Keep Source Formatting Not Working

Question

Good morning,

I hope someone can help me with a very frustrating issue. I work in events and often have to merge various PowerPoint presentations into one master file. I am trying to merge one PowerPoint file into my Master Template, however the "Keep Source Formatting" is not working. The formatting is also not staying true to the original even if I insert the file directly from my computer via the 'Reuse Slides' function.

The slide sizes in each file are 16:9. My PowerPoint version is 16.106.3

Here is how the slides look in the original PowerPoint file:

And here is how the slides look when I copy-paste with Source Formatting into my Master file:

Any help will be greatly appreciated!

Answer 1

Hello Rachel M,

Thank you for posting your question in the Microsoft Q&A forum!

I understand that you are having issue with "Keep Source Formatting" not working on MacOS. I truly understand how you feel. Let me assist you further.

With your situation, I suggest you try this:

1. Manually import the source Slide Master

This forces PowerPoint to respect the original formatting.

• Open both presentations
• In the source file:
• Go to View > Slide Master
• Select the top (largest) master slide
• Copy that master
• Switch to the destination (Master Template) file
• Go to View > Slide Master
• Paste the copied master at the end
• Return to Normal view
• Copy slides again
• For pasted slides: Home > Layout > select the source layout

Result: Fonts, spacing, background, positioning are preserved

2. Drag & drop slides between open decks

(Works better than Reuse Slides on Mac)

• Open both PPT files
• In the source deck, select slides in the thumbnail pane
• Drag them directly into the destination deck’s thumbnail pane
• When prompted, choose Keep Source Formatting

Often preserves layout better than Reuse Slides

3. Paste as Picture (only if layout must be exact)

Use only if slides are final and won’t be edited.

• Copy the slide
• Paste > Paste as Picture

I hope this will help with your situation. Please feel free to reach back if you have further update or more questions.

Best Regards,

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