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The Psychology of Color in PowerPoint Presentations

• April 12, 2013
• Kevin Lerner

Discover how the colors you choose for your PowerPoint presentations can guide the emotional response of your audience.

What are the best colors for a powerpoint presentation it all depends on who your audience is and what you want them to feel.

When used correctly, color can help audience members sort out the various elements of a slide. But its power goes beyond mere clarification. To some extent the colors you choose for your visuals guide the emotional response of your audience.

Blue: The most popular background color for presentation slides

Blue is one of the most common background colors. It’s calming and conservative, which is why it’s very popular with business presenters, as well as for for trainers. Studies have shown that blue has the power to slow our breathing and pulse rates. Dark blue backgrounds with light text are great for conservative corporate no-nonsense presentations. Lighter blue- more common in re cent times- work well in relaxed environments with the lights on, and help promote interaction.

Examples of BLUE in Presentations

• Quest Diagnostics: A serious company with a seriously navy blue background. The subtle angled lines promote a feeling a movement and technology. Blue complements the Green of Quest’s logo, and the white title bar provides a clean but stark contrast to the body.
• This blue template for waste management firm Republic Services provides a conservative backdrop for the financials and white bullet points. The yellow titles stand out, as does the orange, red and blue themed imagery at the bottom, not to mention the company’s logo.
• This slide for Dr. Soram Khalsa’ Complementrix Vitamin system features a template with a dark blue with angled lines. And the inner portion of the template featured a light blue-hue burst of a sun-ray to convey bright life and energy.
• This slide for Lender Direct featured an image of a file folder, edited in Photoshop, with a 80 % transparency set against a light blue background. The light blue graphic helped to convey a sense of openeness , and professionalism, while maintaining the company’s blue brand.

Green: Stimulates interaction and puts people at ease

Green stimulates interaction. It’s a friendly color that’s great for warmth and emotion. Green is commonly used in PowerPoint presentations for trainers, educators, and others whose presentations are intended to generate discussion. It’s also a great color for environmental and earth-oriented discussions.

Examples of Green in Presentations

• This slide for Hills Pet Nutrition features a modern green background with textured lines promoting a warm, but contemporary feeling. Great for their topic on pet affection.
• Money is green and so is this presentation for Presidio Finance. The white text contrasts nicely with the forest green finance images, helping to project a no-nonsense image of success and accomplishment.
• In this slide for TD Waterhouse, we created top title bar in dark green, integrating smoothly with their lime green logo. The green-hued process chart on the slide image stands out comfortably against the textured grey background.
• The flowing green arcs at the bottom and green title text helps substantiate this slides message of health and vitality. Executive Success Team’s green logo and brand also promotes a relaxed and comfortable feeling, just like Mona Vie.

Red: Handle with Care in Presentations!

Red is one of the most influential colors in your software palette — but it also carries negative cultural attachments, so use it carefully. Red is also a great color for conveying passion. Or talking about the competition. Do not use Red in financial information or tables and charts.

Examples of RED in Presentations

• The rich red of Oracle is maintained in this template, featuring red title text in an inset red rectangle and a red bottom bar of binary numbers for a look of blazing edge technology
• Trace Security uses a similar red title bar element, tying in to their black and red logo and brand.
• Red and black are also colors for Sales Training Consultants, and in this slide, we used a flat beige background, with a title bar in bright red together with red bullets and a red target graphic.
• The body pages of the Grenada presentation feature Red, but in an inset border. Text is inversed in white, as is the main body area. The key states in this map are highlighted in red.

Purple: Mystical and Emotional color in presentations and design

Purple is often associated with royalty and wealth. Purple also represents wisdom and spirituality. Purple does not often occur in nature, it can sometimes appear exotic or artificial. Nearly all the clients who come to me with presentations featuring purple or lavender are women. It’s a feminine color and it’s a good color for emotional or spiritual presentations.

Examples of Purple in Presentations

• Crosley & Company’s branding is maintained with a dominant dark purple background, and orange titles.
• A soft lavender background option gives these two medical doctors a chance to add some warmth for their mostly women audiences.

Yellow, Orange, & Gold: Attention-getting colors of affluence and prestige

Yellow can create feelings of frustration and anger. While it is considered a cheerful color, people are more likely to lose their tempers in yellow rooms and babies tend to cry more in yellow rooms.

Since yellow is the most visible color, it is also the most attention-getting color. Yellow can be used in small amount to draw notice, such as key words, or highlights but not in backgrounds. Rather than using flat yellow as a background color, consider a more “golden” or orange color. Simply adding texture to a yellow background or superimposing a photo (in Photoshop) with low transparency, can add more richness to the yellow background image.

Examples of Yellow / Gold in Presentations

• This flat yellow slide is for Web-Reach, an internet consulting firm in Miami. Even though their message was to compete with the Yellow Pages phone book, their yellow background was flat and uninspired.
• With a simple fix in Photoshop, yellow became Gold, and the same slide became more robust. We added a red bar to the top, and a grey arc to the left. Same information, just a textured golden hue helped deliver elegance and style.
• A golden textured earth background helped this slide convey the message of international elegance. The green money background blends with the gold, and the black text brings a nonsense message to the page.
• A golden textured background for Fountainhead Consulting with elements of yellow, blue, red, and grey.

Black: A strong and definite color that’s often overlooked!

Don’t forget your basic black. Often overlooked, black is a background color with useful psychological undertones. Its neutrality makes it a good backdrop for financial information. Black connotes finality and also works well as a transitional color which is why the fade to black transition is powerful, as it gives the impression of starting fresh.

Examples of Black in Presentations

• It’s a matter of black and white for this construction company. It’s intro slides were pure white text on a black background, emphasizing the company’s core beliefs. After the 3 b&w slides, the room lit-up with a series of dynamic colorful slides as the speakers enlightened the audience.
• Over 10 years old, this slide from Ryder transportation remains one of the strongest visuals. Set against a flat black background, the company’s grey logomark conveys a true sense of stability and no-nonsense action. The monotone building blocks tell a strong story.

White: Pure, Fresh and Clean. But a little boring.

White is also a calm and neutral color for presentations. It’s terrific for conveying a fresh start such as a fade to white. It represents purity or innocence. Good for positive information where you want the focus purely on the message, and not competing with a brand image. It’s clean/open and inviting and can create a sense of space or add highlights. But it can also be perceived as cheap, flat (it’s the default color for PowerPoint slides) and harsh on the eyes. Consider grey as a better background color.

Examples of White in Presentations

• To help to maintain a clean and open look this consumer collaborative called on us to integrate their brand colors set against a plain white background. The blue and orange bars provided a conservative frame, while the arcs provided a contemporary look of flow and motion.
• This slide for a large architecture and construction firm featured a flat white background offset by a colorful series of modern buildings and logos.

Grey and Silver: A conservative color; Good when Black or White won’t work.

According to psychologists, grey is often thought of as a negative color. It can be the color of evasion and non-commitment since it is neither black nor white. Some say that Grey is the color of independence and self-reliance. A few years ago, silver was the most popular color for cars. And in the presentation world, this calm color is making a comeback. Grey (or “Silver”) is a softer background than the harsh default color of white, and works well on almost all presentations. A dark grey background with light text…or light grey background with dark text…you can’t go wrong!

Examples of Grey in Presentations

• Farmers Insurance’s silver background integrates subtle ray of light elements to help add depth and texture to this slide. The red, blue, and black stock images blend comfortably with the rest of the page. And the white border around the letters add a level of modernism and clarity.
• The stainless steel background of this slide helps promote a modern contemporary look, helping to link the 4 brands together.
• A clean flowing blue arc with a non-obtrusive silver background help make this slide for Margie Seyfer appear fun but conservative
• Interim Healthcare’s brand is maintained, but a muted image in silver help add depth and dimension to the slide’s message, while supporting its key points.

We perceive dark colors as being “heavier” than light ones, so graphic elements that are arranged from darkest to lightest are the easiest for the eyes to scan. On charts, it’s best to arrange colors from dark to light.

Remember that most eyes aren’t perfect. Because color perception deficiencies are common, certain color combinations — including red/green, brown/green, blue/black and blue/purple — should be avoided.

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By Matt Moran January 3, 2024

22 Best PowerPoint Color Schemes to Make Your Presentation Stand Out in 2024

There’s nothing worse than an amateur PowerPoint presentation. If you’re going into a business meeting or sales pitch, your presentation slides should look as professional as you do. That’s why choosing the right color scheme is so important.

In this post, we’ll be sharing a roundup of 22 of the best PowerPoint color schemes you can use to make your presentation look the part. 

All the color schemes on this list have been incorporated into templates created by professional designers, so they’re super-stylish and guaranteed to make your slides stand out.

Whether you’re an educator looking for a color scheme that will keep your students engaged, or a business professional who wants to make an impact in your next meeting, you’re sure to find something suitable below.

Tips for Choosing the Best PowerPoint Color Schemes

Before we jump into the roundup, let’s talk about how to choose the right color scheme for your needs. Here are a few things to bear in mind when you’re comparing your options.

1. Use High Contrast Colors

When it comes to color, contrast is the number one most important consideration. Text, icons, and other important graphics on your slides need to be highly readable, so you need to make sure to use high contrast colors for these elements. 

In other words, use a color with a significantly different tone/brightness from your background. Certain colors are inherently lighter/darker than others. For example, blue is much darker than yellow. As such, these colors tend to pair well together.

I’d also recommend never combining warm and cold colors, like bright red on bright blue or vice versa. This is because human eyes have trouble distinguishing interactions between the different wavelengths, which causes eye fatigue.

2. Consider Color Associations (Psychology)

People have certain subconscious associations with different colors. For example, people associate blue with trust, calmness, and reliability, which makes it a safe choice for business presentations. 

Green is associated with nature, peace, and organic products, which might make it a good choice if you’re working on a sales pitch for an eco-friendly product. 

Black evokes sophistication, seriousness, evil, and mystery, so it can work just as well for spooky Halloween lesson PowerPoints as for high-end fashion brand presentations.

Try to choose a color scheme that fits the kind of associations you want to make. If you’re working on a brand PowerPoint presentation, a safe bet is to stick with your brand colors.

3. Always Use Gradients

In nature, colors rarely appear in solid blocks – they transition gradually from one hue to the next and blend into each other.  

Because we’re used to seeing colors naturally act this way, you should try to do the same in your PowerPoint presentations by blending colors into each other using gradients. Blocks of solid color can look amateurish. 

The good news is that all the templates on this list are designed by professionals who understand this and therefore use natural color gradients to create a professional look.

4. Choose the Right Color Scheme for Your Screen Type

Finally, don’t forget to consider the screen you plan on showcasing your PowerPoint presentation on. Darker color schemes will look good on close-up screens like tablets and desktops. However, lighter colors work better for projections as they tend to be more readable. 

In particular, never use red text if you’re projecting your presentation onto an external screen, as if any kind of unwanted ambient light/glare hits the screen, the color will wash out. In fact, it’s best to avoid any brightly colored text if you’re using a projector.

22 Best PowerPoint Color Schemes

Alright, let’s jump into the list. Below, we’ve listed our top 22 favorite PowerPoint templates with awesome color schemes.

1. Shades of Grey and Yellow – Our Top Pick

If you’re looking for a darker color scheme to use for a business presentation, you can’t go wrong with the Hornette template. Darker shades of grey and black strike a serious tone that befits a corporate environment, which is offset by bold yellow highlights. 

We like how the high contrast between the darker shades and the bold yellow can be used to direct the readers’ gaze to the most important elements on the page and make key messages stand out. 

The template itself includes 50 slides, including a gallery and portfolio slide, and features creative layouts and useful graphics. All graphics can be resized and edited.

2. Teal and White

Teal is a color that blends blue’s dependability with green’s optimism and healing properties. The result is a calming, balanced color that’s packed with personality. 

This multipurpose PowerPoint template uses teal alongside plenty of whitespaces and is perfect for business and personal presentations. All elements are fully editable, and if teal and white isn’t your style, you can pick another of the 5 included premade color schemes included. 

3. Shades of Black

Dark themes are very on-trend right now. If you want to add a touch of sophistication to your presentation or strike a serious tone, you can’t go wrong with this Halbert PowerPoint template. 

The all-black color scheme looks slick and elegant, and the white text is highly readable. This template works best when you don’t have to worry about room lighting, and might be a good fit for fashion presentations.

4. Color Fun

If you want something a little more upbeat, try this Color Fun PowerPoint template. It uses a wide color palette, which can help provide enough variety to better organize the different sections and elements on your slides. 

It’s bright, upbeat, and sets a positive tone – without being too overwhelming. The designer has toned down the colors just enough that they’re not distracting and won’t cause eye fatigue.

5. Monochromatic Blue

This Tortoise PPT template uses a mix of light and darker blues to create a stylish, professional look. The download includes 150 slides in total, split into 5 colors (30 slides per variation). All graphics included are fully editable and resizable in PowerPoint. 

6. Minimalist Light Colors

Bold and bright colors can work well but sometimes, it’s best to keep things simple. This clean and modern PowerPoint presentation follows the principle of minimalism, with very light shades like beige and pale green. It comes in a 1920x1080p format and includes a bunch of awesome icons and graphic elements that are fully vector editable.

7. Orange Burst

Orange is the most vibrant color in the color spectrum. It’s full of energy and life, so it’s perfect when you want to really get your audience excited about the contents of your presentation. This PowerPoint template from aqrstudio uses orange gradients alongside circular icons and graphics.

8. Yellows and Whites

If you’re looking for a yellow template, check out Soaring by Jumsoft. It features an energetic, professional design and includes 20 master slides in the standard 4:3 side, as well as charts, diagrams, tables, and other awesome visual elements. You can choose the layout that’s most suitable for your content and customize more or less everything in MS PowerPoint.

