keynote presentation portrait

How to change the slide layout in Keynote on Mac and iOS

When you’re creating a presentation in Keynote, the way you arrange the items on your slides is key to delivering your message. For example, you may be using images and text on a slide that need to be placed in a certain way that makes sense to your audience. But you might not always know this as you’re building it.

Whether you have created your slideshow from scratch or used one of the built-in templates, you can still quickly change the slide layout in Keynote to better match your presentation, and here’s how.

Change the slide layout in Keynote on Mac

Open the Keynote app on your Mac and the slideshow that you want to change. Then, follow these steps to change the slide layout:

• Select the slide you want to change from the Slide Navigator  on the left. If you don’t have this open, click  View  >  Navigator from the menu bar.
• Once you select the slide, click  Format  on the top right to open the  Format Sidebar .
• Click Slide Layout at the top.
• Choose one of the new layouts, and your slide will instantly change. You can pick from a dozen layouts, including title only, photo only, title and photo, etc.

You’ll notice in the Format Sidebar that you can also check items under the Appearance  section for title, body, and slide number, as well as change the background color. These changes will apply only to the slide you select.

Change the slide layout in Keynote on iPhone and iPad

Open the Keynote app and the presentation you want to change on your iPhone or iPad. Then, do the following to adjust the slide layout:

• Select the slide you want to change from the Slide Navigator on the left.
• Once you select the slide, tap the brush icon (format) on the top.
• Tap Layout and choose one of the new layouts. Your slide will change immediately.
• Finally, tap X or the brush icon to close the formatting pop-up.

You can also change the background, and enable or disable the title, body, slide number, etc., in the same formatting window.

Hopefully, knowing how to change the slide layout in Keynote will help you create the perfect presentation. Let us know if there’s something in Keynote that you’re struggling with, and a tutorial may come of it!

Do more with Keynote:

• How to use the Keynote Magic Move transition
• How to work with Keynote Presenter Notes on Mac and iOS
• How to use your iPhone as a remote for the Keynote app on your Mac
• How to convert Keynote to PowerPoint on Mac, iPhone, and iPad
• How to password protect your Pages, Numbers, and Keynote documents

6 Tips and Tricks for Amazing Keynote Presentations on Your Mac

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Keynote is the simplest way to make a beautiful presentation on your Mac. If you pick a template you like and let the defaults do the trick, you'll most likely end up with something you're proud of. However, you've got a lot more options than just the basics.

When using Keynote, you can easily transition between different slides. On top of that, you can jump around however you feel necessary—along with much more. Here, you'll learn the best Keynote tips for making amazing presentations in macOS.

1. Master Keynote's Slide Transitions

Transitions and animations are the two biggest reasons to use Keynote for making a presentation. To add a transition effect, select the slide from the slide navigator on the left. From the top-right corner of the window, click on the Animate tab.

Then, select the Action option, and you'll see a big blue Add an Effect button.

When you click on it, you'll be able to select from more than a dozen effects. In the example below, we've used the Confetti effect.

Once you select a transition, you'll be able to define the duration, the direction, and the start time.

2. Animate Individual Objects on the Slides

Keynote lets you control exactly when and where your objects show up. You can animate these by going to Animate > Build In > Add an Effect .

Click the Preview button to see how it looks. If you want to animate multiple objects together or one after the other, select all of them when defining the Build In effect.

When multiple objects are involved, click the Build Order button from the bottom of the sidebar. Here, you can define the order in which the objects appear on the screen.

3. Master Magic Move

Magic Move lets you directly move an object from one slide to another, with complete control over the animation.

First, place the objects on the slides the way you want. From the Slide Navigator , duplicate the slide by using the Command + D shortcut.

Now, change the position of the objects on both slides. The first slide will have objects in the default state. In the second slide, position the elements where you want them to end up.

Select the first of the two slides (not both), and from the sidebar, click on the Animate tab. From the Add an Effect section, choose Magic Move .

Preview it, and you'll instantly see a smooth animation going from one slide to another. Keynote takes care of the transition and animation automatically. But if you want, you can change the duration, match it with text instead of objects, and define when to start the transition.

4. Edit Your Slide Layouts

If you're working on a big presentation, you'll probably want your styling to be consistent. To achieve this, you can use the feature that lets you edit your slide layouts—which will allow you to define layouts and designs you use frequently.

Finding this feature in Keynote is simple. On your Mac keyboard, hold the Control button and click on a slide with your trackpad. Then, choose Edit Slide Layouts from the context menu.

After selecting Edit Slide Layouts , you can adjust numerous areas of your Keynote slides. For example, you can include a title and photo—along with several other things.

