Speaker notes prompt
Good notes are what you’d say, not what’s already on the slide. These prompts get notes you can speak from.
Step by step: presenter view on a projector
- Extend your screen. Connect the projector or TV and set it to extend your desktop. Then open presenter view with the notes button beside Present.
- Open the audience window. Drag the audience window onto the projector and click it for full screen. The room sees only the slides.
- Present from your laptop. Keys, a clicker or your phone move both screens together. Press T to pause the timer, B for a black screen and Esc to end.
Notes for a new deck
Presenter Cue’s prompt asks for notes on every slide when Speaker notes is ticked. For longer notes, add to the topic line: “speaker notes of 4 to 6 sentences, conversational, with one example per slide”.
Notes for a deck you already have
Here is my presentation as JSON. Rewrite only the "notes" of every slide: 3 to 5 natural sentences I can say out loud, adding what isn’t on the slide (an example, a reason, a question for the audience). Keep everything else exactly the same and send the whole JSON back in one code block. [paste your deck’s JSON backup here]
Get the JSON from Download → Backup (.json), then open the answer with New → Open a .json file or paste it.
Reading your notes while you present
With Pro, presenter view shows your notes beside the current and next slide, and your phone remote shows them in your hand, with A− and A+ to change the size.
What good speaker notes look like
Speaker notes are not a script to read word for word. They are what you would say if a colleague asked “what does this slide mean?”: the reason behind the bullet, an example, a number to mention, a question for the audience. Three to five sentences is usually enough for a slide you talk over for about a minute.
Slide: “Late deliveries cost repeat customers”
Weak note: “Talk about late deliveries.”
Useful note: “When a delivery is late, the customer doesn’t blame the driver, they blame the shop. In our interviews, 7 of 10 shop owners said a late delivery had cost them a regular customer. Ask the room: how many of you have stopped ordering from somewhere after a late delivery?”
Using the notes while you present
- Presenter view (Pro) shows your notes, the next slide and the timer on your laptop while the audience sees only the slides.
- Your phone as the remote (Pro) shows the notes in large text that you can resize, so you can walk around.
- Practice: read the notes aloud once with the timer running. If a slide takes too long, shorten its note rather than talking faster.
Editing notes in the studio
Every slide has a notes box under the slide. Edit it directly, or paste a new answer from your assistant to replace all the notes at once. Notes are included in the JSON backup and in the speaker notes download (a text file you can print), but never on the slides themselves.
Questions
How long should speaker notes be?
About what you’d say in the time the slide is up: for a 1-minute slide, 100 to 150 words. Short notes with key phrases are easier to glance at than full paragraphs.
How long should speaker notes be?
Three to five sentences for a slide you talk over for about a minute. If a note is longer than you can glance at, split the slide or cut the note.
Can I add notes to a deck from PowerPoint?
Copy the slide text into your assistant with the Presenter Cue prompt to rebuild the deck with notes, then paste the answer into the studio.
Do notes appear in the PDF?
No. The PDF shows the slides only. Download the speaker notes separately as a text file.
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