Pastels are the color trend of the year. These lighter, softer shades of colors have been embraced by younger generations like Millennials and Gen Z and have rapidly become associated with self-care for their ‘calming effect’. If you want to incorporate them into your PowerPoint color scheme, check out this pastel template by UnicodeID.

10. Organic Greens

Working on a food-related presentation for a culinary business? Or perhaps you’re putting together a pitch deck on an environmental topic? Either way, this organic green PowerPoint template has the perfect color scheme for you. It’s ideal for health and nature-related slides.

11. Bold Red and Black

The NOVA PowerPoint template by Artmonk uses a stunning red-on-black color scheme. It’s a bold color combination that packs a punch, so it’s great for presentations in which you’re trying to break the mold and make a statement. It’ll look great on screens but might not show up well on projector displays due to the dark background.

12. Bright Multicolor

Here’s another awesome multi-colored palette that’s upbeat and fun. Wide color palettes like this are great for large slide decks as they give you a lot of options to choose from. I can see this one working really well for creative agencies and personal portfolios. 

13. Lime and Dark Blue

Blue and yellow is a classic combination. This lime and dark blue template offers a new twist on that classic combo to make it a little more exciting. If you already use dark blue as part of your brand color palette, this is a great template to use.

14. Pretty Pink

The Pretty Pink color scheme is perfect for creating feminine and youthful PowerPoint presentations. This would be perfect for female-oriented business products, or presentations about beauty, pop culture, and more.

Teal is the perfect color scheme for exuding wealth and intelligence. In color psychology, green connotes wealth and money, whilst blue evokes intelligence. Teal is the perfect blend of the two colors, which makes it a great choice for financial presentations and documentation.

16. Dark with Splashes of Color

If you want a luxurious and ultra-modern color scheme, Black with splashes of color is just the ticket. The black creates a sleek and professional feel, whilst the bold and colorful highlights make the key information in your presentation pop.  

Coral is a bold and vivid color scheme perfect for making an impact on your presentations. This PowerPoint template utilizes coral as the background of each slide which helps the text and other visuals to really stand out.

18. Classic Blue and White

If you’re looking for a clean, modern, and professional color scheme for your PowerPoint presentations, you can’t go wrong with classic blue. The color scheme evokes professionalism and technological prowess and is perfect for tech businesses and startups. The Contact PowerPoint from Envato Elements is a great example of how this color scheme can be used.

19. Pinks and Purples

Pinks and Purples is a vibrant and feminine color scheme that would work perfectly for beauty brands and retail stores. The colors are bold and inviting and have a luxurious feel. This Beauty Care template from Envato Elements utilizes this color scheme as well as unique shapes to make for a visually interesting presentation.

20. Winter Watercolors

Winter Watercolors is a great color scheme for festive presentations. The muted, blue, and green cold tones are easy on the eye and evoke a homily feeling. This would be perfect for creating slideshows for Christmas parties or other winter-themed events.

21. Coral Highlights

Unlike the last coral color scheme we looked at, which used a coral background with white text, this template uses mostly white slide backgrounds. Coral is used much more sparingly to highlight key elements on the slide. This gives the PowerPoint a more relaxed and feminine touch.

22. Primary Colors

This Primary Colors color scheme is perfect for adding a vibrant touch to your presentations. This color scheme is a modern take on the classic colors of red, yellow and blue, and would be perfect for creating fun and engaging business presentations.

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30+ Stylish PowerPoint Color Schemes 2024

Color is an element that can make or break a design, and that rule holds true for presentation design as well. Choosing the right PowerPoint color scheme is super important.

But there’s one extra thing to consider – where your presentation will be given. A PowerPoint presentation can look quite different on a computer or tablet versus on a projected screen.

When it comes to selecting a PowerPoint color scheme, this is an important consideration. We’ve rounded nearly stylish PowerPoint color schemes as inspiration. While darker color schemes might look great close-up on screens, opt for lighter backgrounds (for enhanced readability) for projected presentations.

Note: The last color in each scheme is for the slide background.

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1. Blue, Gray Green & Orange

With a bright overall scheme that’s easy on the eyes, this color scheme can help you create a modern PowerPoint presentation that’s readable and friendly. You can even tweak the colors somewhat to better work with your brand, if necessary.

The best thing about this color palette is that it lends itself to plenty of different presentation styles and applications.

2. Violet Gradient

Using the first two colors noted above, you can create a dark-to-light monotone gradient that can make for a modern PowerPoint design style.

Take this concept and expand it to any other colors you like for your spin on this modern color scheme.

3. Mint and Orange

On paper, these colors don’t seem to blend all that well, but with the right application min and orange on a black background can work.

Use a pair of colors like this for presentations where you are trying to make a bold statement or impact. This concept is often great for trendy topics or ideas that are a little unconventional.

4. Bright Blue and Light

The brighter, the better! Bright blue color schemes are a major trend in PowerPoint design … and for good reason. The color combination creates a bright, light feel with easy readability. Those are two things that pretty much everyone wants in a presentation template design.

The other thing that’s great about a color scheme like this – which focuses on one color – is that it matches practically everything else in the design with ease. It’s great for image-heavy presentations or those where text elements are a key focal point.

5. Teal and Lime

Two colors that you might not expect to see paired create a classy combo that’s interesting and engaging. Both teal and lime are considered “new neutrals” and work with a variety of colors easily. (What’s somewhat unexpected is putting them together.)

What’s great about this PowerPoint color scheme is that the extra interest from the hues can help generate extra attention for slides. The template in the example also mixes and matches teal and green primary color blocks to keep it interesting from slide to slide.

6. Colorful Gradients

Gradients are a color trend that just keeps reinventing and resurfacing. In the latest iteration, gradients are bright with a lot of color. Designers are working across the color wheel for gradients that have more of a rainbow effect throughout the design, even if individual gradients are more subtle.

What you are likely to see is a variety of different gradients throughout a project with different colors, but maybe a dominant color to carry the theme. Use this for presentation designs that are meant to be more fun, lighter, and highly engaging.

7. Light Blue Minimal

This color scheme with light blue and a minimal aesthetic is super trendy and so easy to read. You can add a lot of style with a black-and-white style for images or a deep blue accent for header text.

While a pale blue is ideal here, you could also consider experimenting with other pastels and the same overall theme for a modern presentation design.

8. Bright with Dark Background

The combination of bright colors on a dark background can be fun and quite different from the traditional PowerPoint color schemes that are often on white or light backgrounds. This design style for a presentation is bold and engaging but can be a challenge if you aren’t comfortable with that much color.

When you use a style like this, it is important to think about the presentation environment to ensure that everything will look as intended. A design like this, for example, can work well on screens, but not as well on a projector or in a large room.

9. Navy and Orange

The navy and orange color combination is stylish and classic for presentation design. To add a fresh touch consider some of the effects such as the template above, with color blocking and overlays to add extra interest.

What makes this color combination pop is the element of contrast between a dark and a bright pair. The navy here is almost a neutral hue and works with almost any other design element.

10. Dark and Light Green

A modern take on a monotone color scheme involves using two similar colors that aren’t exactly tints and tones of one another. This pairing of dark green and light (almost minty) green does precisely that.

What’s nice about this color scheme is that the colors can be used almost interchangeably as primary elements or accents. It provides a lot of flexibility in the presentation design.

11. Bright Crystal Blue

Blue presentation color schemes will always be in style. The only thing that changes is the variance of the hue. This pair of blues – a bright crystal blue with a darker teal – works in almost the same way as the pair of greens above.

What’s nice about this color palette though is that the dark color is the accent here. That’s a modern twist on color design for presentations.

12. Blue and Yellow

Blue and yellow are classic pairings and can make for a striking presentation color combination. With a bright white background, these hues stand out in a major way.

What works here is the element of contrast. A darker blue with a brighter yellow creates an almost yin and yang effect with color. The only real caution is to take care with yellow on a white or light background with fonts or other light elements.

Teal is a personality-packed color choice. If you are looking for a bold statement with a PowerPoint template, start here.

While the above color scheme also includes a hint of yellow for accents, the teal color option is strong enough to stand alone. You could consider a tint or tone for a mono-look. It also pairs amazingly well with black-and-white images.

Teal is a fun color option that will provide a lot of practical use with your slide deck.

14. Bright Coral

This color scheme is one of those that you will either love or hate. The bright coral color is powerful and generates an immediate reaction.

It’s also quite trendy and will stand out from many of the other more bland PowerPoint colors that you may encounter. This is a great option for a startup that wants to present with a bang or a brand that has a similar color in its palette. It may not work so well for more traditional brands or those that are more conservative with their slide designs.

15. Dark Mode Colors

A dark mode color scheme might be the biggest trend in all of design right now, and that also applies to presentation design.

This purple and emerald color paired with black with white text looks amazing. It is sleek, modern, and has high visual appeal without having to use a lot of images.

This works best for digital presentations when you don’t have concerns about room lighting to worry about.

If you aren’t ready to jump into dark mode on your own, the Harber template above is a great start with nice color, gradients, and interesting shapes throughout the slide types.

16. Navy and Lime

A navy and lime combination is a modern take on colorful neutrals that are anything but boring.

These colors have a nice balance with a white or light background and are fairly easy to use. With so many brands already using blue in their base color palette, this is an option that works and is an extension of existing elements for many brands. (Use your blue and add the lime to it.)

Also, with this color combination, the idea of a minimal overall slide structure is nice so that the power of the colors and impact comes through. They work beside images in full color or black and white.

17. Modern Blue

When you aren’t planning to use brand colors – or maybe as a startup or independent contractor so you don’t have them yet – a modern color combination can add the right flair to a PowerPoint presentation.

The bright grayish-blue in the Lekro PowerPoint template – you can find it here – adds the right amount of color without overwhelming the content. Plus, subtle orange accents help guide the eye throughout this PowerPoint color scheme. https://elements.envato.com/lekro-powerpoint-presentation-67YW3M

18. Blackish and Yellow

While at first pass, black and yellow might seem like a harsh color combination, it can set the tone for a project that should emanate strength. This PowerPoint color scheme softens the harshness of the duo with a blackish color, that’s grayer and has a softer feel.

Pair this combo on a light background or with black and white images for a stylish, mod look.

19. Orange and White

A bright color can soften the harshness of a stark PowerPoint design. Especially when used for larger portions of the content area, such as background swatches or to help accent particular elements.

The Sprint template makes great use of color with a simple palette – orange and white with black text – but has slide ideas that incorporate the color throughout for something with a more “designed” look to it. (And if you aren’t a fan of the orange, change the color for use with this template to keep the modern feel.)

Purple presentations are in. The color, which was once avoided by many in design projects, has flourished with recent color trends.

Because more funky, bright colors are popular, a presentation with a purple focus can be acceptable for a variety of uses. The use in Batagor template has a modern design with a deep header in the featured color, which works best with images that aren’t incredibly bold in terms of color.

21. Blue-Green Gradients

Another trending item in color is the use of gradients. This trend can be applied to PowerPOint presentations as well.

Use a blue-to-green gradient for a soft and harmonious color scheme that won’t get in the way of content. Use each hue alone for accents and informational divots throughout the presentation design.

22. Black and White

Minimalism is a design trend that never goes away. A black-and-white (or gray) presentation screams class and sophistication.

It can also be easy to work with when you don’t want the color to get in the way of your message. And if a design can stand alone without color, you know it works.

23. Reds and Black

If you are designing a presentation for viewing on screens, such as desktops or tablets, a dark background with bright color accents and white text can work well. (This combination gets a lot trickier on projector displays.)

While reverse text and red aren’t always recommended, you can see from the Nova template that they can be a stunning combination. But note, this modern color scheme is best for specific content and audiences.

24. Blue and Pink

This color scheme is a spin on Pantone’s colors of the year from 2016. https://designshack.net/articles/graphics/how-to-use-the-pantone-color-of-the-year-in-design-projects/ The brighter, bolder versions of rose quartz and serenity and fun and sophisticated.

The unexpected combo sets the tone with a strong, trustworthy blue and adds softness with the paler pink. The colors work equally well with white or darker backgrounds.

25. Blue and Green

Blue and green accents can help a black or white background come to life in a presentation template. The colors here can work with either background style, based on how you plan to display your presentation.

What’s nice about these colors is that they are pretty neutral – since both are found in nature – and can be used with ease for design or text elements in a PowerPoint color scheme.

26. Beige and Gray

If you are looking for a softer color palette, consider beige and gray. These hues can work well on screens or projected, making them a versatile option.

The nice thing about such a neutral palette is that it gives content plenty of room, so that will be the true focus of the presentation.

27. Tints and Tones

While the purplish blue-gray in the Business PowerPoint Presentation template is stunning, it represents a greater trend in presentation design. Pick a color – maybe your dominant brand color – and use tints and tones for the presentation color scheme.

By mixing the color with white or black and gray, you’ll end up with a stunning set of color variations that match your messaging.

28. Bold Rainbow

While most of the color schemes featured here only include a color or two, bright color schemes with wider color variations are trending.

This distinct “rainbow style” can be somewhat difficult to use without rules for each color. Proceed with caution.

29. Bright Neutrals

Lime green is the brightest “neutral” you might ever use. A fun palette that’s versatile can be a solid foundation for a color palette.

It works exceptionally well in the Rouka PowerPoint template thanks to a pairing with a subtle gray background. Using a light, but not white, background can be great for screens and projected presentations because it takes away some of the harshness of a white background. The subtle coloring is easier on the eyes for reading and viewing.

30. Rich Browns

Browns aren’t often what comes to mind when thinking of building a color scheme, but rich browns can be a modern option.

Pair a neutral beige-brown with a darker color for an interesting contrast that works with almost any style of content.

31. Mint Green

Go super trendy with a modern and streamlined palette of mint green and gray on white. While this combination can have a minimal feel, it also adds a touch of funkiness to the design.

Add another hint of color – think orange – for extra accents.