When you're finished, hit the blue Done button at the bottom, and you'll have something that better fits your needs.

If you aren't a big fan of the presentation layouts in Keynote, you can always consider picking from various Keynote alternatives .

5. Customize Your Toolbar

The more you use Keynote on your Mac, the more you'll figure out what does and doesn't work for you. You'll also probably notice that you use some tools more frequently than others. Having easy access to these is a good idea if you'd like to work more efficiently when creating your presentations.

Customizing your toolbar in Keynote is quite straightforward. When using the app on your Mac, you'll first need to go to the View menu from the macOS menu bar and choose Customize Toolbar located at the bottom of the dropdown.

A pop-up window will appear; here, you'll see a huge range of icons and other things you can move around. Moving these is the same as if you wanted to change icons on your iPhone or iPad; you can drag and drop the features you most frequently use.

When you're done customizing your toolbar, you can click the Done button in the bottom right-hand corner.

Keynote isn't the only way you can customize on your Mac . You can change several areas on your computer—color schemes, icons, and sounds, to name a few.

6. Use Action Buttons for Shapes in Keynote

As you create your presentations in Keynote, you might want to use shapes for several reasons. You can use them to create graphics , and they're also handy for breaking up your text—among numerous other things. One of the app's best hidden features lets you turn any shape into more of an interactive button.

You can use the action options for shapes in Keynotes to jump to a different slide. But that's not all; they're also handy for opening web pages and even ending the presentation.

First, you'll need to add a shape to your Keynote presentation. You can do this by selecting Shape from Keynote's toolbar at the top.

Choose the shape you want to add to your presentation and select it. After that, use the Command + K keyboard shortcut.

Expand the dropdown menu, and you can choose whether you want your shape to link to a slide, a website, or something else.

After choosing the purpose of your shape in Keynote, complete the remaining steps that your Mac prompts you to do. You can then use your shape to supercharge how your presentation functions.

Get More Advanced With Keynote Presentations on Your Mac

If you use a Mac to create your presentations, you might want to use Keynote for several reasons. Its interface is user-friendly, and you have plenty of customization options. On top of that, the app makes it easy for you to move around to different slides and various other things—giving you more control over what you're trying to do.

Now that you've read these tips, you should have a better understanding of how you can improve your presentations and wow your audience. You've learned all about adding effects, skipping to different slides, and more.

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How to Add Pictures & Backgrounds in Keynote Presentations

Apple's Keynote presentation software offers ease-of-use and powerful features. It has quickly gained popularity as a way to build powerful visual aids that support your presentation.

Images are found in many presentations as a way to add visual interest or support your speaking points. In this tutorial, you'll learn how to work with images in a Keynote presentation.

You can use this tutorial as the complete guide to working with images in Apple Keynote. You might be surprised at how much you can do with images right inside of Keynote. We'll also cover how to create Keynote backgrounds using images. Let's get started.

Guide to Making Great Presentations (Free eBook Download)

Also, be sure to grab our free eBook: The Complete Guide to Making Great Presentations .  It'll help you master the presentation process, from: initial idea, through to writing, design, and delivering with impact.

Now let's get started with this tutorial, to learn all about how to add pictures to Keynote and use images for backgrounds.

Watch & Learn

In this screencast, you can watch me work with images in a Keynote presentation. I'll show you a variety of skills that you can use to add, edit, and customize images in Keynote. You'll also learn how to create Keynote backgrounds with image files.

Want to see more? Keep reading the tutorial to see screenshots and a step-by-step guide to help you get the most of images in Keynote.

How to Add Pictures to Keynote

It's easy to add images to Keynote presentations. Let's start off with a simple example of taking an image file that's already saved on your computer and dropping it into a Keynote presentation.

To add a new image, click on the  Media  button on the menu at the top, and click on  Choose.  (You can choose the  Photos  option, but it'll only browse through your Photos that are stored in your Apple Photos library.)

Now, you'll see a standard file browser window. Just select your photo and click  Insert  to add it to your Keynote slide. That's all you need to do in Keynote to insert an image!!

Another way that you can add images to Keynote is to simply use the clipboard. If you don't want to save an image before adding it, you can simply copy it to your clipboard and choose  Edit > Paste , or use the keyboard  Cmd + V  to paste an image from the clipboard. This eliminates the step of saving the image.

Where to Find Images

It's important to be careful about rights usage when you add images to your presentations. You can't just Google for images to use—you've got to ensure that they're licensed properly and you've got the right to use them.

Using unlicensed images can run afoul of copyright law and lead to a lawsuit from the rights holder. Sure, it's unlikely that this would ever create an issue. But the risk simply isn't worth taking. 

