The short answer: in Microsoft Teams, share your file with PowerPoint Live. You see your speaker notes alongside the slides; the audience’s slide view does not show them. Check the file-access caveat below before presenting a confidential deck. In Zoom, or if PowerPoint Live isn't an option, share the slide show window, not your whole screen. If you have only one screen, run the slide show in a window and share that window.
Sharing your whole screen can expose notes, notifications or another window. The rest of this guide explains each option, what it's good for, and what to check before you start.
Why sharing your whole screen causes problems
When you share your entire screen, the audience can see other content that appears on the shared display. If you're in PowerPoint's Presenter view on a single laptop screen, that includes your notes, the next-slide preview and the timer. It can also include notifications, other windows and anything you open by mistake.
Sharing a single window, or a PowerPoint file through the meeting app, limits what others see to that window or file. That reduces the risk of exposing unrelated content.
Option 1: PowerPoint Live in Microsoft Teams (best for most Teams calls)
PowerPoint Live is Teams' built-in way to present a PowerPoint file. Microsoft says it "uses significantly less network bandwidth than typical sharing", which helps on a weak connection (Microsoft Support: Share slides in Teams meetings with PowerPoint Live).
How to start it
- In the meeting, select Share.
- Under PowerPoint Live, choose your file. Recent files from OneDrive or SharePoint appear there. If yours isn't listed, select Browse OneDrive or Browse my computer.
- Alternatively, from the PowerPoint desktop app, select Present in Teams at the top of the file.
(Steps from Microsoft Support.)
What you see, and what they see
- You see your slides with your speaker notes beside them, plus participant video, raised hands and reactions. You also get a thumbnail strip, a grid view for jumping to any slide, and a laser pointer, pen and highlighter.
- On small screens, the presenter view is hidden by default. Turn it on with More options > Show presenter view, or press Ctrl+Shift+X.
- By default, attendees can click back and forward through the slides on their own without changing what everyone else sees. If you'd rather keep everyone on your slide (for example, before you reveal pricing), select Turn off participant navigation in the slide controls. This controls browsing ahead, not file permissions.
(All from Microsoft Support.)
Limits to know before you rely on it
- It works with .pptx and .ppsx files. Older formats such as .ppt and .odp aren't supported.
- Recordings don't capture videos, animations or annotations from a PowerPoint Live session. If the meeting will be recorded and those matter, use window sharing instead.
- Anonymous participants can't present this way.
- Where the file goes: choosing an existing file from the recent PowerPoint Live list does not change its permissions outside the meeting. If you browse to a file that has not previously been uploaded to Teams, it is uploaded: to your OneDrive for a private meeting, with access for meeting participants, or to the channel's Files tab for a channel meeting, with access for team members.
That last point matters if the deck contains anything you don't want participants to keep, such as draft pricing or an internal version. Remove confidential material from the meeting copy before sharing. The audience's slide view does not establish that the underlying file or its notes can never be accessed.
(Source for all four points: Microsoft Support.)
Option 2: Share only the slide show window (works in Teams and Zoom)
The window-sharing instructions below assume desktop PowerPoint and the Teams or Zoom desktop app. Check the sharing preview before presenting. How you set it up depends on how many screens you have.
If you have two screens (laptop plus monitor)
- Start the slide show. With two displays connected, PowerPoint normally opens Presenter view on one and the full-screen slides on the other (Microsoft Support: Start the presentation and see your notes in Presenter view).
- If they open on the wrong screens, go to Display Settings in Presenter view and select Swap Presenter View and Slide Show (Windows). On a Mac, use Swap Displays (Microsoft Support).
- In Teams or Zoom, share the slide show window, not the window with your notes. If you share the entire display showing your slides, anything later moved onto it may be visible. Stop sharing before leaving Slide Show.
If you have one screen (a laptop on its own)
In PowerPoint for Windows, Alt+F5 starts Presenter view even with a single display (Microsoft Support: Keyboard shortcuts for delivering presentations). But if you then share your whole screen, the audience sees your notes too.