32. Dark Gray and Blue

It doesn’t get more classy than a combination of grays and blues. This new take on a classic color scheme adds another brighter blue as well to pick up on modern trends.

Just be careful with text using a dark background such as this one. White is probably your best option for typography (and look for a font with thicker strokes!)

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Using The Right Colors In Powerpoint Presentations

Home   >  Presentation Design > Colors in PowerPoint

In this article you will learn the art of using colors effectively. By understanding the significance of colors and where to use them, you can make your message more impactful and memorable.

Select a color theme for your presentation

What is the purpose of colors in PowerPoint slides? 

Contrary to popular belief, colors serve a far more critical function than just making your slides look attractive. They can help you highlight a critical point, make your slide deck look consistent, convey emotions, and ultimately make your message more effective. By using the right colors, you can create a visual hierarchy that guides your audience's attention to the most important information on your slides. For example, using a bold, contrasting color for your call-to-action can help it stand out and encourage your audience to take action. Colors can also be used to evoke emotions and set the tone for your presentation.  Mastering the use of colors in your PowerPoint presentations can make a significant difference in how your message is received.

Watch the video below to learn...

3 Ways to Choose Colors in PowerPoint

How to Use Your Company Colors as Color Theme

You can pick the exact color of your Company logo  using free software or the PowerPoint Eye Dropper Tool. Watch the video below to know more.

How to find custom color palettes

If you are looking to find a beautiful color palette to use in your presentation, please check the video below for a great resource:

The meaning behind different colors

The colors you choose can evoke emotions and influence your audience's perception of your content. In the rest of this article, we will explore the significance of common colors used in presentations and where to use them for maximum impact.

Download 10 Free PowerPoint Title Sets Click here to sign up & Download ALL 10 PowerPoint templates showcased below for free.

The Power of Red:

Red is a color that exudes excitement and energy. It inspires action and motivates people to take charge. 

Take a look at the following PowerPoint title templates:

Free Red PowerPoint Title Template

Free Red PowerPoint Title Template 2

When to use Red:

Use red when you want your audience to take action. It's perfect for sales presentations where you want your audience to sign on the dotted line or project presentations where you want to encourage your team to meet deadlines. Red is a powerful color that can drive results.

However, it's important to use red in moderation as it also signifies danger. In finance presentations, for example, it's best to use red sparingly.

The Calming Effect of Blue:

Blue is a color that signifies professionalism, trust, and credibility. It's no wonder that most business presentations use a blue theme. When used correctly, blue can create a sense of calmness and reassurance in your audience.

Take a look at these blue themed title templates:

Download Free Blue Color PowerPoint Template

When to use Blue:

Use blue as a base color when you want to inspire trust and credibility in your audience. If your presentation is about your company's values and tradition, blue should be your color of choice. Blue is also an excellent option for finance presentations and investor presentations.

Exuding Warmth With Orange:

Free PowerPoint Background with Orange Colors

The color orange is known to evoke feelings of warmth and happiness. It's like a bright and sunny day that fills us with positive energy and joy. So, if you want to bring cheer to your presentations, consider using orange as your background color.

Orange PowerPoint Title Template for Free Download

When to use orange

It's important to use the color orange wisely. While it's perfect for presentations aimed at youth or children, it may not be suitable for serious settings. But, if you're looking to raise funds for a good cause or announce a happy initiative for your staff, orange can convey care and warmth.

Shades of Versatile Green:

Green is a versatile color that represents nature, novelty, abundance, and cheerfulness. 

Green PowerPoint Nature Title Template

When to use green

It's a natural choice for presentations about health or ecology, and it can also convey hope in finance presentations.

Free Green Lines PowerPoint Title Set

However, it's worth noting that people with color blindness may find it difficult to read green and red combinations. So, be mindful of your audience and choose your colors wisely.

The Classy Purple:

Purple has long been associated with royalty, class, and exclusivity. Yet, it's not a color that's commonly used in corporate presentations. By incorporating purple into your design, you can convey a sense of luxury, richness, and style that will set your presentation apart.

Free PowerPoint Title Set - Purple

When to use Purple:

Financial institutions often use purple to convey exclusivity. It is a great choice for brochures and other marketing materials. When used in the background of your presentation, purple can add a touch of dignity and sophistication that will impress your audience.

The Allure of Black:

Black is a color that evokes a sense of strength, sophistication, and conservatism. It's a versatile color that pairs well with most other colors, making it a popular choice for designers looking to add richness to their designs.

Free Black Color PowerPoint Title Template

When to use black

In presentations, black is often used as a background color to highlight product packaging or other key elements. Because it's the absence of color, black can make other colors appear brighter and more vibrant.

It goes well with most colors and hence used by most designers to add richness to their designs.

Choosing the Right Colors:

When it comes to selecting the right colors for your presentation, it's important to experiment and find the combination that works best for your message. If you're unsure, stick to white backgrounds with a few design elements to break up the monotony. Remember, the colors you choose can have a significant impact on how your message is received. By incorporating the right color into your design, you can create a presentation that's memorable, impactful, and professional.

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• By Illiya Vjestica
• - January 26, 2023

What are the Best Colours for Your PowerPoint presentation?

Choosing the best colours for PowerPoint isn’t as black and white as it seems. Many factors go into picking a powerful palette – involving everything from your audience’s emotions to your talk’s cultural context and, of course, to how your slides look.

Suppose you’re taking it as seriously as you should. In that case, you need to consider all of these when deciding on your colour scheme – as nailing this aspect of your presentation’s design will help you to communicate your message in the most impactful way possible. Interested? Let’s get stuck in.

Complementary colours

It would help to consider contrast when picking two or more colours for your presentation.

Contrasting colours are valuables when it comes to heightening the visual effect of your slides. They’re instantly impactful – reeling your viewers in by drawing their eyes to the screen. Also, they enhance your slides’ other elements – such as any fonts or tables used – increasing their visibility when used correctly. There’s a reason why black is nearly always paired with white and blue with yellow or orange. Together, they create a powerful impression… and it’s all thanks to contrast.

There’s a simple way to discover contrasting colours, and that’s by using a simple colour wheel. With this tool, you can easily see which colours are the opposite of which… helping you to refine your palette and ensure your presentation has colourful clout.

It also helps to follow the 60-30-10 colour rule . It’s generally for interior decorating but can support picking a colour scheme.

What Colours should not be used in PowerPoint?

When choosing colours for your slides, it’s important to create a contrast between the background and the text. I recommend avoiding using light text on a light background.

For example, a yellow background with white text often makes the text difficult to read. Likewise, with yellow text on a white background, it’s challenging to see.

Make sure your presentation content can be seen at the back of the room. You can use a colour contrast checker to ensure you have a strong contrast ratio to ensure your slides will be readable. This will help make your text more readable and provide a clear contrast between the text and background of your slides to enable your audience to follow along easily.

What are the Most Popular Colours for PowerPoint?

Here are some of the best colour combinations in PowerPoint. You can choose to experiment with your own as well.

Red & Black

Black & Yellow

Others include:

Blue & Yellow

Black & White

Orange and blue

Yellow and purple

Black and white

The selection method is slightly different for more complex presentations using three or more contrasting colours (triadic colours, for those who want to know). Pick three equally distanced colours around the colour wheel to choose the best complementary shades. These colours should, again, work beautifully together – providing that perfect contrast you crave.

Popular triadic choices include:

• Orange, green and purple
• Yellow, blue and red

Generally, we wouldn’t advise throwing a fourth colour into the mix – or more, besides. While using bright colours can have a wonderfully eye-catching effect on your PowerPoint slides, using too many at once could make them too “busy” – overloading the audience and detracting from the potential power of the colour combinations you’ve used. Adhere to the cliche “less is more”, and your simple yet striking presentation should speak for itself.

Colour psychology

You’re probably already familiar with the basic principles of colour psychology. Essentially, it’s been said that specific colours have set effects on people – specifically, causing them to feel a particular way. For instance, red is purported to inspire anger, blue to calm, and yellow to feel joy.

While there’s something to be said for this, colour psychology (as many people understand it) isn’t a flawless theory for one big reason: emotions aren’t quantifiable! Therefore, we can’t honestly claim that specific colours create the same feelings in every person – everybody’s different, and shades carry unique meanings for most of us.

You want to tap into your audience’s context of specific colours and other psychological and physical factors that may come into play. This is where the true magic of colour psychology lies. By understanding what influences your audience when it comes to colour – and knowing which colours are paired up with which emotions and responses in their lives – you can design something that sings. For instance, did you know that while, in Western and Japanese culture, the concept of love is associated with the colour red, it’s symbolised by the colour blue in African culture and yellow in Native American?

You can also your colour choice to the theme of your presentation. More on that later.

Know your audience. Get to know what inspires them, and let that influence your palette. It could make all the difference.

Colour symbolism

So, now you know to look into contrasting colours and your audience’s association with them. But we’re missing one major factor: you. What colours reflect you the best?

There are two ways that you can approach figuring this out. The first is straightforward: looking at your brand’s existing design. If you have a strong image already – of which colours will doubtlessly play a role, used on your website, logo and elsewhere – this is where you should start when designing your presentation. After all, these colours are already associated with you, so using them will create a strong link between your PowerPoint and the rest of your materials. Further, use colours so your audience can recognise you more quickly, and your presentation should look more professional. There are a lot of pros.

Option two requires a bit of decision-making. Suppose your brand doesn’t have any firm affiliations to colour already. In that case, you should consider which colours are associated with what in the context of your presentation and overarching brand ethos. Similarly to the colour psychology we’ve discussed, these hues will help you communicate your message clearly (and colourful). Some colour combinations are considered classic. They go together

Some popular colour associations include:

• Green – nature, the environment
• Blue – the ocean, sadness (referred to as “the blues”!)
• Orange – warmth, autumn
• Red – anger, love, energy

So: what are you talking about? Are there any clear colour associations to that topic already? Drill down to the heart of your presentation’s message, and choose the colours that reflect that the most.

One final thing. Once you’ve discovered your “essential” colour – whether that’s the colour that’s most strongly associated with the topic of your presentation or the colour that you’re hoping will have the biggest influence on your audience – make sure to make it the strongest colour on your palette (for instance, the background of your slides). This should ensure it delivers the impact you’re hoping for… levelling up your talk. Perfection.

Over to Hue

We know that we’ve given you a lot to think about, but if you’re ever feeling confused over colour, remember that it all boils down to the following factors:

Your brand + your audience’s colour associations + visual effect = the best palette

Once you’ve nailed this equation, the rest should come quickly. Good luck!

Choosing the right colours is one thing – putting together a presentation your audience will never forget. That’s another. Get in touch with us today to see how we can help your slides shine.

Illiya Vjestica

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Combining colors in PowerPoint – Mistakes to avoid

By Robert Lane

Why do some color combinations work so well in your presentations, and why do other color combinations make your presentations difficult to watch? PowerPoint expert Robert Lane explains how to combine colors to make effective and professional-looking slides.

With PowerPoint You have all the Tools but ...

Newer versions of PowerPoint have marvelous tools for helping even the “artistically challenged” among us get beyond bullet points and create effective, graphically appealing, downright professional-looking visual slides. That’s fantastic! Now the question is … how should we use those tools? Most of us have never been trained as graphic artists and don’t necessarily know the rules for making visually attractive and meaningful content.

Because the discussion of “effective visual communication” might fill an entire book, let’s narrow the focus here to concentrate solely on the use of color in PowerPoint. What are good, and not so good, ways of using color on slides?

Color Groups

One way to approach colors is to classify them into two broad groups: warm and cool colors (Figure 1). Reds, oranges, and yellows are referred to as warm colors. They tend to pop out and attract attention—especially a bright red. Greens, blues, and purples are cool colors. They tend to recede into the background and draw less attention, especially darker shades. White and very light colors also catch the eye, whereas black and very dark colors generally are less noticeable.

Figure 1 – Color Groups

Note, however, that above effects are not absolutely fixed. They can flip. The quantity and contrast of one color compared to another also comes into play. For example, if we place small black shapes on a solid white slide background, the black shapes pop out as more noticeable, versus the sea of white around them (Figure 2). In this case, the brain is more interested in figuring out if shapes communicate some form of meaning or pattern, rather than merely reacting to their color characteristics. Not surprisingly, some optical illusions take advantage of this phenomenon.

Figure 2 – Color Quantity and Contrast

Consider the color groups, as well as quantity and contrast, when combining colors on slides. It’s pretty safe to combine warm colors with each other and shades of brown (Figure 3) or cool colors with each other and shades of gray (Figure 4). White, black, and beige are neutral colors and go well with all colors in either group.

Figure 3 – Warm Colors Group

Figure 4 – Cool Colors Group

Where most PowerPoint designers get into trouble is combining colors across the warm/cool boundary. Absolutely NEVER do what is depicted in Figures 5 and 6. If you stare at either of these images for very long, your eyes begin screaming. They have trouble distinguishing interactions between the color wavelengths, resulting in fatigue and discomfort. Mixing bright blues and reds is a terrible practice to inflict upon audiences, and unfortunately it happens all too often. The same goes with mixing reds and greens.

Figure 5 – Red and Blue Color Combinations Cause Eye Strain

Figure 6 – Red and Green Color Combinations also Cause Eye Strain

A red and green combination also brings up the issue of color blindness, which apparently affects approximately 7 percent of men and 1 percent of women. Inability to notice the difference between red and green colors is the most common form of color blindness. For example, let’s say you place green text on a red background, as in Figure 6. If the text color’s shading (amount of darkness) has little contrast with the background color’s shading, some viewers will not be able to read that text at all! Avoid such problems by never mixing these two colors, especially in a text versus background combination.

Julie Terberg, a graphic designer and PowerPoint MVP, also points out that using the themes in PowerPoint can make your color combination choices easier (Figure 7). Theme colors have been chosen to look good together (although, still use caution) and to work well in both light and dark presentation environments.

