Often times during PowerPoint presentations you might want to share video and audio clips. Doing this means you have to get out of your presentation, find the video file, play it, then get back into your presentation and find the slide you were last on. But what if you could play movie clips and sound files from within your presentation?

If you have these files on your computer, you can!

Note: You can only put some types of audio and video files in PowerPoint presentations. Audio files need to be .aiff, .au, .mid or .midi, .mp3, .wav, or .wma. Video files need to be .swf, .asf, .avi, .mpg or .mpeg, or .wmv. You can insert YouTube videos using the Video from a Web Site option and the old embed code (using tags) or by downloading the video onto your computer in a format PowerPoint will accept.
 

Step 1: Put all your files in one place

Media files inserted into PowerPoint presentations are linked. Put all your files into a folder. If you need to take your presentation with you (such as on a flash drive) or need to e-mail it to someone, send the entire folder with all the files, or else the media files will not play in the PowerPoint.

Step 2: Create a new PowerPoint presentation

Create your PowerPoint presentation as you normally would, but leave extra space on slides for media files or insert separate slides for them.

Step 3: Insert media files.

Go to the slide(s) where you want to insert media files.

Go to the Insert tab.

Find the Media Clips group.

Click either the Movie or Sound icon. Find the file you want to insert and click OK. If a dialog box appears, select When Clicked.

Video files will appear as boxes, which you can resize and move about. Audio files will appear as a sound icon, which you can also move about. When you click on an inserted media icon, you will see a new Video Tools or Audio Tools tab on the Ribbon, which you can use to customize the playback of your media.

Step 4: Play media files

Always test your PowerPoint to make sure that the media files are working properly. View your PowerPoint as a slideshow and click on each media file you inserted to make sure that it plays.