helps everyone follow what the presenter is saying, breaking down the barrier of speech characteristics.

Warning : Captions & Subtitles is a cloud-based feature in Microsoft 365 and is powered by Microsoft Speech Services. This means your speech will be sent to Microsoft servers for processing.

PowerPoint can display on-screen captions in more than 60 languages. Here's how you can set up real-time captions for your PowerPoint presentation.

1. In PowerPoint, go to the Captions & Subtitles section on the Slide Show tab at the top.
2. Click Subtitle Settings , then select Spoken Language and Subtitle Language from the menu options.
3. Specify the Microphone you want to use as the source (if more than one microphone is connected to your device).

Spoken Language is the language you will speak during your presentation and Subtitle Language is the language in which on-screen subtitles will be displayed to your audience.

In the same menu, you can customize where subtitles appear — in the bottom margin, above slides, or overlaid on the top/bottom. You can further customize the appearance settings by clicking Subtitle Settings and going to More Settings (Windows) . This will take you to Windows accessibility settings.

Additionally, in the Captions & Subtitles section , you can check the Always Use Subtitles box to have the subtitles always displayed when the slideshow starts (the default is off). Of course, you can turn this feature on or off while presenting. Just click the Toggle Subtitles button on the toolbar below the main slide during the slideshow.

Tip : Captions & Subtitles relies on a cloud-based voice service, so it's important to have a fast and reliable internet connection.

Set up live translation for presentations

If you're presenting to a large audience or to a geographically dispersed virtual group, chances are not everyone in the audience has the same level of comfort with the language you're presenting in.

You can make your presentation more accessible by adding live translations as you present. This is a neat and often overlooked side benefit of the Captions & Subtitles feature.

When setting up subtitles, instead of selecting Subtitle Language as Spoken Language , change it to any other language that suits your needs. This will add the translation directly to the slideshow without any additional effort. In the screenshot above, the presenter was speaking in Hindi and set the subtitle language to English, the result was perfect.

Tip : Test-run your entire presentation to make sure the translation works for every slide. If possible, get a native speaker to check it for you.

Real-time slideshow captioning in PowerPoint is a powerful feature and a testament to what cloud-based speech processing can do. It takes just minutes to set up and can make your presentations more impactful!

Kareem Winters

Update 26 December 2024