Figure 7 – Using Theme Colors Make Your Choices Easier

The Forgiving Nature of Color Gradients

Interestingly enough, the process of combining colors is much more forgiving when using gradients—colors that fade into each other. Beginning with version 2010, PowerPoint offers a greatly improved, user-friendly interface for making gradients, by the way (Figure 8).

Figure 8 – Adding a Gradient to a Shape

Because nature regularly blends colors this way (think of a sunset), we are used to seeing colors gradually transition from one hue to the next, meaning that you can get away with combining just about any color set and still end up with a reasonably attractive and professional look. Just make sure the transitions are gradual.

Try blending colors to make a custom-designed slide background, a decorative shape—perhaps for a sectional background (Figure 9) or navigation button (Figure 10)—or even jazzy, 3-D text (Figure 11).

Figure 9 – Purple, Gold and Gray Gradient inside a Shape

Figure 10 – Gradient-filled Shape used as a Navigation Button

Figure 11 – Gradient-filled PowerPoint Text

Color and Text Considerations

Going back to the issues of color quantity and contrast (black dots on the white background), those considerations are especially important when slides contain text. Unless such text exists in a navigation button or is purely decorative, generally the goal is for audience members to be able to read it, right? Therefore, opting for a simple background that contrasts sharply with the text color helps the message pop out and attract attention (Figure 12).

Figure 12 – Text Color should Contrast Sharply with a Background

Placing text on top of pictures is popular but can be tricky because controlling the contrast then becomes more difficult. The solution, again, is to make sure the text color contrasts as much as possible with a majority of the picture’s colors and then add a distinct shadow or glow to the text (Figure 13).

Figure 13 – Shadow on Text Helps it Appear more Distinct on top of a Picture

General Color Issues

Here are a few additional PowerPoint-related color tips we’ve discovered over the years:

Using red text is almost never a good idea. That particular color, of all colors, tends to washout when projected on a screen if any kind of unwanted ambient light also hits the screen—perhaps from sunlight streaking through a window or glare from a poorly aimed stage light.

Unless there is a particularly good reason for using brightly colored text … don’t. Stick with white or light beige on a dark background or black (or otherwise very dark color) on a light background. Your slides will have a more professional appearance as a result.

Stay away from gradients in text unless the words are large and intended to be primarily decorative in nature.

When using gradients, simplicity is your friend. Limit the number of colors, and, whenever possible, try using combinations that are readily found in nature for maximum appeal.

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9 Beautiful Color Palettes for Designing Powerful PowerPoint Slides

Anuj Malhotra

Color is fascinating. It is stimulating. It is like the universe itself- Infinite.

No matter how much you read on colors and their meanings, color theories, color wheel and types of color schemes , importance of color in design and what not, it still appears fresh and enlightening. Such is the power of colors- it makes you hungry for more knowledge, more thinking, more feeling and literally more hungry if you use warm colors like the exciting yellow and orange at an eating place. Even more romantic: just recall the abundance of colors and the romantic energy they evoked in La La Land!

Source- YouTube

So when we say, “Color plays an important role in design”, it is actually an understatement. It plays a huge role. It evokes a range of emotions, helps our eye navigate smoothly across the design, and sets the tone for the overall message you want to convey.

Unfortunately, as much as colors and their combinations are put to a wonderful use in web design and graphic design, they are grossly neglected in the presentation business. Half of the presentations are still reminiscent of stone age- dot points and essays thrown on white slide. The other half uses the safe blue (nothing wrong in that as blue represents professionalism) but all the time blue, seriously? Audience begins to feel blue.

P.S. Did you know Blue is the world’s favorite color ! It is! But I can place a bet of million dollars (not that I have it) that it is not the above blue. This is PowerPoint’s default color when you insert a shape or SmartArt.

It’s time to get creative while using colors in presentation slides! Forget about your brand colors if they are not exciting. Change them too. We desperately need to use this powerful design element and nonverbal communication tool to bring our presentations to life! But how?

We have done the hard work and found 9 awesome color palettes that would work wonders for presentations. Many are a beautiful combination of warm and cool colors (warm colors being red, yellow and orange that seem to approach us while cool colors being violet, blue and green that appear to recede from us). Also sharing the inspiration behind these color palettes. Let’s devour them one by one:

Also Read : A Super-Fast Guide to Business Plan Templates

9 Creative Color Combinations You Can Steal for Your Slides

Color palette #1- powerfully memorable (red and grey).

This color palette comprises basically 2 colors- red and grey and shades of them. This high contrast color scheme is applicable to all types of presentations, especially where you need to pitch your products or services. Red adds energy to the content and the slide, while grey grounds the slide, makes it look professional and lets red be the centre of attraction.

Red is also a great color for a brand since it signifies warmth, confidence and energy. Being such a memorable, emotionally intense color and having high visibility, it boosts brand recognition, and hence, is an integral part of bold color palettes. Here’s the color palette for you:

Download this Color Palette

We have also provided the darker variations of each color (called as Shades in color terminology) and lighter versions (called tint) in case you need to highlight or tone down a certain color based on your requirements and company branding.

P.S. To use such color palettes, simply save them and use the Eyedropper tool from the Color menu in PowerPoint:

If you want the exact color code in case you are using an older version of PowerPoint, you’ll have to manually enter the RGB color values for each hue. Simply click the More Colors… option given above the Eyedropper option and manually enter these values:

• Color 1- Red (Red- 224, Green- 69, Blue- 86)
• Color 2- Dark Red (Red- 43, Green- 21, Blue- 21)
• Color 3- Grey (Red- 242, Green- 242, Blue- 242)
• Color 4- Dark Grey (Red- 127, Green- 127, Blue- 127)

Inspiration Behind this Color Palette:

DDB Canada created a heartfelt campaign for The Historica Dominion Institute and in support of The Memory Project to pay tribute to its soldiers on 11/11/11. The sombre grey and lots of white space evokes the vacuum caused by the absence of those soldiers. The use of a single bright color- red- creates a dramatic effect and evokes awe in the viewers. Here’s the brilliant print ad:

Source- bestadsontv.com- The Historica-Dominion Institute: Remember 11/11/11

Do not draw the meaning that this combination is for special occasions. Every presentation is special for you. You want your message to be remembered. So use light grey as background and red in the foreground to highlight the most important phrase, icon..basically the core of that slide. Here’s a real estate PPT slide that applies such color palettes beautifully:

Also notice how dark grey has been used for text instead of the standard black. It creates a harmonious look and feel, and the slide overall looks creative and professional at the same time.

Give a Red-Carpet Look with this Color Scheme:

When following color palettes, you can switch the background and foreground colors- red as background and white or light grey as foreground. That will give a red-carpet look to your presentation:

Presentation Rule To Remember: Have High Contrast for Easy Readability

By and large, this rule will save you from making color disasters:

• Light Background Colors- Dark Foreground
• Dark Background Colors- Light Foreground

There was another color in the color scheme- dark red, almost resembling brown which is a very masculine color. You can use that too where you need to use color other than red; as we did in the slide below:

Alternatively, we could replace the serious dark red with the happy bright red in the above slide and use a shade of grey for the remaining 28% as we do not want to highlight that portion. We want to highlight 82% and since red is a perfect accent color (accent colors are colors used for emphasis); let’s use the same:

Which slide would perform better? Tell us later when you are done with this article; let’s move on to our second color palette:

Color Palette #2- Vibrant and Young (Plum, Orange, Teal & Grey)

Why do presentations have to look “old”? Why have they become synonymous with draining life out of audience? Too much text. Check. Bad design and layout. Check. Devoid of color or dull colors. Check, check. Well, for those who cannot chop off content due to some reason and have limited design and layout knowledge, we published an article on 15 Ways To Turn A Very Text-Heavy, Bullet-Ridden Slide Into Amazing! For the last problem i.e. dull colors, we are publishing this article. This color scheme (comprising plum, orange, teal and grey) screams young and is in no way less professional than any other color scheme:

Grab this Color Palette

Color codes for the hues:

• Color 1- Plum (Red- 184, Green- 13, Blue- 72)
• Color 2- Orange (Red- 242, Green- 151, Blue- 36)
• Color 3- Dark Teal (Red- 43, Green- 106, Blue- 108)
• Color 4- Dark Grey (Red- 64, Green- 64, Blue- 64)

The beauty herself and icon of the young generation- Emma Watson- stuns in a color-oozing ad by Lancôme, owned by L'oreal. She is the brand ambassador of Lancôme and her vibrance is matched by the beautiful spring colors in the ad below which you would have surely looked even before reading all this text.

Courtesy: Lancôme

Warm orange, seductive plum, innocent pink, mysterious dark teal- the above ad has all the face-turning colors. Doesn’t look relevant to presentations? That’s what I thought too before I extracted the colors and applied it to my slides. Boy, they look so vibrant!

The dark grey adds a professional touch while the plum and orange colors inject interest into the slide. Plum, very similar to purple, is a rich color that is associated with royalty and romance. Orange is the color of joy and creativity while Teal is the color of sophistication, confidence and serenity. If you feel combining these colors is creating a color riot, just choose any 2 contrasting colors from this palette and make your slides rock like these:

Color plays a very important role of grouping elements here. The reader can easily read the content alternatively as the process goes, or read the dark teal group and orange group separately. A picture will form in his head and if asked to recall the process later, he will remember the color blocks and quickly recall the content too.

The color palettes you choose depend on your preferences totally. That said, try using the brightest color sparingly or else it would overwhelm the audience and overpower everything. In the slide below, we reserved the plum color for the title alone:

Have you ever seen any Human Resource presentation so vibrant before? I never had. Let’s move to color palette 3:

Color Palette #3- Retro Rocks (Dark Blue, Tan & Green)

As conflicting as it may sound, your presentations can look old but it has to be stylishly old! Yes, I mean retro. Who doesn’t like the retro look and feel whether it is fashion, art or presentations for that matter. Here’s a color palette (comprising dark blue, tan and green colors) to give that retro vibe to your presentations!

Download this Color Scheme

Here’s the color code for each hue:

• Color 1- Dark Blue (Red- 4, Green- 37, Blue- 58)
• Color 2- Tan (Red- 225, Green- 221, Blue- 191)
• Color 3- Green (Red- 76, Green- 131, Blue- 122)

“Home is wherever you park.” A beautiful vintage poster I came across on the web immediately caught my attention thanks to its classic and nostalgic color scheme.

It’s dreamy quality comes from the dark blue sky, the green ground and the moon and the stars. The best color palettes mirror real life- they are relatable and thus more “human”. Since Dark Blue signifies power and knowledge, it is a perfect color for corporate presentations. Let’s apply it to our slides and see how it looks:

The slide looks a poster, doesn’t it! What better do you want. Each PowerPoint slide should be worthy of sharing on social media networks like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn. Since the look is so classic, your presentations also get the timeless look and feel. Here’s another presentation slide that is so poster-ish and larger than life:

Color Palette #4- Dominating Duo (Teal & Red)

This brings two of my favorite design colors together- Teal and Red. Color experts, interior designers and graphic designers can’t get enough of Teal. It is trendy and unique- neither blue nor green. It appears as if it has been discovered only recently, especially where presentations are concerned. I see Teal dominating infographics but can’t recall even one in presentations!  

Teal, as we said before, signifies trustworthiness, serenity and reliability. Complementing it and conflicting it is the energetic and sexy red. Use the lighter version of Teal which is Aqua as your slide background and you have a soothing, calm effect while red grabs the audience eyeballs.

Use the Eyedropper tool to extract these colors or apply the following color code:

• Color 1- Aqua (Red- 131, Green- 211, Blue- 212)
• Color 2- Dark Teal (Red- 45, Green- 129, Blue- 131)
• Color 3- Dark Red (Red- 145, Green- 12, Blue- 7)
• Color 4- Orange (Red- 244, Green- 129, Blue- 83)

A movie poster. Didn’t know my search for comedy movies would land me to the colorful and lively movie poster of Nacho Libre . The red flowing cape is understood and nothing out of the box but the hero’s teal tights surely caught my attention. Red looks all the more ravishing thanks to the ample teal in the background. Have you watched this movie? If you judge a book by its cover and correspondingly a movie by its poster, then the movie surely appears interesting.

Well, presentation mostly is not a comedy affair or a showbiz. But like any other visual communication, it has to attract audience attention and sustain it. Let’s replicate this color combination in our presentation slides and see how it looks:

The font is awesome but even an ordinary italic font in bold red could hardly go unnoticed. The darker shades of teal and red add mystery to the look and feel making one curious to see what comes next. This scheme is great for your Title slide and Section Header slides.

If you are using images in your text slides like in the one below, you can use just one color since the image already contains its own colors and adding teal and red would make the slide look busy. So you can use shades of teal and create a beautiful slide like the one below:

Color Palette #5- Authoritative Punch (Dark Green & Tan)

It’s said that age also influences your color preferences. Probably, the audience of your presentation is not the millennials but the investors and C-suite executives. You do not want to risk using orange and reds and appear non-serious. You want to look dead-serious and super-professional. Blue is a safe choice as I said. However, color palettes like this comprising 2 colors- Tan and Dark Green- are a better alternative and makes your slides look different from others:

Use this Color Palette Template

• Color 1- Dark Green (Red- 42, Green- 50, Blue- 46)
• Color 2- Tan (Red- 216, Green- 203, Blue- 187)
• Color 3- Blue-Gray (Red- 33, Green- 36, Blue- 39)
• Color 4- Brown (Red- 141, Green- 128, Blue- 111)

We have all searched for breathtaking wallpapers for our laptops and phones. What makes them breathtaking? Amazing landscape and colors. Here’s one such wallpaper I found on Pixabay. It is magical and mysterious. The forest dark green evokes awe, especially when it is surrounded by plenty of white space and light colors.