If you know your Keynote presentation needs images, you might be wondering where to source great looking stock images. Typically, I use Envato Elements for unlimited access to ultra-high-resolution stock photos. As an Elements subscriber, you'll get access to over 500,000 stock photos that are easy to browse, source, and license.

Elements makes it easy to browse, download, and license images that you can use for your Keynote presentations (or any other purpose!)

Thanks to the high-resolution and high-quality images, Elements is the perfect place to source images you can use for Keynote backgrounds. And even if you stop subscribing, you'll still have access to the images you licensed while subscribed. 

How to Use Image Galleries

You don't have to use a single image on each slide. Instead, use an Image Gallery to add multiple images in the same box in Keynote. 

To add a new image gallery, go to the  Insert > Image Gallery  option on the Keynote menu. Then, you'll see a placeholder box that serves as the Image Gallery. My favorite way to add images is to simply drag and drop them from somewhere on your computer on top of the image 

As you can see in the screenshot below, an Image Gallery will have arrows to switch between images. You can also resequence the images in the format option on the right side of Keynote while you've got it selected.

An Image Gallery is perfect if you're going to send your presentation to others and let them view it at their own pace. You don't have to include a single slide for each and very image you want to include—drop them all in a single gallery instead.

How to Apply Image Effects

You don't have to use a separate image editing app like Photoshop or Pixelmator to adjust images. Keynote's built-in options are often adequate enough to make simple adjustments and skip the step of opening up the image in an editor.

With an image selected, click on the  Format  option in the upper right corner. You'll see a new window open up that allows you to adjust and work with images. There are plenty of tools that you can use to apply to an image, so let's take a look at a couple of my favorites.

The first of these is  cropping,  which you may need to use to refine the section of the image in a presentation. Make sure that you're on the  Image  tab, then click on  Edit Mask. 

Then, just grab the handles on the edge of the image and adjust it to only show the part of the image that you want remaining. Click on  Done,  and you'll lock in the new crop. The Keynote crop image tool is handy for selecting only the part of an image you want to use.

Now, let's switch to the  Style  tab. Try out options like  Borders  and  Shadows  to refine the look of an image, or adjust the  Opacity  to make the image more transparent.

Set an Image as a Keynote Background

Let's look at how to create Keynote backgrounds using image files. A well-placed image background can set the stage beautifully for key points on a slide.

The simplest way to add an image as a background is to start by following the same steps as shown above to add the image to the Keynote file.

Now, right click on the image and choose  Send to Back  to put the image file underneath all of your content.

Now, you can see all objects on the slide on top of the image background. But, you can't really see the content clearly because of the lack of contrast as you can see in the screenshot below.

Click on the  Format  button to open up the settings to adjust the image. Make sure that you're working on the  Style  tab and reduce the opacity to a lower number so that the image is somewhat faded.

That's all there is to it. Just drop in an image, then adjust the opacity so that the content is still visible. A well-placed image sets the stage perfectly.

Add Images to Slide Masters

So, let's say that you want to add the same image to the background of each and every slide design. Instead of adding it to slides one-by-one, you can add it to the  slide master,  which is like the slide template that controls the overall design of the slide.

Think of a Keynote slide as being assembled in layers. At the bottom, you've got the slide master. The slides sit on top of the master. You add objects like text, shapes, and other content to the slide itself. But, if you want to add something to multiple slides, you can add it to the master instead.

To adjust the master, click on the view button in the upper left corner and choose  Edit Master Slides.   

Now, you're working on the master. I'm going to simply add an image to it with the same steps we learned earlier. 

Then, I'll apply some basic adjustments to it that'll make it perfect for a background, pulling the opacity and saturation down so that it blends in perfectly with the slide. Check out the screenshot below for an example of toning an image down:

When you finish editing the slide master, click on  Done. You'll switch back to the regular slide view, and the adjustment has been applied to all slides that use the same slide master.

Again, the purpose of adjusting the slide master is to tweak multiple slides at the same time. Adjust the master for consistency and batch updates.

Learn All About How to Make Great Presentations (Free eBook)

Take the knowledge you gained in this tutorial further with our new eBook: The Complete Guide to Making Great Presentations . Grab this PDF Download now for Free with your subscription to the Tuts+ Business Newsletter. 

Recap & Keep Learning

Images are a must when it comes to building engaging presentations in Keynote. This guide contains all of the information needed to master images in Apple's Keynote presentation app.

Check out these Keynote tutorials to learn more about Apple's easy-to-use presentation aid app: 

How do you work with images in Keynote presentations? If you've got a follow-up question or a tip to share, make sure to check in with a comment below.

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Keynote slides orientation

Is it possible to make vertical slides with keynote? Can they be turned around? I'm trying to make a slideshow for an installation using monitors placed vertically.... but I'm not sure if that's possible. Thank you for your help!

