cons have become an everyday part of our lives. We’re used to seeing icons as placeholders for software, tasks, settings, etc. Icons are even used in every day signs…think of ‘stop’ and ‘exit.’
They are also very useful in presentations.
What is an icon?
An icon is simply a visual symbol that represents an object or a concept.
A concept or an object can be represented by almost any number of icons. The concept of ‘success,’ for example, could be represented by any of the following icons:
And the concept of ‘objectives’ could be represented by any of the following:
Adding icons to your slides is a simple and effective way to enhance their design and messaging.
Note: Icons in their simplest form are simply images. However, if you want to customize them to better fit your presentation’s design, you will need to either create icons from scratch, or insert icons as vectors. Alternatively, if you have the Office 365 subscription, you can insert icons as native PowerPoint shapes.
Where to find icons
If you’re going to work with icons in PowerPoint, it’s helpful to understand how to:
- Find icons on the web – see our favorite online sources of free icons
- Cut icons the WebDing icons on your computer (see example here)
- Create icons from scratch
- Format, ungroup and customize icons
- Convert EPS to SVG
How to use icons in PowerPoint
Once you get icons into your presentation, you’ll likely need to know how to:
- Save icons as images
- Use icons in creative ways
- Use shortcuts for inserting icons