Let’s apply this color scheme to a serious presentation topic such as Customer Relationship Management:

Since dark green is an established army color as it camouflages with surroundings, you can leverage this association to your advantage. Use shades of green and tan in the slides that follow and give an authoritative look and feel to your presentation:

Color Palette #6- Crystal Clear (Turquoise, Teal & Blue)

If you have been using sky blue in your presentations, you can continue doing that. It is a refreshing and calming color that instantly brings to mind images of sky and sea. Also want to add a touch of sophistication to your presentations? Choose the Turquoise color instead. It is a combination of pale blue and green and brings to mind the turquoise gemstone.

Like blue, it is also refreshing and calming and symbolizes depth, stability and wisdom. More importantly, it’s crystal clarity signifies open communication, healing and emotional stability. A shade of turquoise is Teal that we used a little while back along with red. A lighter version of turquoise is aqua which when contrasted with white looks all the more pure and relaxing.

Color palettes like this one however puts turquoise against its darker shades like dark blue, teal and green to add authority, wisdom and sophistication to your presentation.

Grab this Beautiful Color Scheme

• Color 1- Turquoise (Red- 39, Green- 195, Blue- 243)
• Color 2- Dark Teal (Red- 12, Green- 113, Blue- 133)
• Color 3- Dark Teal (Red- 5, Green- 112, Blue- 145)
• Color 4- Dark Blue (Red- 3, Green- 52, Blue- 83)
• Color 4- Black (Red- 0, Green- 0, Blue- 0)

One can watch marine life for ages. The colorful beings inhabiting the crystal clear waters are a treat to watch. So, when I stumbled upon this BBC One documentary on tiny Japanese fish “pufferfish” designing a sculpture on the seabed, I was awestruck. It proved useful for my color palettes inspiration too. Here’s the cute fish:

Source- Youtube (BBC One Documentary)

Imagine this is as the background for your presentation- Lovely! The fish’s piercing black eye, dark blue shadow, the specks of green on its tail and skin wonderfully complement to create this natural color scheme. Let’s steal it for our PowerPoint presentation:

White looks the perfect contrasting color for blue. But the Teal color lends more power to the word “grow”. Of course, the typography also plays its part in reinforcing the message. By the way, if you want to add typography to your skill arsenal, do check out these 11 Typography Tweaks And Text Effects To Spice Up Your Presentation Content .

There is a lot of blue in this color palette but it won’t make anyone feel the blues. Take a look at this business slide to adapt to the right color palettes:

Color Palette #7- It’s American-ish (Red & Blue)

Fourth of July is around the corner. So why not use a color palette inspired by it.

There’s a reason America adopted red and blue along with white for its national flag. Red symbolizes courage and sacrifice, blue symbolizes vigilance and justice while white represented innocence and purity. The beloved American superheroes wear their patriotic colors with pride. See Spiderman's suit- red and blue. What about Superman and WonderWoman! Their traditional outfits too had dominantly red and blue combination.

That does not mean you have to be an American to use the color palette that we are sharing. We are using a totally different variation of red and blue. So use the following color palette without any hesitation:

Download this Dynamic Color Palette

RGB values for each hue:

• Color 1- Rose (Red- 255, Green- 86, Blue- 87)
• Color 2- Dark Teal (Red- 55, Green- 108, Blue- 138)
• Color 3- Light Orange (Red- 242, Green- 217, Blue- 187)
• Color 4- Blue-Grey (Red- 99, Green- 143, Blue- 169)

Never knew surfing on Facebook during office hours could also be productive. A video on my timeline “7 Signs You Are Perfect For Each Other” by FilterCopy got me glued with its beautiful color scheme.

Let’s apply this dynamic color scheme to our slides. Here is a slide which looks bold and powerful. There is a beautiful balance of masculinity and femininity too with dark blue and soft red.

White is a perfect contrasting color for easy readability, whether you take red and white combination or blue and white. Blue on red doesn’t look bad either. It scores a little less on readability as compared to white but if font size is not too small, you can carry off red and blue together with style like in the slide below:

Color Palette #8- Opposite Attraction (Blue & Yellow)

Opposites attract. So let’s take 2 opposite color forces- one that is attention-grabbing and one that is conservative. One that represents summer and the other winter. Yellow and blue. A warm and cool color in one single slide gives you the perfect balance- the youthful energy and the professional touch.

Use this Color Palette

Color 1- Dark Blue (Red- 2, Green- 81, Blue- 150)

Color 2- Orange/Mustard (Red- 253, Green- 179, Blue- 56)

Inspiration Behind This Color Palette:

A newsletter from an online shopping portal in my inbox coaxing me to shop for Father’s Day definitely convinced me (to steal the color palette for this article). It was perfect for the occasion as blue is considered the color of men and yellow calls for celebration.

So, if you love using blue for your presentations, please do. But try yellow or mustard this time as in the color palette and breathe life into your corporate presentations! Yellow is also the color of innovation; so we felt the color palette was perfect for this slide:

The yellow used here is not the bright yellow or the bright orange that professionals detest using. It is soft orange or mustard that does not look childish from any angle. Use shades of blue and yellow to avoid making the slides look too colorful. Notice how dark blue has been used for human face instead of a new color:

Color Palette 9- Down to Earth vs. Royal (Brown & Gold vs. Dark Purple)

How about using earthy colors for our presentation that gives an impression we are grounded in our roots! Earth tone color schemes include combination of browns and tans. The soil, clay, dirt and rocks give us neutral colors that can be used to give a down-to-earth look to our presentation. Here’s such a scheme that contains all the neutral colors except one- dark purple that is a color of royalty:

Grab this Color Scheme

According to your choice of color palettes, here are the values to get the exact hue:

• Color 1- Gold (Red- 254, Green- 174, Blue- 2)
• Color 2- Brown (Red- 110, Green- 54, Blue- 42)
• Color 3- Light Yellow (Red- 241, Green- 226, Blue- 160)
• Color 4- Dark Purple (Red- 32, Green- 12, Blue- 37)

An image of a yellow excavator on a construction site on Pixabay had all the feel-good earthy colors. You could also extract the sky blue color from this image although it is mostly covered by yellowish clouds. Wonder where we got the purple from? See the excavator’s shadow and the front portion where vehicle number is displayed:

Source: Pixabay

Let’s take the first 2 colors from such color palettes and apply this to a presentation slide- golden background and brown foreground. The gold color adds spark and prestige to the slide while the masculine brown gives power to the content:

Now, let’s apply the last 2 colors from this palette- pale yellow and dark purple. It’s a high contrast scheme and gives a royal look and feel to the slide. Let’s use the pale yellow as the background on the same slide and replace brown with purple. Which looks better?

Want to make your presentation look more royal and sophisticated? Use purple as the presentation background and use the soft yellow for your content, shapes and icons:

That’s all we had to share on color palettes with you for today. As we said in the beginning, color combinations can be infinite. Hope you exploit the power and psychology of color palettes to inject vitality into your PowerPoint presentations and other designs!

And hey, which color palette(s) did you like the most? Please give us your valuable feedback in the comments below. And if you found the article useful, spread the word. Here’s a pre-populated tweet to get you started:

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Home Blog Design Color Theory for Presentations: A Detailed Guide for Non-Designers

Color Theory for Presentations: A Detailed Guide for Non-Designers

Color theory is a common conversation topic for graphic designers as its rules guide every aspect of a quality-crafted project. We can ask ourselves then: does color theory apply to presentation design? The short answer is: definitely yes.

To elevate the impact that your presentations can have, we designed this guide, intended to help people who are not necessarily knowledgeable in graphic design. We will cover in detail what color theory is, how different color schemes make a psychological effect on your target audience, recommended color schemes and pairings, and accessibility rules. Also, you can find two step-by-step examples in the final section on how to craft high-quality presentations by following these rules.

Table of Contents

Color properties and models

• On primary, Secondary, and Tertiary colors

Color temperature

Why do we use color theory, monochromatic, complementary, rectangle or tetradic, split complement, accessibility rules for color theory, black: luxurious, sexy & powerful, white: fresh and clean, silver: innovation and modernity, red: power, action & confidence, blue: trustworthiness, stability & safety, yellow: happiness, energy & attention, green: money, health, nature & luck, purple: wisdom, creativity & ambition, brown: strength, security & isolation, orange: uplifting, attention & energy, pink: girly and romance, case study 1: creating a presentation with contrasting values, case study 2: create a presentation for eco-friendly purposes, case study 3: create a vibrant presentation to engage your audience, final tips for proper usage of color theory in presentation design, what is color theory.

We can resume color theory as guidance on color mixing and combinations for achieving harmonious results, but to truly understand color theory, we must understand the concept of color itself.

The initial findings and research on color date back to ancient Greece , where Aristotle understood colors as “a mixture of light and darkness,” but discordances were seen in the way the human eye was able to perceive the phenomenon of color. Demokritos understood colors as the energy emitted from self-radiating objects but could not be extracted for artistic purposes. For philosophers like Plato, color was perceived after the rays emitted by the self-radiating objects collided with “pure rays” placed in the human eyes by the gods. Therefore the perception of “color” mainly depended on the properties of those rays (size, strength, and speed). 

Even if we can criticize such simplistic approaches to color perception these days, the truth is those definitions aren’t that far from contemporary concepts. The color theory formalization process started with the findings of Leone Battista Alberti, referring to the mixture of colors as an infinite process in which other hues are created, but recognized only four true colors: red, blue, green, and grey. For Alberti, white and black were alterations in different colors.

The works of Leonardo da Vinci were geared toward the interaction of light and shade, where white represented the light and black the absence of color. This formulation was adequately analyzed by Sir Isaac Newton in 1666 when he observed that white light was composed of the entire spectrum of colors present in the rainbow. His experiment, made using two prisms, proved that light lacked any proper color on its own, but “color” was a human perception of the range of energies emitted when light fulfilled these three premises:

• It had a medium for propagation: air, water, etc.
• It involved interacting with at least two elements: an object and light.
• It had a spectator whose rational interpretation was able to “decode” the energy into a “color.”

The direct consequence of Newton’s findings is the method by which we can analyze a color’s properties.

• Hue : How is the color perceived (if it is blue, red, yellow, etc.).
• Saturation : Also known as Intensity, it refers to how vivid color is. The more saturation it has, the stronger the color it will be. The lower the saturation value is, the more grayish the color would look.
• Value : Speaks of the amount of light present in color. Colors with considerable amounts of light are referred to as Tints , whereas colors lacking light are known as Shades . 

Thanks to these properties, colors can be classified according to their interaction with each other in two big models:

• Additive color model : This is where RGB comes from. Red, Green, and Blue make the primary colors as they are the colors available in the photoreceptors of the human eyes. Since white is conceived as the combination of red, green, and blue in equal parts, any ratio alteration creates the different colors we can perceive. Hence, black is defined as the removal of the three primary colors. This theory was conceived by James Clerk Maxwell and is fundamental for any kind of visual media.
• Subtractive color model: This model refers to CYMK, the acronym being Cyan, Yellow, Magenta, and Black. It is called subtractive as the concept behind it is purely physics-based. If we take the light spectrum and mix it with pigments, certain pigments absorb part of the light spectrum before letting the light bounce. Therefore, light waves are “subtracted” from the original light source when the color reaches the viewer’s eye. For instance, white objects lack pigments; that’s why the full spectrum reaches the object and can be perceived as white. As you add more pigments, you subtract more light waves from the light source, getting to the point where an object is perceived as black (hence why the letter K is in the acronym). 

Now, these two different color perception models are applied in various mediums. As mentioned above, the RGB color range from the additive color model is used in visual media, such as computers and television. Up to 16.7 million colors can be created from this model, and the methodology for this is by mixing each channel (red, green, and blue) in a range from 0 (least saturated) to 255 (most saturated). 

The CYMK color range from the subtractive color model is used for print media in a broad range of options: paper, textile, dyes, ink, etc. Unlike the RGB mode, CMYK is heavily restricted to an estimated 16k possible colors. Since CMYK is based on pigments, the conformation of each color is expressed in percentages for each tint.

On Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Colors

We have approached a great deal of information, but what about what the teacher told us about “primary” and “secondary” colors in school? Well, let’s blame artists for this. 

During the 18th century, discussions about color vision came to the convention that all elements were made out of three primary colors: red, yellow, and blue. This was due to the belief that these three tints could mix all the other colors perceived by the human eye. The RYB model distinct red, yellow and blue as the primary colors , where the mixture of these hues produces the secondary colors : orange, green, and violet.

Tertiary colors result from mixing a primary and a secondary color but include a higher ratio of the primary color. By doing that, you end up with these colors:

• Blue-green (Teal) = Blue + Green
• Yellow-green (Chartreuse) = Yellow + Green
• Red-orange (Vermilion) = Red + Orange
• Red-purple (Magenta) = Red + Purple
• Blue-purple (Violet) = Blue + Purple
• Yellow-orange (Amber) = Yellow + Orange

Although lighting professionals typically coin this concept, the truth is we can classify colors by their “temperature.” For artists and any kind of visual/printed medium, color temperature is a relative concept that relates to how cold or warm a color is perceived and the psychological effects linked to it.

Why is the color temperature a relative concept? Simple, it’s strictly related to the color in proximity to it. For example, if we take a wine color sample (red-violet) and put it close to a blue-colored object, the wine color will be perceived as warmer . On the other hand, if we take that same sample and place it next to a red thing, the wine color is observed as cooler due to the presence of blue pigment.

As a convention, colors can be classified according to their temperature as:

• Warm colors : Red, yellow, and orange hues
• Cool colors : Blue, blue-green, and violet hues

Some colors are “in-between” as they can both be warm or cold. Examples of these are pink, green, and gray.

In a later section, we will analyze the impact color temperature has on psychology and its usage for transmitting emotions in a message.

