Google, known for its many services like Google Maps, its search engine, its Gmail box… also offers an office suite called Google Docs. Within it, there is Slides, or Google Presentations in French, which is the equivalent of Microsoft’s PowerPoint, but with the advantage of being available for free in the Google Docs suite. It allows you to create professional presentations, course or training materials… in short, it’s a really practical software for everyday use.
By default, its display is in landscape format, that is to say, horizontal, but we will see how we can switch its display to portrait mode, like an A4 sheet for example.
Tutorial to change the display to portrait mode in A4 landscape format on Google Slides
It should be noted that by default, this option to switch from landscape mode to portrait mode does not exist on Google Slides, as it may exist on PowerPoint. But don’t worry, there is a very simple trick to switch the display and get exactly the same result.
To do this, simply go to the Google Slides menu:
- click on “File“
- then click on “Page setup“
- a window will appear, with a dropdown menu, allowing you to choose between “Standard 4:3“, “Widescreen 16:9“, “Widescreen 16:10“, “Custom“
- click on “Custom“, and insert the desired dimensions yourself, namely, if it is for the equivalent of A4 format, 21cm by 29.7cm (as the screenshot below)
From now on, all the slides in your presentation will be oriented in the same way, with the desired dimensions. Nothing prevents you from setting smaller or larger dimensions (A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6…).
Nothing forces you to start with A4 format, if you simply want to switch to landscape mode while keeping the same dimensions as the current presentation, another solution is simply to follow the tutorial above, but swap the 2 values displayed by Google Slides: this will still allow you to switch to landscape mode.
Little tip: note that since Google Slides is an American software, measurements with commas must be indicated with a dot (29.7 instead of 29,7), if you want to have exactly the same dimensions as an A4 sheet. This is practical if you want to print your work, for example.
Why is it interesting to use Google Slides in portrait format?
If you want to create your CV on Google Slides, create posters, a presentation in vertical format (for display on mobile for example), or even mockups, the portrait format can be useful and more comfortable than the landscape format. Moreover, you can then save your work in PDF format, to share it with a printer, put it online, etc.