How to turn on guides, a grid and rulers

1. Open the guides window

   On the editor's bottom bar, to the right of the zoom, click the “Guides and grid” icon. Everything that helps you line things up lives in this window. Viewers never see any of it: lines, the grid and columns exist only in the editor.

2. Add guide lines

   Click the ruler above or to the left of the slide, or drag from it onto the slide, and a line appears — just like in PowerPoint. Drag a line's marker on the ruler to move it; drag the line off the slide to remove it. In the window, “Vertical” and “Horizontal” add the same lines, with the exact position of each one and “Remove all lines”.

   “Edge margins” adds a frame of four lines: set the distance in pixels and click “Add”. The frame helps align text and the logo on every slide.

3. Turn on the grid

   Tick “Snap grid” and choose a step: 5, 10, 20, 40 or 80 px. Blocks start snapping to the grid points. The grid works on a free canvas and on template slides — wherever blocks are moved with the mouse. On the canvas, Ctrl+' turns it on too.

4. Add columns and rows

   Under “Columns and rows”, click “Add columns” or “Add rows”. Set the “Count” — 1 to 12 — the “Type”, the “Margin” or “Offset”, the “Gutter”, the color and the opacity. Columns and rows are shared by all slides, and blocks on the canvas snap to their edges as well as to guide lines.

5. Show or hide the rulers

   The “Rulers” checkbox shows them above and to the left of the slide. They count in slide pixels of 1920×1080; on the canvas, a band marks the selected block. Lines and columns are saved in the presentation and visible to co-authors, but anyone can hide them for themselves with the eye icon in the window.

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