As in any discipline, we need a framework to provide quality results. Color theory is the consequence of centuries of research made by thinkers, scientists, and artists about the behavior of color and the human psyche. 

This framework ensures we work under visually harmonic results for the desired outcome. Correct usage of color theory can elevate a design to its maximum potential. Although, we should consider that design is not the ultimate reason why the research on color and its theorization happened in the first place. In 1879 Odgen Rod published Modern Chromatics , the first scientifical publication made by a physicist about color theory taking notions from Jack Clerk Maxwell’s postulates. His work inspired the creation of a color standardization system, resumed in the 1912 book Color Standards and Color Nomenclature by Robert Ridgway.

In a different line of research, color representation was an idea often revisited during the 18th and 19th centuries. 3D shapes displayed the different hues, shades, and tints: spheres, pyramids, and cones. Eventually, the method was inefficient for any respectable academic or professional work. It was by the hand of professor Albert Munsell (creator of the Munsell Color System, still used to date) that a proper relationship between hue, saturation, and value was established. His discoveries involved a rigorous methodology in which the three color properties were expressed in percentages as a “rational way to describe color” – contrasting with the traditional (and misleading) color naming system.

Munsell’s first findings were published in his 1905 Color Atlas , improved later in the 1929 Munsell Book of Color . The impact of Munsell’s research was that his system was almost instantly adopted by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for soil research and later on by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) for the standardization of skin and hair colors in forensic pathology. Other known usages of Munsell’s system include dental restoration practices (for defining dental pieces’ tint) or comparing digital media to human color vision.

A final application of color theory and the one that mainly involves us in crafting presentations came from the findings of art theorist and artist Wassily Kandinsky . He established the nexus between colors and the effect on human behavior – a study that later evolved into the discipline of Color Psychology . His perception of the spirituality found in art is heavily used to date in marketing as specific colors were able to alter the mood of the audience. We will elaborate on this topic in a later section of this guide.

Types of Color Schemes

In this section, we will explain in detail each of the color schemes. Consider this article on color mixing for presentations as complementary information about tips for how to balance the color ratio and how to select a scheme.

A monochromatic color scheme applies a single color with variations in shades and tints. This kind of scheme is often found in house paint palettes, and the overall effect is consistency.

Whereas it lacks contrast to make it look “vibrant,” the monochromatic scheme is one of the preferred choices of many designers as simply you cannot go wrong with it. It takes the decision of color matching out of the scene, and you can play with different shades and tints of the same hue to make transitions, highlight an element, etc.

The analogous color scheme works with a pairing of the main color and the two directly next to it in the color wheel. One example we can take is an analogous scheme of blue with blue-green and green. 

Overall, it is a color scheme that can be applied in most scenarios without harsh dynamic range impact. Its expected usage is for logos or branding, looking for a harmonic result in which the different colors blend together to convey a message.

If you want to create an impactful contrast, this is your color scheme. The complementary color scheme uses two colors directly across the color wheel. Any other tints or shades relevant to those two colors can also be used. 

And here’s why color theory is critical when approaching a presentation design. How would you actually use the colors in this complementary color scheme? 50/50? If that’s your initial guess, you are awfully wrong.

To preserve harmony in the composition, the advisable route is to consider one color as the predominant and the second contrasting color as the accent . The different tints and shades can be used in similar proportions, always as subordinates of those two. 

The complementary color scheme is ideal for graphs, charts, and infographics. Its striking contrast makes elements outstand; thus, it’s advisable not to overload the balance between predominant and accent. One part can be colored in the accent color, then tints and shades of that color make the different points of the graph. The predominant color becomes the background for that presentation.

The tetradic color scheme defines a rectangle area where the four corners are the selected colors for the palette. It is one of the schemes that oughts to be used with extreme caution.

As a result of this selection process, we end up with two bold tones, and two muted ones, which are secondary colors related to the first ones. To apply the rectangle color scheme, start by making one color dominant . Balance the rest of the colors as subtle accents for different sections. To avoid its overwhelming effect, you can use either black or white (depending on your selection of colors) to tone down the color explosion.

Mobile development is a fine example of applying a tetradic color scheme, where we can see menus with cards in different colors. Keep a close eye on it; you will subtly find the other three tones in each card. Companies like Google or Microsoft use tetradic schemes for their logos, as it boosts the idea of diversity and openness.

The triadic color scheme is trendy in flyers design and is also known to produce the best colors for presentations. Since all colors are equally distant in the color wheel, you get a high contrast composition; however, the best part of this color scheme is to play with the softer tints each color has as it gets closer to white.

Say you pick blue-violet as the dominant color. Yellow-green will be the color to contrast that blue-violet for a balanced look (red-orange if your take was to make it highly vibrant), so you can use either 100% yellow-green or a softer tint of it for different parts of your design. Then, the red-orange becomes a hue to add dynamism to the composition in attention-grabbing details. 

The square color scheme is a bolder version of the rectangle color scheme. Coining the idea of even spaces between colors, you end up with dramatic changes in hues while preserving one primary color, which is one of the reasons why web designers often pick this color scheme. 

For correctly applying this scheme, we suggest you pick the darkest hue as the dominant color , then gradually introduce the others using the 60-30-10 rule for a balanced composition. Using white or black as the predominant color is an alternative, whereas the others picked by the square color scheme make the composition pop.

Finally, we have the Split Complement or Split Complementary color scheme, which resembles a tree structure. This scheme picks a primary color. Instead of selecting its direct complementary, it opts for a split in which the two colors are chosen on each side of the complementary color. 

This kind of scheme is ideal for infographics and presentations since you balance the high contrast of the Complementary scheme with two subtler but intense colors. The second reason why so many users are fans of this scheme is that it keeps a proper balance between warm and cool colors. 

Let’s assume red-violet is going to act as the base color . Then blue-violet can be used to enforce some shadow areas and yellow to bring life to the composition in a striking way. Since the contrast can be overwhelming, be mindful about the dosage of color you apply, and mostly: choose the base color with care . As an extra note, you can use a tint of the selected base color if you consider the chosen one is far too bold (e.g., if you picked yellow as the base color).

Color isn’t the answer to every project. Even if you consider the first step of picking the proper color scheme for your design is done, there are some extra rules you ought to check to ensure design accessibility . We cannot be more clear about this topic: if your design doesn’t follow the basic accessibility rules, all that hard work was done for nothing. Why? Let’s consider the following scenario.

You designed a presentation. The slides are done and ready to be projected for your audience. After the conference started, people in the back rows complained they could not understand what was written in your slides. Or worse: they get confused when trying to visualize graphs. And this doesn’t just affect people with visual impairments (which you should always consider when designing your slides) – different lighting conditions can hinder your own presentation performance from your workspace if the color contrast isn’t appropriate.

Therefore, we will resume the principal guidelines for accessibility that concern color theory:

• Contrast foreground and background : To ensure your presentation is readable, apply a color contrast of 4.5:1 for placeholder text and 3:1 for titles. This also applies if the text was rasterized as part of an image. You can see the difference below between what’s considered a faulty contrast and a well-made pairing.
• A word of caution : Please look at the font color’s overall lightness. There’s a specific reason for not using 100% lightness because it causes visual discomfort to the user.

• Don’t assume people understand color the same way: As we’ve seen above, the perception of color is subjective and can be influenced by factors that can be both psychological, physiological, or even educational. Let’s take a classic as an example. A form section that says, “Required fields are in red.” Whereas this can be simple to understand, a person with daltonism or achromatopsia (total color blindness) won’t even know where to look. Instead, use a visual cue to help the user understand where to look, such as “Required fields are marked with an *.”
• Test designs in different sizes: Something that can be seen as balanced on a printed paper or computer screen may be overwhelming when reduced to mobile format. It’s a good practice to test the color schemes in different screen sizes to be confident users can read and understand our content, regardless of the medium they use.

Psychological effects associated with effective color theory application

Even though the naming is relatively recent, color psychology is the discipline that understands the relationship between color and human interaction. So significant is the importance for this study area that food packaging doesn’t happen accidentally, as improper color usage can alter how you perceive that food. Marketing, interior design, gaming industry, graphic designers , and so many other industries apply the guidelines of color psychology in their daily production to grant consumer satisfaction. 

This section will explore the intrinsic messages that color can transmit and how our presentations can benefit from that.

As an easy term, black can be understood as the absence of color. People can also interpret black as the lack of light or the technical fact that black can absorb the entire light spectrum.

Since we can analyze the color meanings by its positive and negative associations, we start with the positive feelings oozed by the color black. It is a direct message of sophistication and luxury. People instantly associate black with the color of tuxedos, black limos, and many spy-themed movies. 

The black color also speaks of power, and it’s not without a cause, as court dresses historically have been black. Banking institutions reserve the black color for their premium members’ cards.

Negative connotations of the color black are feelings that evoke depression. This can be easily fixed by a sound, contrasting presentation color palette.

Opt for a black-themed presentation if you wish to transmit exclusivity, a VIP product or service for your audience. Gold accents work perfectly for this kind of topic, although somewhat cliché. Instead, you can work with ochre and coffee tones with subtle white accents to make the design tridimensional. Use texture images, such as carbon fiber, to reinforce the message of something luxurious that can elevate the customer’s standards.

Word of advice: not all black colors are precisely “black” – You can find warmer blacks, which work best with ochre tones, and cooler blacks that get along best with silver/gray hues.

White speaks of purity, of something clean and innocent, hence why it is the main color picked for wedding dresses, baptisms, or hotel bedding. White also transmits minimalism, which is why nordic styling often pairs warm wood with matte white finishes for table lamps or furniture. It has a conveyed message of austerity.

As a color, technically speaking, is the full spectrum of light without being bounced. Therefore, white can be understood as a blank state, a new beginning of sorts. Its simplicity makes easier the effort to craft a presentation, so that’s the reason behind many users opting for classical white-predominant themes.

Negatively speaking, white can evoke bad feelings for those who have photophobia (intolerance to harsh lights) due to its striking contrast. Remember the recommendation above for not using pure 100% lightness in the white text? The same applies here for backgrounds unless you have a keen desire to hurt the spectators’ eyesight. Lower the value of white to 80-90% if your presentation is going to be purely white-based, and use 100% lightness for accent details if you prefer.

Pure white can also be perceived as dull, so pairing it with another hue is necessary for specific industries for quality presentation design.

Silver or gray (depending on whether it resembles a metallic look) is a color of grace and modernity. It transmits a message of a change of direction, as light can bounce off it. Hence, professionals use it not just for technological aspects but also mental health as you feel all mental blocks are getting lifted.

It is a color often associated with wealth – its direct relationship with the silver metal – and thanks to being shiny, clean, and alluring, it is associated with everything modern and hi-tech. 

Whereas it can be seen as a perfectly balanced color, it can easily be misused and fall under the bland side of the color spectrum. Melancholy and loneliness are negative feelings sometimes associated due to the lack of a prominent hue on them. Don’t be fooled by such a statement as there aren’t two equal grays in the world: put two gray color samples side by side, and you’ll notice the subtle differences in hue.

It is a color that dignifies, speaks of maturity, and a well-organized scenario. The corporate world uses this color in almost every scenario without even relating that embedded message, and at the same time, it reinforces the meaning. 

In color psychology, the primary colors are the ones that transmit the most powerful messages. Red conveys the fiery energy that fuels power and confidence. It is a color with a duality no other hue can express, and we will analyze why.

On a positive note, red is associated with love and passion. The image of a woman wearing a red dress or holding a red bottle of perfume not just seeks to evoke passion but to present the woman as a confident person, capable of making her own choices to shape her future. She is the coveted element of desire, not by her sex but by the ideal of power she can transmit. 

Traditionally, red is the color of power in cultural scenarios. The Academy Awards attendants and nominees walk over the “red carpet.” Political parties use the color red for their logos. Anyone who sees the color red can instantly associate with the brand Ferrari and their Cavallino Rampante logo. 

Physiologically, red is powerful enough to produce these physical effects:

• Elevate blood pressure
• Enhance metabolic rate
• Increase heart rate
• Induce hyperventilation
• Increase appetite

That’s why using red is not something to take for granted. Abusing the usage of red in a presentation can cause discomfort, whereas proper usage of red makes it engaging and dynamic. Remember that red is also the color used for signage in the case of “danger,” “stop,” “fire,” and several other negative connotations.

Be cautious when using pure red as your dominant color. Sometimes it’s best to play it safer and opt for a shade or a tint not so predominant in the message.

Blue is a color that instantly uplifts productivity. Commonly found in nature as in the daytime sky or water, it inspires serenity in the spectator, building confidence to become more productive. 

One of the reasons blue is so commonly used in designs is because it’s felt as something conservative. Like you cannot go wrong when using blue or pairing blue with another color. That’s another sign of how much of an intense presence blue has in our daily life that we feel natural to pair blue with another hue. 

As one of the primary colors, blue creates a strong feeling of stability and safety. Businesses, banking institutions, and health centers use blue to transmit their values of professionalism and trustworthiness. Psychologically, blue has the opposite effect to red regarding pulse rate, so it’s not unusual to find blue hues in offices requiring much concentration time. 

Negatively, blue is associated with sadness, as in the common saying “feeling blue.” Pure blue schemes can seem detached to some audiences; therefore, opt for a Split Complement , Analogous , or Rectangle color scheme to make it look attention-grabbing. Some schemes pairing blue shades with ochre, brown, or orange can transmit the message of luxury when done with subtlety. 

As the final primary color, it’s bright and intense, becoming one of its main usages as an attention-grabber. In general guidelines, we must not overuse yellow as a color in designs since it quickly builds visual fatigue. Physiologically, that has been related to the amount of lighting it emits in comparison with other colors (hence, its similar performance to white in cases of photophobia). However, we must not forget yellow can also increase the metabolic rate.

