Turn a PowerPoint into a flipbook people can open on a phone

A deck sent as a file has problems. It opens differently on different computers, the fonts change, the animations break, and the version in someone's inbox is never the latest. On a phone it is worse.

A flipbook turns each slide into a page and gives the deck one link.

What you need

The FlipbookIQ add-in for PowerPoint. It is free, it works on Windows, Mac and PowerPoint on the web, and the download page has the install steps. Your IT admin can also deploy it to a whole team from the Microsoft 365 admin center.

How to publish

1. Open your deck in PowerPoint.
2. On the ribbon, choose Flipbook, then Make a flipbook. The pages appear in the pane beside your slides.
3. Choose Publish. You get a link, and a QR code you can show on a slide.

Every slide becomes a page. Links on slides come through as links, and videos you have added come through too. The text of each slide is kept, so a reader can search the deck and select text.

Keep the same link

You will edit the deck after you share it. Change a slide, choose Publish again, and the link stays the same. Readers with the flipbook open are offered the update.

That is the main reason to do this. Nobody has an old file, because nobody has a file.

What to check first

• Run Check before you share. It finds placeholder text, dates that have passed and the same figure shown two ways.
• Look at each page. What you see in the pane is what readers get.
• Use readable type. On a phone, a slide is small. Text under about twenty points will be hard to read.
• Skip animations that carry meaning. A slide that only makes sense after three clicks will read as a mistake. Put the final state on the slide.

Sharing options

• A link for email or chat.
• A QR code, for a slide, a handout or a poster.
• An embed for your website.
• A password or an end date for a private deck. These are part of the paid plans.
• A PDF. Readers can download a searchable PDF, unless you switch that off.

When a flipbook is not the answer

If you need people to edit the deck, send the file. If you are presenting live, present from PowerPoint. A flipbook is for people who read the deck on their own, afterwards.

The same add-in works in Word. Open the document, choose Flipbook, then Make a flipbook. In Word on Windows the pages are made on your own computer. In Word on Mac and on the web, it signs you in and opens the Studio.