For years, PowerPoint has been synonymous with boardroom presentations and academic lectures. Its default 16:9 slide ratio is tuned for projection screens, not LinkedIn grids or TikTok thumbnails. But what if the same tool that powers your pitch decks could also become your go-to design app for social media content?
Enter the Social Media Canvas add-in for PowerPoint on Windows —a lightweight, intuitive extension that transforms PowerPoint into a rapid-fire graphics engine for content creators.
Do you book the face, tick the tok, or just like everything in an insta? Whatever your favourite social media platforms, you know that time is precious and getting your ideas out there quickly can be the difference between being a leader or a follower. But you might not turn to PowerPoint as your chosen design app because it’s synonymous with creating presentations. Don’t diss it yet. Read on. You might be surprised.
As a presentation-centric app, PowerPoint offers a few canvas sizes which steer you towards the presentation creation process:
Can you see where to select the canvas sizes for your next social media post? No! Now where you can do it? You first need to go and find the pixel size, do some math, and fiddle around with this dialog to get things just right. And let’s be honest, this does not sound like a great use of content creation time.
Put simply, this add-in gives you a brand new workflow for creating your social media content. Start where you normally create new files from, the backstage view – which, incidentally, is only supported by Microsoft PowerPoint on Windows – you get here simply by pressing File in the ribbon. Then click the Social Media tab to get started with your new creation:
From here, you can choose the social media platform you want to design for, and then choose the type of content you’re going to create. If you can’t find the exact size you’re looking for you can create a bespoke size by clicking the Custom Size button at the end of the list of social media platforms.
When you’re happy with your choice, click the Create New File button and a brand new file will be generated, at the right size, ready for you to start designing. And this is where the power in PowerPoint comes to the rescue. It’s so easy to drop pictures, text, video and other content exactly where you want on your canvas. You then have a smorgasbord of in-app tools to align and edit that content to your heart’s desire. We have a ton of articles about creating content in PowerPoint in our blog.
Once you’ve finished designing, come back to the File / Social Media tab and choose Save as Pictures. This guarantees that your slides are exported as PNG images at precisely the right number of pixels for the chosen canvas size.
And if you’re creating video content (did you know PowerPoint can create videos too?) then you can also export as an MP4 video by clicking the Create a Video button. You even get to choose the frame rate and compression quality level.
In addition to the new file setup experience, you’ll also find a new menu in the Design tab of the PowerPoint ribbon:
This menu provides a quick way to modify the size of an existing file, without modifying your original content.
The free version of this add-in can be downloaded and installed from here.
At BrightCarbon, we have two Microsoft MVPs (Most Valuable Professionals). The program is deeply rooted in community and as such, MVPs give up a portion of their time to create content to serve their chosen specialised area. For some years I’ve listened to people saying “Wouldn’t it be cool if PowerPoint could do XYZ?” and this was one of those examples where I thought an add-in could fill a gap. So this is a gift from me to you, supported by BrightCarbon. I hope you enjoy using it and we’d love to see some examples of what you manage to create with it. Drop us some links in the comments below or tag me and/or BrightCarbon on LinkedIn.
The Social Media Canvas add-in doesn’t reinvent PowerPoint—it unlocks its hidden potential. For creators who want speed, flexibility, and control without leaving the Office ecosystem, this tool fills a long-standing gap.
Whether you’re crafting a carousel for Instagram or a banner for LinkedIn, PowerPoint just became your new design playground.
Leave a commentPlaceholders in PowerPoint form part of a layout and keep content in the right place on a slide. But sometimes, you want the names you see in the Selection Pane in the slide to follow what you set in the master. We're going to unravel a bit of PowerPoint history and find a solution to this conundrum in the process.
Though there are lots of ways photos can be edited, one of the most common things our clients want to do with an image is to isolate the subject by removing the background. There are an increasing number of ways to do this, some using clever AI. But which is the best? Let’s find out!
As the saying goes, a picture speaks a thousand words. PowerPoint offers you multiple image sources to help you create your latest presentation masterpiece, but it isn't very consistent in how it presents them to you. Let's fix that!
Join the BrightCarbon mailing list for monthly invites and resources
Tell me more!All of the content I've seen so far has been valuable and definitely worthwhile. The resources are awesome, and you're really crushing it with useful content.
Theresa Schuck Thorp Olympic Steel
That’s amazing!
How exciting Jamie and team. Many tx