A safer set-up on one screen:
- Go to Slide Show > Set Up Slide Show and choose Browsed by an individual (window) (Microsoft Support: Set up slide show). The slide show now runs in a resizable window instead of taking over the screen.
- Start the slide show, then in Teams or Zoom share that window only.
- Keep your notes somewhere the audience can't see: printed, on a tablet or phone, or in a separate window you don't share.
This windowed method is also documented in Zoom’s guide to screen sharing a PowerPoint presentation.
Our recommendation: if you present on a single laptop regularly and use Teams, PowerPoint Live (Option 1) is the simpler way to keep notes private. Window sharing is the fallback for Zoom or when PowerPoint Live doesn't suit the file.
A Teams-specific detail
Teams has a dedicated Slide control feature for handing slide navigation to a colleague. Start from Teams for desktop on Windows, share the presentation window and run the presentation full-screen, then use Slide control in the presenter toolbar. This feature is unavailable when sharing an entire screen. Mac users can receive slide control but cannot initiate it. This is separate from Teams' general Give control feature. (Microsoft: Present content in Teams meetings)
Option 3: Show yourself and the slides together
On a sales call or a short pitch, it can help for people to see your face next to the slides rather than a small thumbnail. Both apps offer this, with limits.
Teams presenter modes
Teams offers Standout, Side-by-side and Reporter layouts, which place your video alongside your shared content. Turn on your camera, select Share, pick a mode under Presenter mode, then choose what to share. Microsoft notes that these interactive modes are available only in Teams for desktop. Attendees on Teams mobile or web see your shared content and your video as separate feeds (Microsoft Support: Presenter modes in Microsoft Teams).
Zoom presenter layouts
In a supported version of the Zoom desktop app for Windows, macOS or Linux, you can place your video alongside or over shared content. Presenter layouts must also be enabled for your Zoom account. Controls and available options vary by version and sharing method.
- Start the slide show in its own window as described above, then select Share in Zoom.
- Select the slide show window, not the PowerPoint editing or notes window.
- Where available, choose a layout in the Presenter layout panel and check its audience preview before selecting Share.
- While sharing, use Layout on the floating toolbar where available to adjust the layout.
Presenter layouts are not supported in cloud recordings or live streaming. Zoom documents computer recording of these layouts for desktop app version 6.3.0 or later. Use an ordinary window share if the layout is unavailable or unsuitable. (Zoom: Applying a presenter layout when screen sharing)
When to skip this: if your slides are dense (tables, small charts), putting yourself on top of them will hide content. Use a normal window share instead.
If your slides include video or sound
- Teams: when sharing a screen or window, turn on Include sound before you start sharing. Microsoft warns that "all sound from your computer, including notifications, will be audible in the meeting" (Microsoft Support: Show your screen during a meeting).
- Zoom: enable Share sound when the audience needs your computer audio. Use Optimize for video sharing only for a full-screen video clip, then turn it off for ordinary slides; otherwise text and diagrams can look blurry. Computer audio can include notification sounds too. (Zoom: Sharing your screen or desktop)
- Our recommendation: turn on your computer's do-not-disturb or focus mode before the call, so message alerts don't pop up or ping during your presentation.
Five-minute pre-call checklist
- Pick your method: PowerPoint Live (Teams), window share, or video with slides.
- Do a test share with a colleague, or join from your phone as a second attendee, and check what appears on the other end. Keep the phone’s microphone and speaker audio off to avoid feedback.
- Check the file: remove hidden draft slides or internal notes you wouldn't want participants to keep if the file is uploaded to the meeting.
- Check readability in a small window. Many people will watch on a laptop with the meeting app taking part of the screen. If a slide is hard to read in a small preview, it's too dense. Our guide to fixing a text-heavy slide explains how to trim it.
- Silence notifications and close windows and tabs you don't need.
After the call: what to send
If people ask for the slides afterwards, a PDF is usually the safer file to send. It preserves the slide layout and is convenient for reading, though PDFs can still be edited with suitable software. Our guide to PowerPoint or PDF covers how to export a clean version and keep the file size down.