How Many PowerPoint Slides Should You Have Per Minute of Your Presentation?
You’d think deciding how many slides to put in your PowerPoint might be the easiest part about creating a presentation, but it’s a question that many people ask. How many slides should you have for each minute of your presentation? How many minutes should you spend on each slide?
As we’ll soon see, getting the right answer to this question is easier said than done. But it’s also crucial. A presentation that has too many slides in a short amount of time can feel rushed and give your audience a sort of slide transition whiplash that leaves them feeling more confused than informed. A presentation that has too few slides can leave your audience lacking key details or context, as well as important visuals that might help them understand the content.
Is It True You Should Spend One Minute Per Slide?
A commonly held rule is that you should spend about one minute on each slide for your presentation. Some people extend this rule out to two minutes maximum. The reasoning behind this rule makes sense. You want to keep your presentation flowing and you don’t want to leave your audience with too much time staring at the same screen. To keep everyone’s brain activity up, you want to have well-timed slide changes and give plenty of context in your slides.
Where this rule fails, however, is that it is considered a rule to begin with. This one minute rule works much better as a general guideline. Like we said, the reasoning behind it makes sense, but treating it like a strict rule that absolutely must be followed to make a good presentation isn’t a good idea. The most important thing isn’t the quantity of slides, it’s the flow and engagement.
For example, let’s say you have 30 image-based slides that take 5 minutes to get through. If each slide has just one image, 5 minutes is probably plenty of time to look through them. You certainly wouldn’t want to follow the one minute rule by spending a full 30 minutes on them. Conversely, consider a situation where you have a detailed data-driven chart. One minute might not be enough time to discuss all the data points, making it understandable to spend 3, 4 or even 5 minutes on it.
How Many Minutes Per Slide (or How Many Slides Per Minute)?
But we don’t want to leave you here just as lost as when you arrived on this page. We can offer you some concrete recommendations as to how many slides you may want to include based on how long your presentation time is (or vice versa).
How Many Slides for a 30-Minute Presentation?
Recommended range: 20-40 slides
If this is a true presentation where you will do almost all of the talking for a full 30 minutes, then 20-40 slides is a good aiming point. For presentations where you expect a lot of question-and-answer or discussion, then fewer slides might be preferred.
How Many Slides for a 20-Minute Presentation?
Recommended range: 15-30 slides
A helpful tip for this length of presentation is to start on the higher side in terms of the number of slides. Then, you can cut out any that seem unnecessary as you’re practicing or consolidate them.
How Many Slides for a 15-Minute Presentation?
Recommended range: 10-20 slides
If ever there was a presentation where you were going to do fewer slides, it’s going to be for a short presentation that is 10-15 minutes. Try sticking to the main points of your message to ensure the most important details get covered in a short amount of time.
Factors That Influence How Many Slides to Have in Your PowerPoint
While the amount of time you have to deliver your presentation is one factor that will influence how many slides you should create, there are other factors to consider as well. For example, the type of presentation you are giving is one key factor that will determine how many slides you need.
For an informational presentation, may benefit from having fewer slides that allow for longer discussion periods. For persuasive presentations, like a sales pitch, a faster pace can be useful to break up the content into digestible fragments and keep your audience engaged.
You should also consider what form your content will take. Is it mostly text or are there a lot of visuals that will be important to the presentation. If there is a lot of visual content, then you can afford to have more slides. In this case, you want to avoid cramming too many key visuals into one slide, so feel free to spread them out into multiple slides.
Lastly, consider your own pace and presentation style. None of the recommendations we’ve shared here have to be strict rules that must be followed. You want your PowerPoint to be structured in a way that not only helps your audience but also helps you as a presenter.
Some presenters do best when there is a brisk and steady flow, meaning that breaking things out into more slides can be helpful. On the other hand, some presenters like to take the time to dwell on details, perhaps relying on storytelling to get their message across. Those types of individuals may need fewer slides to fit within the time constraints of their presentation. If you expect regular questions from your audience, that could also be a good reason to reduce the number of slides you put into your PowerPoint presentation.
It’s a lot to consider, and if you’re thinking to yourself that you don’t really have the time for all of this, you’re not alone. Slide planning and creation can be time-consuming and difficult. It’s why we made the Twistly add-in that allows you to use the AI from ChatGPT to make the slides for you in just a few minutes. If you’re interested, click below to give it a try. You’ll have the ability to tweak the presentation however you like, adding, consolidating or removing slides to fit within the time constraints of your presentation and your presenting style.