Rich text formatting of Notes Pane should be visible in Normal View and Presenter View as well.
It would be nice to have richtext formatting also visible in the Notes pane in the Normal view. There actually are context-sensitive options to highlight text, change font size, use colors, but it is only visible in the Notes Page view. Currently, it is only bold and italic that is displayed in the Normal View.

18 comments
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Steve Bullman commented
So, if I choose 'outline view', right click a slide and select 'show text formatting' then colour a word, I can then highlight a word in notes using 'text highlight colour'. This shows up in presenter view too! Is this new?
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Ian Buckley commented
I can make my notes on word with highlights then copy it into the notes in my presentation and it works fine BUT why go thru that if you can turn on the ability to do it in Powerpoint?
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Anonymous commented
Yes! Would love colour, font, highlighting options for the note sections of PPT.
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Anonymous commented
Move cursor to the notes pane, then press and hold 'control' and use mouse track wheel to adjust text display size. Simples
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Anonymous commented
Move cursot to notes pane, then press and hold 'control' and use mouse traxck wheel to adjust size. Simples.
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Anonymous commented
Being able to save the layout of the presenter view (eg. no next slide so notes have a bigger area)
Currently presenter view is only limited to super basic font sizing at the least adding a numerical value to that so I could note it for specific presenters.
I would also like the ability to emphasize text with color and different font sizes as well as the current bold, underline, and italics. -
Anonymous commented
This does not work:
John Korchok commented · June 14, 2016 3:56 PM · Flag as inappropriate
You can already do this, although the method is not intuitive:
1. On the View tab, select Outline View.
2. Right-click on the Outline pane at the left side of your screen and choose Show Text Formatting. Now click in the Notes pane and set your font size. -
Anonymous commented
I'm visually impaired and I am also frustrated that the notes view in presentation mode can't be changed to a larger font size - the two options you have just don't quite cut it.
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Ute commented
I've seen other suggestions in this forum to improve Notes Master, so let me add another one. It might be time to enhance Notes Master, as there has not been much of a change during the last 20 years.
Please have the notes master follow the Design.
The first step would be to apply the same Design settings like Design Fonts and Design Colors (and Design Effects) to the Notes Master (and Handout Master as well) as soon as I apply a different Design to a presentation.
The second step should be the ability to add objects like additional placeholders or images to the Notes Master, that travel with the Design, if it is changed.
I created a set of PowerPoint templates for a large corporation that owns many brands. They apply a different Design to their presentations to use the same slides for their various brands. They asked me to insert a logo on the Notes Master, but refrained from this idea when they learned that the logo will not change when applying another Design. So objects on Notes Master (and Handout Master as well) should become part of the Design and change when another Design is applied. -
Anonymous commented
As an educator I would very much like to be able to highlight key things that I need to teach my end users. Also, while learning new applications it helps to be able to add notes in different colors directly to the power point notes section.
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GB Allen commented
With all the great formatting tools available in PPT, it's crazy that the notes pane is so dumb! Please add the ability to use formatting in notes. This would be so helpful for highlighting key words and organizing notes with bullets and indents. I'm kind of baffled as to why MS would leave this out when it is available in virtually every other part of MS Office.
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Brittany Musselman commented
Google slides has the ability to apply font colors and formatting in the notes. This makes it a great tool for taking notes for class without having to print the powerpoint presentation. This saves trees, money, and makes notes more portable. It is frustrating because I would like to be able to download the powerpoints and take notes on that so I could study off line too. However, the lack of font colors in the notes pane is so frustrating. My notes are full of color and it helps me keep certain things straight. Fixing this would make me utilize powerpoint instead of just google slides, and would make my life easier. & to the person that said you can do this, with the going to the view outline, right click, and do the show text formatting, this works for everything except font color, and that is one of the main things I need.
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Rodney Adhemar commented
What is the point of spending time and effort on a PowerPoint presentation and then the text format is not carried over to the slide show, presenter view, notes pane. Excellent presentation software let down by the lack of a feature necessary for a smooth professional delivery. Shame on you Microsoft..
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John Korchok commented
You can already do this, although the method is not intuitive:
1. On the View tab, select Outline View.
2. Right-click on the Outline pane at the left side of your screen and choose Show Text Formatting. Now click in the Notes pane and set your font size. -
Elad Avron commented
Yes, the notes on the notes pane is tiny and it hurts my eyes when I work on it.
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DealMkr commented
Agreed! Would love to see this carry through on Handouts as well. Use case - notes and handouts tend to be more detailed than the presentation itself. Would love to be able to format these notes for a reader versus viewer.
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Anonymous commented
Save trees! So many folks have to print their notes pages because they rely on text formatting and color coding. Please make this happen. Save a forest or two.
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Echo Swinford commented
When we insert notes in the notes pane, we can apply formatting (font size, font color, bold, underline, italics, etc.), and this formatting appears when we view or print Notes Pages.
Why does all of this formatting not appear in the notes pane, and, more importantly, why does it not appear in Presenter View. Bold, italics and underline appear.
Please make font size and color changes appear in the notes pane and in Presenter View.