Yellow can get perception dualities as we’ve seen with red: some people find it cheerful, inspiring happiness and energy (e.g., SpongeBob SquarePants character), and others perceive it as absolutely annoying. That’s due to the attention-grabbing factor, so we must apply it carefully in presentation design.

Due to it being a stimulating color, we would recommend using tints of yellow as background color if yellow is a must. Avoid pure yellow at all costs. Some people interpret the yellow color as aggressive, and your presentation conveys the wrong message. Psychologically, it has been studied that conceited people prefer yellow color , whereas introverts react negatively to it. Instead, use a color scheme that pairs yellow with a less dramatic color, and apply yellow as the accent color of your scheme.

Is there any other instant connotation for green besides nature, outdoors, and ecology? Green is distinguished as a refreshing color and associated with health and eco-friendly practices.

As a combination of the steady blue and the happiness-booster yellow, green mellows the soul, taking us to a relaxing atmosphere. This is why designers create “green spaces” inside office buildings – becoming critical in dense capital cities with limited outdoor places to unplug from work. 

Historically, humanity has associated green with different values:

• Money : Currency bills, such as the US dollar.
• Health : There are cultural associations of the color green with fertility, eating healthy, the agricultural industry, and living stress-free.
• Nature : The outdoors, green energy, eco-friendly organizations.
• Luck : A four-leaf clover, casinos, winning.

On the other hand, there’s the common saying that one can be “green with envy”, or relate to motion-sickness. Thankfully, that’s not the message green transmits when used in the design.

Before applying green to your slides, remember it’s not the same message you send when using an olive green (that speaks of elegance and earthiness) as when using an aqua green (freshness, sports). Be mindful when picking the green hue and research its own meaning before using the color because you just like it.

Although this color is associated with feminist movements these days, purple historically speaks of wisdom and creativity. It has an embedded message of ambition due to its cultural references to royalty and the clergy. You may ask yourself why if black is associated with the luxurious, we say that purple is the color of royalty. Well, the answer to that question we have to speak about a dye named Tyrian purple , with an insanely costly procedure that only allowed the extremely wealthy population to wear clothes in that color.

Changing perspectives, we can speak of the purple color from a creative aspect as a color that boosts inspiration. Its link to spirituality is well-documented, and one of its most controversial usages is the work of artist Francis Bacon in Study after Velázquez’s Portrait of Pope Innocent X . Also, purple is a color associated with courage. The Purple Heart medal is a military decoration of the United States awarded in the name of the US President to those wounded or killed during service. 

The shades of purple can evoke exotic perceptions, from wine to delicate flowers such as orchids to precious gemstones such as Amethyst. 

Since it’s not a color felt as natural by humans, we can create vibrant presentations on different topics that take the user away from conventionalism. 

Brown is a color commonly used for outdoor adventures or to introduce all-terrain experiences in isolated places. Being the color usually associated with earth, it’s not a surprise to find the values of strength and reliability linked to the color brown, even if it’s not a color easy to manage as it leans towards both orange and yellow. 

Warmth, comfort, and security are feelings transmitted by the color brown for its close relationship with nature. That could explain why security firms opt to include brown in their branding strategies and pair it with black to enforce the importance of “securing the valuables.” 

To apply it in presentation design, it is a color that must be balanced in a complementary or split complementary scheme, preferably with a blue tint. Orange can bring far too much energy to the scene, so use the combination of brown + orange with caution (the same rules apply with brown + yellow).

Depending on where its hue leans, we can say orange can be an uplifting color on an extremely attention-seeking one. The strong-red oranges are used for attention, such as in signage, whereas yellow-orange speaks of happiness, of being carefree. The “ideal” orange – such as the one in the photo above – is a color that transmits the feeling of energy, leading parcel delivery companies to use it for their marketing strategies. 

As a highly energetic color, it’s often found in uniforms for sports, mascots, energy drinks, etc. People associate orange with summer and autumn: spectacular sunsets, orange juice, flowers, and so on. For the Asiatic culture, orange is a spiritual color that speaks of meditation, leaving materialism behind and Buddha. For Americans, orange is linked to Thanksgiving and Halloween. 

Thankfully, orange is a color easy to pair in most scenarios as it blends with a multitude of colors. Still, we recommend it to mute the pure orange, opting for a sophisticated shade of it and leaving the intense orange hues as accent colors. 

Last but not least, we will speak about the pink color. It is a color associated with the feeling of kindness, love, and femininity. A broad range of shades transmits different messages: whereas pastel pinks can evoke tenderness, a vibrant shade of pink such as magenta can be observed as aggressive by some audiences. 

Joyful, pink is a girly tone that makes you feel integrated. As if you achieved your most desired dreams and you celebrate the outcome surrounded by your loved ones. For artists, it is a vibrant color that contrasts with often “dull” colors such as gray and black for interesting composition values.

If you can look aside the simplistic “girl” color concept, it’s a refreshing color that instantly takes people to a feeling of inspiration and renewal. 

Case studies for color theory

In this final section of the article, we will use four different case studies to explain why some color selections are made in regard to sending the viewer a message with the presentation. Please keep in mind that most presentation templates are fully editable; therefore, if you love a design, but you don’t feel comfortable with its color range, you can change the color palette for ppt presentation by making a custom theme in PowerPoint .

This first case study involves a medium-sized company that seeks to automatize its candidate selection process for the HR department through AI technology. As not every single member in the managerial area is convinced about this idea, the HR department prepared what’s known as a force field analysis presentation . 

Thanks to the force field analysis model, the HR department presents the initiative, its driving forces (being the Pros of the initiative), and the restraining forces (the cons of this initiative) are easy to identify and represent with the help of a force field analysis slide template .

In a Complementary color scheme, the elements that weigh on the decision are represented in two colors: sapphire blue for the driving forces and orange-red to expose the restraining forces. Since we talk about something corporative, the same sapphire blue was used for the initiative area, not influencing the palette with another color.

Conducting the analysis from a color psychology perspective, the orange-red is attention-grabbing enough for people not to ignore the cons that this project can experience over time, whilst also reflecting an energetic resistance to change. Sapphire blue, on the other hand, speaks of professionalism. Of trusting the process in the decision to make since it’s time to move on and pursue bigger horizons – and the current selection process for new personnel is both time-demanding and often not tailored for certain departments.

In our second case study, a waste management company is visiting potential customers to offer their services whilst also educating company owners on the importance of treating production waste with the care it requires. 

This next slide introduces the ecology of waste management, in which, depending on the original materials, there are multiple methods to repurpose waste rather than piling it up in open outdoor spaces.  

The waste management presentation template used features a Monochrome color scheme in shades and tones of green. The greens used are not also randomly selected:

• Dark green used in the title and accent effects speaks of the fact that waste can be repurposed into money, and that fact can easily become a driving force for customers to change their waste management policies.
• Bright green in the accent sections and number of slides refers to rebirth. Of giving new life to what’s considered decay.
• Pale green in the cogwheels and placeholder text percentages is a symbol of peace. Remembers the audience that being mindful about the final destination of our production processes is part of having a corporate social responsibility.
• Mint green is a signal for refreshment. Of lifting taxing decisions and outsourcing from people knowledgeable in the subject.

With this case study, you can appreciate how slide color schemes can reinforce the message to transmit without filler words.

The next case study to analyze comes from a group of young software developers presenting their skills to a customer for a web design project. Despite not having a large trajectory in the industry, their team is well-balanced between experienced developers and creative designers to meet the demands of their clients.

This programming presentation template is the chosen asset to introduce their services visually compellingly while also listing their project portfolio.

A fine example of a Split Complementary color scheme, no doubt. The color selected was yellow-red, using blue and violet as the other two colors that made up this scheme. Since yellow is far too intense, it’s left as the accent color for some sections, and the background is a darker blue leaning towards blue-violet. The vector images follow suit by combining the colors selected in the palette, using gradients and lighter tints. 

The question becomes now: what about the aqua tone? Sometimes, designers can combine color schemes inside a design to balance the overall composition. Since yellow would be too much attention-grabbing, and the presence of blues and violets is covered, there is a secondary usage of the Analogous color scheme, opting for a tint of the blue-green next to the blue color. The discrete way in which it was used brings life to the image and centers the vision in the placeholder text area. 

To conclude this guide, it is essential to answer a common question: how do I pick the colors for my slide design project?

For some people, inspiration about a word, a concept, or a product to present directly leads to the color selection of the main color – or at least an indicator of which hue would work best. Then, the selected color scheme helps to build up the entire color palette for the presentation. In some other cases, an image can become the leading source of inspiration. That’s the reason why you should check tools such as Design Seeds’ Instagram Profile or even Pinterest. 

Online tools can help us easily come up with good colors for presentations. Some recommendations for this are Coolors or COLOURlovers . Although… what if you already got inspiration from a presentation you attended but don’t know which colors were used? This incredible tool may cheer you up: Site Palette , a Google Chrome extension that gives you the entire list of colors used, with their HEX values to reproduce them in your designs.

Check out our complete tutorial on how to make a PowerPoint Presentation .

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8 tips to make the best powerpoint presentations.

Want to make your PowerPoint presentations really shine? Here's how to impress and engage your audience.

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Table of contents, start with a goal, less is more, consider your typeface, make bullet points count, limit the use of transitions, skip text where possible, think in color, take a look from the top down, bonus: start with templates.

Slideshows are an intuitive way to share complex ideas with an audience, although they're dull and frustrating when poorly executed. Here are some tips to make your Microsoft PowerPoint presentations sing while avoiding common pitfalls.

It all starts with identifying what we're trying to achieve with the presentation. Is it informative, a showcase of data in an easy-to-understand medium? Or is it more of a pitch, something meant to persuade and convince an audience and lead them to a particular outcome?

It's here where the majority of these presentations go wrong with the inability to identify the talking points that best support our goal. Always start with a goal in mind: to entertain, to inform, or to share data in a way that's easy to understand. Use facts, figures, and images to support your conclusion while keeping structure in mind (Where are we now and where are we going?).

I've found that it's helpful to start with the ending. Once I know how to end a presentation, I know how best to get to that point. I start by identifying the takeaway---that one nugget that I want to implant before thanking everyone for their time---and I work in reverse to figure out how best to get there.

Your mileage, of course, may vary. But it's always going to be a good idea to put in the time in the beginning stages so that you aren't reworking large portions of the presentation later. And that starts with a defined goal.

A slideshow isn't supposed to include everything. It's an introduction to a topic, one that we can elaborate on with speech. Anything unnecessary is a distraction. It makes the presentation less visually appealing and less interesting, and it makes you look bad as a presenter.

This goes for text as well as images. There's nothing worse, in fact, than a series of slides where the presenter just reads them as they appear. Your audience is capable of reading, and chances are they'll be done with the slide, and browsing Reddit, long before you finish. Avoid putting the literal text on the screen, and your audience will thank you.

Related: How to Burn Your PowerPoint to DVD

Right off the bat, we're just going to come out and say that Papyrus and Comic Sans should be banned from all PowerPoint presentations, permanently. Beyond that, it's worth considering the typeface you're using and what it's saying about you, the presenter, and the presentation itself.

Consider choosing readability over aesthetics, and avoid fancy fonts that could prove to be more of a distraction than anything else. A good presentation needs two fonts: a serif and sans-serif. Use one for the headlines and one for body text, lists, and the like. Keep it simple. Veranda, Helvetica, Arial, and even Times New Roman are safe choices. Stick with the classics and it's hard to botch this one too badly.

There reaches a point where bullet points become less of a visual aid and more of a visual examination.

Bullet points should support the speaker, not overwhelm his audience. The best slides have little or no text at all, in fact. As a presenter, it's our job to talk through complex issues, but that doesn't mean that we need to highlight every talking point.

Instead, think about how you can break up large lists into three or four bullet points. Carefully consider whether you need to use more bullet points, or if you can combine multiple topics into a single point instead. And if you can't, remember that there's no one limiting the number of slides you can have in a presentation. It's always possible to break a list of 12 points down into three pages of four points each.

Animation, when used correctly, is a good idea. It breaks up slow-moving parts of a presentation and adds action to elements that require it. But it should be used judiciously.

Adding a transition that wipes left to right between every slide or that animates each bullet point in a list, for example, starts to grow taxing on those forced to endure the presentation. Viewers get bored quickly, and animations that are meant to highlight specific elements quickly become taxing.

That's not to say that you can't use animations and transitions, just that you need to pick your spots. Aim for no more than a handful of these transitions for each presentation. And use them in spots where they'll add to the demonstration, not detract from it.

Sometimes images tell a better story than text can. And as a presenter, your goal is to describe points in detail without making users do a lot of reading. In these cases, a well-designed visual, like a chart, might better convey the information you're trying to share.

The right image adds visual appeal and serves to break up longer, text-heavy sections of the presentation---but only if you're using the right images. A single high-quality image can make all the difference between a success and a dud when you're driving a specific point home.

When considering text, don't think solely in terms of bullet points and paragraphs. Tables, for example, are often unnecessary. Ask yourself whether you could present the same data in a bar or line chart instead.

Color is interesting. It evokes certain feelings and adds visual appeal to your presentation as a whole. Studies show that color also improves interest, comprehension, and retention. It should be a careful consideration, not an afterthought.

You don't have to be a graphic designer to use color well in a presentation. What I do is look for palettes I like, and then find ways to use them in the presentation. There are a number of tools for this, like Adobe Color , Coolors , and ColorHunt , just to name a few. After finding a palette you enjoy, consider how it works with the presentation you're about to give. Pastels, for example, evoke feelings of freedom and light, so they probably aren't the best choice when you're presenting quarterly earnings that missed the mark.

It's also worth mentioning that you don't need to use every color in the palette. Often, you can get by with just two or three, though you should really think through how they all work together and how readable they'll be when layered. A simple rule of thumb here is that contrast is your friend. Dark colors work well on light backgrounds, and light colors work best on dark backgrounds.

