PowerPoint includes several useful animations that allow you to make text, images, shapes, charts, SmartArt graphics, and other objects appear on slides one at a time. This step-by-step guide will show you how to add these animations to make your PowerPoint presentations more dynamic and engaging.

Why Use Appear Animations

Making items appear one by one, also known as the appear animation, is an impactful way to emphasize points, reveal information slowly, and direct the audience’s attention. Some key benefits include:

Focus audience attention – Revealing one item at a time forces your audience to focus on each point as it appears. This improves information retention and comprehension.

Emphasize key points – Appear animations draw attention to important text, images, and concepts you want to highlight in your presentation.
Build anticipation and interest – Watching a slide come together piece by piece triggers audience curiosity and makes presentations more interesting.
Improve flow and pacing – Controlling the sequence of appearing items lets you deliberately pace your slides for better flow.

Add Animations to a Text Box

It’s easy to make text in a text box emerge one word or line at a time:

Select the text box that you want to animate.
Go to the Animations tab and locate the Animation section.

Click the drop-down arrow under Animation and select an entrance animation like Appear, Fade In, or Wipe.
In the Timing section, click the drop-down under Start and choose By Letter or By Word to make text appear one letter or word at a time. You can also choose By Paragraph to make it appear line by line.
Click Effect Options to set the direction the text appears from, like top-to-bottom.

Click Preview to test the animation.
Optionally, add delays or set the duration of the animation in the Timing section.

Animate Bulleted Lists

You can also make bulleted list items appear one by one using custom entrance animations:

Select the entire bulleted list.
Go to Animations > Animation Painter.
Click the dropdown under Custom Animation and choose Entrance > More.

Select an entrance like Appear or Ascend.
Check the box for One by One under Group Text.
Click OK. This will apply a unique animation to each bullet.

Click Preview to test it out.
Fine-tune timings or durations in the Timing section if needed.

Animate Individual Objects

The same appear animation effects can also be used to make individual objects like images, shapes, and charts emerge onto a slide one at a time:

Select the object you want to animate.
Under the Animations tab, pick an entrance animation like Ease In.
In the Timing section, delay the animation by setting a start time like On Click or After Previous to control when it appears.

Optionally, set durations, multiple animations, or triggers.
Click Preview to test the animations.
Repeat for additional objects as needed.

Best Practices

Keep these tips in mind as you add appear animations:

Use sparingly – Limit animations to important text and objects to maximize impact. Too many can be distracting.
Keep it simple – Subtle, clean animations like Appear or Fade In work best. Avoid overly flashy ones in professional slides.

Set delays – Use delays, triggers, and transitions to deliberately control the sequence and pacing at which items appear.
Maintain flow – Make sure animations don’t interrupt the flow of information. Appearances should reinforce ideas.
Check presentations modes – Test animations in both Normal and Presenter modes to ensure slide progression happens smoothly.