Export from Illustrator to PowerPoint

UPDATE

This post was written in 2015. It’s now possible to import SVG directly into PowerPoint (office 365, PowerPoint 2016)

Export your artwork from Illustrator as SVG. See this article to find out how

Go to the insert tab, click Pictures

Find your SVG file and click Open

OLD POST

Just a really quick one about getting artwork from Adobe Illustrator into PowerPoint as vector artwork.

We are asked to review lots of presentations and PowerPoint templates for our clients and often see artwork that probably originated in Illustrator placed into PowerPoint as an image (logos and line drawings for example). It’s not immediately obvious that you can import artwork as a vector into PowerPoint. Using a vector format when possible means that your artwork stays sharp when it’s scaled up or when viewed on a high resolution device.

How to export from Illustrator for us in PowerPoint
Office applications use the Enhanced MetaFile (.EMF) for vector files – In illustrator simply go to

File > Export > Enhanced MetaFile.

Save your document. The file will be visible in PowerPoint from;

Picture > Insert

Have a look at your artwork, it stays sharp when you scale it. Using this method will also reduce the file size of your PPT if you have a lot of items in illustrator that you want to use in your PowerPoint presentation – useful if you intend to email it.

If the colours of your artwork don’t look quite as you expected make sure that your color settings in Illustrator are the same as these.

Working Spaces
RGB: sRGB

Color Management Policies
Convert to Working Spaces

illustrator sRGB

PowerPoint uses the sRGB colour model so it’s important that Illustrator is using this too otherwise the colours could look less saturated than the Illustrator version.

If you have some vector artwork (.ai or .eps .svg) that you would like to use in PowerPoint but don’t own a copy of illustrator you could try Inkscape which is a free (open source) alternative to Adobe Illustrator.

httpss://inkscape.org/