Spend some time in the Slide Sorter before you finish your presentation. By clicking the four squares at the bottom left of the presentation, you can take a look at multiple slides at once and consider how each works together. Alternatively, you can click "View" on the ribbon and select "Slide Sorter."

Are you presenting too much text at once? Move an image in. Could a series of slides benefit from a chart or summary before you move on to another point?

It's here that we have the opportunity to view the presentation from beyond the single-slide viewpoint and think in terms of how each slide fits, or if it fits at all. From this view, you can rearrange slides, add additional ones, or delete them entirely if you find that they don't advance the presentation.

The difference between a good presentation and a bad one is really all about preparation and execution. Those that respect the process and plan carefully---not only the presentation as a whole, but each slide within it---are the ones who will succeed.

This brings me to my last (half) point: When in doubt, just buy a template and use it. You can find these all over the web, though Creative Market and GraphicRiver are probably the two most popular marketplaces for this kind of thing. Not all of us are blessed with the skills needed to design and deliver an effective presentation. And while a pre-made PowerPoint template isn't going to make you a better presenter, it will ease the anxiety of creating a visually appealing slide deck.

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15 Clever Color Combinations that Make Your Presentation Professional

Cool colors, warm colors, other sources used.

Presentations have been used wherever people convey ideas, present projects, and propose innovations. They have existed since Microsoft’s creation in 1987. PowerPoint presentations have changed the game in which business is conducted. It has also become a more powerful tool for teachers, professors, instructors, and even young kids attempting to convince their parents to get them a pet dog. No matter which PowerPoint templates you may be using, it's essential that you use them correctly.

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PLOS ONE released an essay of a study they completed that tested the Goldilocks Principle , which is quite simply the idea that a “psychological well-being” can be reached when an equilibrium of complexity and simplicity is met. This can go together with the attractiveness of a person’s outer appearance or for example, a presentation. PLOS ONE tested this theory with colors in fashion, attempting to display that people did, in fact, shied away from clothing that matched almost identically and also, clothes that clashed with one another completely. The same idea can be applied when making a presentation that will ‘wow!’ an audience: find the “ Golden Equilibrium .”

Also, keep in mind what tone you want to set for your viewers. Ask yourself such questions as: Am I presenting a new idea and need to win over my superiors? Or am I merely wanting to up my game when displaying notes for my students? Think about content: am I talking about biology, economics, or Roman history? Colors have a fantastic way of conveying a setting. To break it down into an easier fashion, there are two types of categories in which all colors are separated into warm and cool, except the neutrals (white, black, and gray). With that, here are fifteen warm and five cool, clever color combinations you might want to try for your next presentation.

You can also browse for more options and play around with our free PowerPoint presentations and PowerPoint templates . They are a good way to learn how to edit and work with such designs, change the color schemes, and convey your thoughts to the viewer with visual content.

Cool colors range anywhere from solid greens to fuschia pinks and give off a calm and relaxed impression. Blue and green dominate this group but don’t be fooled. Blue represents intelligence, strength, and importance, while green aids with signs of health, the environment, and harmony. Purple ends the spectrum of calm colors, signifies royalty, and can make a bold statement if used correctly.

Must-Have Powerpoint Color Themes

Surprise your audience with creative and professional infographic templates, designed by a young team from Bangladesh called PixWork . With more than 2000+ unique compatible files for PowerPoint, Keynote, and Illustrator, it suits to various areas like:

• Business Presentations;
• Commercial Branding;
• Online Advertising;
• Business Plan;
• Social media;
• Real Estate and Construction;
• Portfolio and Photography;
• Educational;
• Health Industry;
• Sports Purposes;
• The hospitality industry, etc.

Main Features of PowerPoint color themes cover:

• ILLUSTRATOR, POWERPOINT, and KEYNOTE functionality;
• infographics presented in Pptx, Key, Eps, and Ai;
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• Dark and bright version is available;
• It is fully resizable and editable, including text, numbers, icons, colors, gradients and effects, photos, logo, etc.;
• 16x9 Aspect Ratio for PPTX and Key available;
• The template includes Font Icons and Vector Icons;
• It has a master slide layout and drag & drop photo menu.

For PowerPoint and Keynote, this Bundle contains Supper Set, PowerInfo, Amazing Set, Business Set, SpecificMaster, MultiUse Set, and Bonus Slides & Icons. For Illustrator, utilize our well-structured AmazingSet, BusinessSet, TheHugeSet, and 3ConecptPack. 

SAVE 98% and get it only for $19! In comparison, if you purchase each infographic separately, you will have to pay $800+.

Read our PixWork Graphic Designer interview for some great pieces of advice on how to become a professional web developer.

2021 Pitch Deck

It’s another stylish option for your perfect presentation. It is ideal for art projects, exhibition announcements, and online gallery planning, as here you have an opportunity to place your masterpieces in the pre-made placeholders. 

Be Presentation

Are you looking for a gentle, minimalistic design to emphasize your modern art view? Congratulations! You have found the template that will make your project sparkle. Here you can see a soft color palette that looks stylish, eye-catching, and will grab your client’s attention at first sight. 

This template is an amazing option for beauty & fashion industry companies. It has pastel shades, modern image placeholders, fancy accurate fonts. In a word, everything that depicts the contemporary approach to the business and art. You can replace the demo data with yours in a few clicks due to a user-friendly interface and drag & drop feature.

The coffee color scheme of the Mezzanine makes this template look warm and cozy. It has a clear layout, elegant image blocks, fancy fonts, and an overall look and feel. It is suitable for interior and exterior designers, furniture suppliers, and home decor providers. You can share the details about your offers, show team members and the latest statistics with the handy in-built tools.

Roemah - Furniture & Home Decoration

This layout is a top solution for a resume or portfolio creation. It has a calm and stylish cold color scheme, which attracts the viewers. Due to the various slide designs and their excellent structure, you can organize your speech’s flow, prepare the necessary data, represent all the aspects of your business in a trendy manner. 

This variant is a great solution for art and photo studios. You can paste your works in stylish geometric frames and emphasize the most valuable information with harmoniously arranged blocks. It breathes with creativity so that there is no doubt your customers will love it at first glance. 

Melissa is a calm and elegant PowerPoint template with a soft green color palette. It’s easy to show your brand, team, roadmap and attract new clients with well-structured slide layouts. It will be a great choice for fashion studios, stylists, and beauty specialists. 

First Goal - PowerPoint

For $18, this slick but bold blue template could be the turning point for your presentation. It utilizes different shades of blue to hit off a cool but important look. It agrees with Goldilocks’ Principle by making sure the colors complement each other. This template also gives you the ability to efficiently break down your topics of choice while also still looking visually pleasing and organized.

Mockingbird Pitch Desk Pro - PowerPoint Presentations

This theme is an excellent example of using a wave of cool colors to express different tones. It uses a cool yellow, with a hint of green in it, and a solid green and blue to ground the visual look. Because of its wide range of color, any topic can be used on these types of slides. It will be sure to carry over a sophisticated look of significance and importance.

Minimalis - PowerPoint Presentations

This is a beautiful cool color scheme template. It incorporates coordinating blue, green, and cyan shades to each slide in a minimalistic but professional format. It can be best used for business, statistics, or a collection of facts of any sort. Perfect for a first-day lecture as well.

Multi Profit Financial Company PowerPoint Presentations

This is the best look for any presentation you might encounter. This Business Plan template offers a simple but refreshing PowerPoint look with a monochromatic scheme. Don’t gloss it over though. Blue is a beautiful color that aids each slide in presenting your notes and information to the best of its ability.

21 Easy Tips To Create A Powerful Presentation For Your Business [Free Ebook]

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Warm colors include anything from red-violet to a primary, bold yellow. Red is a wildly identifiable color that represents love, passion, heat, joy, importance, and power. Yellows and pinks aid the scheme with playful, romantic, cheerful, and delicate shades for a more intimate and positive transformation to a PowerPoint. Orange can also be used to give an energizing or a warm tone to a slideshow possibly about health.

Infographic Pack

This option has a light and dark warm shades. Their combination looks harmoniously, makes it unusual and easy to perceive simultaneously. You can place all the necessary info regarding your company or startup, including statistics, team members, roadmap, and charts.

Danz Creative

Neon style is in great demand among artists, as it is one of the leading trends nowadays. It is catchy, bright, and vivid. It is a perfect match for music producers, designers, and photographers, as this option has everything you need to represent your services at their best.

Another pretty design for the corporate solutions. It has a greyish monotonous color scheme with bright accents. That is why it is easy to highlight the most important information, concentrate the viewer’s attention on these details. You can use it to present your new company project, make reports and collect statistics. 

Provision Creative PowerPoint Presentations

This is a great, bold presentation template that can be best used when presenting new ideas to a group of people. It uses red as a ground color base for the entire slideshow and utilizes black, white, and gray neutrals as aids.

Food Vintage PowerPoint Presentations

This beautiful orange template is great for people needing to showcase a portfolio containing a lot of pictures. The warm monochromatic color scheme gives off a beautiful, comfortable, and inviting tone to the presentation that showcases its contents off in the best way.

Layer Infographic PowerPoint Presentations

This colorful template gives you easy and simplistic access to displaying quick facts and information. Although it contains blues, greens, and some dark colors, its professional layout gives off a more warm and bold visual rather than something more relaxed, which cool colors are known for.

Miracle PowerPoint Template

This is a drop-dead gorgeous template that incorporates sunset colors of pink, orange, and red over neutral, black and white backdrops for a stunning display. Its formatting and typefaces are minimalistic to give your presentation that extra dash of elegance.

Creative Business - PowerPoint Presentations

This darker shade of fuschia, combined with other glorious shades of pink, complete this utopian PowerPoint presentation template. No sharp edges or intense graphics come with this specific choice found in TemplateMonster. It is all one slick, continuous PowerPoint that can be used with any topic of discussion and brings another level of professionalism to the table.

Gray, Kurt, et al. “ The Science of Style: In Fashion, Colors Should Match Only Moderately .” PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science.

Bear, Jacci Howard. “ A Designer's Guide to Understanding Colors .” ThoughtCo, 8 Aug. 2017.

TOP PowerPoint Templates 2020

Free and premium powerpoint templates faq.

A PowerPoint presentation is a presentation created using Microsoft PowerPoint software. The presentation is a collection of individual slides that contain information on a topic. PowerPoint presentations are commonly used in business meetings and for training and educational purposes.

A template is a design scheme (colors, fonts, and so on) plus some content for a specific purpose—such as a sales presentation, a business plan, or a classroom lesson. You can choose from a number of PowerPoint templates made in WARM COLORS and COOL COLORS .

There is lots of website on the web for cool and free PowerPoint Template. One of them is TemplateMonster and a growing selection of templates made in different styles and for different purposes.

You can bring a more remarkable design to your project using Food Vintage PowerPoint Template , Miracle PowerPoint Template or other kinds of creative ready-made presentation templates. PowerPoint lets you enhance your presentation with animations, cool transition effects, and beautiful custom-made illustrations.

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An experienced marketing specialist, traveler, and lifestyle blogger. In the rapidly changing and constantly growing digital world, it's important to keep an eye on innovations in the field. Follow me on Quora and Facebook for the latest updates.

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How to Make a “Good” Presentation “Great”

• Guy Kawasaki

Remember: Less is more.

A strong presentation is so much more than information pasted onto a series of slides with fancy backgrounds. Whether you’re pitching an idea, reporting market research, or sharing something else, a great presentation can give you a competitive advantage, and be a powerful tool when aiming to persuade, educate, or inspire others. Here are some unique elements that make a presentation stand out.

• Fonts: Sans Serif fonts such as Helvetica or Arial are preferred for their clean lines, which make them easy to digest at various sizes and distances. Limit the number of font styles to two: one for headings and another for body text, to avoid visual confusion or distractions.
• Colors: Colors can evoke emotions and highlight critical points, but their overuse can lead to a cluttered and confusing presentation. A limited palette of two to three main colors, complemented by a simple background, can help you draw attention to key elements without overwhelming the audience.
• Pictures: Pictures can communicate complex ideas quickly and memorably but choosing the right images is key. Images or pictures should be big (perhaps 20-25% of the page), bold, and have a clear purpose that complements the slide’s text.
• Layout: Don’t overcrowd your slides with too much information. When in doubt, adhere to the principle of simplicity, and aim for a clean and uncluttered layout with plenty of white space around text and images. Think phrases and bullets, not sentences.

As an intern or early career professional, chances are that you’ll be tasked with making or giving a presentation in the near future. Whether you’re pitching an idea, reporting market research, or sharing something else, a great presentation can give you a competitive advantage, and be a powerful tool when aiming to persuade, educate, or inspire others.

• Guy Kawasaki is the chief evangelist at Canva and was the former chief evangelist at Apple. Guy is the author of 16 books including Think Remarkable : 9 Paths to Transform Your Life and Make a Difference.

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The best Google Slides and Powerpoint presentation templates

Here's a selection of the best free & premium google slides themes and powerpoint presentation templates from the previous month. these designs were the most popular among our users, so download them now, the best presentations from april.

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World Environment Day

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Minimal Charm

Are you looking for a monochromatic theme that is interesting at the same time? How about using a simple and clean theme, along with black-and-white pictures, to convey business or corporate content in a professional way?

Futuristic Background

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Elegant Bachelor Thesis

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Fantasy Cloud Sky Theme

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Generation of '27

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Cute Doodle Gifs Lesson

Transform your classroom into a creative and fun environment with this template full of gifs! Great for all ages, this gifs lesson is designed to help students express their creativity and explore their artistic side. With gifs featuring cute doodles and creative visuals, students can learn anything in an easy...

Elegant Black & White Thesis Defense

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Chalkboard Background

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Minimalist Korean Aesthetic Pitch Deck

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Clinical Case 04-2023

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Engineering Project Proposal

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