You can specify a custom size for your slides by going to Document in the top right corner, it wil open a box on the right side of your screen and there wil be an entry regarding the size of your slides, the default is 1024 x 768. Open this selector and you see "custom size". If you enter 768 x 1024 in the resulting window the slides wil be in a vertical orientation.

ps. my keynote version is 6.2 and it is in dutch so I don't know what the menu items will be called in your version

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Keynote User Guide for iCloud

• What’s new in Keynote for iCloud
• Intro to Keynote for iCloud
• Intro to text boxes and other objects
• Create a presentation
• Upload a presentation
• Sync a presentation
• Print a presentation
• Change the presentation view
• If you can’t find a presentation
• Resolve presentation conflicts
• Add or delete slides
• Add presenter notes
• Advance slides on click or automatically
• Change the slide background
• Show slide numbers
• Reorder slides
• Group or ungroup slides
• Skip or unskip slides
• Add text to a presentation
• Select text
• Copy and paste text
• Add bulleted or numbered lists
• Change the font, size, style, or color of text
• Add drop caps
• Raise and lower text
• Add a shadow to text
• Change text capitalization
• Adjust alignment and spacing
• Format columns of text
• Adjust character spacing
• Add borders and rules (lines)
• Add a background color to text
• Link to a website, email, phone number, or slide
• Write in another language
• Change the text direction
• Create a presentation with the formatting of a different language
• Add or replace images
• Add an image gallery
• Crop (mask) an image
• Add shapes and lines
• Edit shapes and lines
• Combine or break apart shapes
• Add text inside a shape
• Add video and audio
• Add or delete tables
• Select cells, rows, columns, or tables
• Add or change rows and columns
• Merge and unmerge cells
• Change the look of table text
• Change table gridlines and colors
• Format tables for bidirectional text
• Enter text and numbers
• Add formulas
• Change an existing formula
• Clear cell content and formatting
• Format as currency or other data
• Use Formulas and Functions Help
• Alphabetize or sort data
• Create or delete a chart
• Edit chart data
• Edit chart text and markings
• Change how data is displayed
• Change the chart background
• Change a chart’s type
• Add a slide transition
• Animate objects
• Present on your computer
• Present on a separate display
• Present over the internet
• Use the presenter display
• Move and align objects
• Resize objects
• Rotate or flip objects
• Connect objects with a line
• Place objects inside a text box or shape
• Layer, group, and lock objects
• Customize the look of objects
• Add a title or caption
• Apply object styles
• Fill shapes and text boxes with colors or images
• Email a presentation
• Intro to collaboration
• Invite others to collaborate
• Collaborate on a presentation
• Change shared presentation settings
• Stop sharing presentations
• Shared folders and collaboration
• Use Box to collaborate
• Post presentations in a blog
• Save, name, or duplicate presentations
• Delete or recover presentations
• Restore earlier versions
• Organize presentations
• Password-protect presentations
• Download presentations
• Spell-check text
• Find and replace text
• Add or reply to comments
• Set your author name and color
• Keyboard shortcuts
• Legal notices and acknowledgements

Change the presentation view in Keynote for iCloud

You can change the slide view to see more or less detail as you work. For example, you can enlarge (zoom in) the view to fine-tune the placement of an image, or reduce (zoom out) the view to work on the overall layout. You can also choose to have the entire slide always visible, even as you resize your browser window.

Tip: As you zoom in or out, you also increase or decrease the visibility of the surrounding canvas. You can use the canvas space to add and customize objects before you’re ready to move them onto the slide.

Click the Zoom pop-up menu (with the percentage) in the toolbar.

Choose an option:

A percentage: The slide enlarges or reduces to the specific percentage.

Fit in Window: Shows the whole slide within the window.

If you enlarge or reduce the size of the browser window, the zoom level automatically changes so that the slide always fits the window.

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Change paper size to A4 in Keynote

Hi, can someone please let me know how to set-up the paper size to A4 with the Keynote Application.

When I am printing the Keynote presentation with a background there are big borders on the top and on the bottom of each page.

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 11.5

Posted on Aug 7, 2021 2:47 PM

Posted on Aug 8, 2021 1:20 AM

I have to assume you want to print the slide, full size on paper:

1 - go to Inspector /Document /Document

in the Slide Size dropdown menu; enter 3579 x 2551

2 - go to File > Print

in the Printer dialogue box:

select the correct printer

in the options dropdown menu select:

Keynote and click on Slide

Page attributes select A4

Media & Quality select the correct paper type and quality setting

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Aug 8, 2021 1:20 AM in response to Vincent for Mac