Have you noticed that some changes just don’t feel like improvements?

Microsoft has announced that it is retiring PowerPoint’s much loved Reuse Slides feature. For anyone who builds presentations regularly, this is a real blow.

If you have never used it, Reuse Slides was one of those quiet, behind-the-scenes features that made life easier. It let you open a small panel in PowerPoint, browse another presentation, and pick out the exact slides you wanted. You could even choose to keep the original formatting.

It was perfect for keeping your company’s branding and layout consistent. It was a huge time saver, too. Instead of rebuilding every deck from scratch, teams could pull in existing slides from previous proposals, reports, or training materials. That kept things looking professional and saved hours of work.

But earlier this year, that convenience disappeared.

Microsoft says it removed Reuse Slides because there are duplicate ways to do the same thing. It no longer makes sense to maintain overlapping features. While that might be true, it is not much comfort for people who liked the simplicity of clicking one button and getting straight to work.

You can still reuse slides, but it takes an extra step or two. One easy way is to open both PowerPoint files at once and drag and drop slides between them. This usually keeps most formatting, animations, and media in place.

Another option is to go to View and select New Window, which opens a duplicate of your current deck. That is helpful if you want to work on a new version while keeping the original untouched.

These alternatives work, but they do not feel quite as seamless. Reuse Slides gave you more control, especially when you only needed a few slides from a larger deck. Drag and drop can work, but it is less precise and sometimes causes small formatting quirks that need to be fixed afterwards.

Still, change happens. Microsoft wants fewer overlapping features and a simpler experience, even if it means saying goodbye to some favorites.

If your business relies on PowerPoint for client presentations, sales decks, or internal training, make sure your team knows about this change. Help them get comfortable with drag and drop or the New Window trick to save time and confusion later.

And if you need help with this, or any other Microsoft change, feel free to reach out.