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9.14: Grouping Objects

  • Page ID
    46574
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    Learning Objectives

    • Group objects
    • Modify grouped objects

    PowerPoint allows you to insert shapes or objects and position them in various ways in a slide. In the previous module you learned how to arrange objects. Now we’ll walk through how to group objects. The main reasons to group objects are to make it easier to move, align or resize objects together. In this example we assume objects have already been arranged and now need to be grouped.

    Group Objects

    1. Open a slide in a PowerPoint presentation containing various shapes or objects arranged in the slide.
    2. Start from a corner of the slide, hold the left-mouse button down and drag it to include all objects to be included in a group.
      PowerPoint screenshot of flow chart slide with all shapes being selected.
    3. Release the mouse button and all the objects should be showing that they have been selected by each object showing its rotate arrow, resizing dots, etc.
    4. On the Home tab, select the Arrange button, and in Group Objects, select Group.
      PowerPoint screenshot of flow chart slide with all shapes selected and being grouped.
    5. Now all the selected objects will be in one group and can be moved, resized, rotated, copied, flipped or rearranged as one group.
      PowerPoint screenshot of grouped flow chart resized.PowerPoint screenshot of grouped flow chart rotated.

    Modify Group Objects

    Once objects are grouped, they can be modified in a variety of ways including ungrouping and regrouping. We’ll walk through a few steps of how to modify within a group object.

    Text

    If a group object has resized by either enlarging or shrinking and there is text involved within the group, check to see if it now needs to be modified. When a group is resized, text retains its original font size. To resize it, triple click on the text and all text in an object is selected. A menu will appear to change the size to fit the object.

    PowerPoint screenshot of grouped flow chart resized and font being resized to fit new shape sizes.

    Shapes

    Within a group, an individual object can be moved around without affecting the other objects. To move a specific object in a group, select the object and drag it to a new position.

    PowerPoint screenshot of grouped flow chart resized and shape being moved to new location within group.

    Ungroup/Regroup

    If after repositioning or adjusting a group you no longer want the objects to act as one group, go back to the Home, Arrange, Group Objects, selecting Ungroup. If you decide that you’d rather have them as a group again, select all the objects and select the Regroup option.

    PowerPoint screenshot of flow chart slide with group selected and being ungrouped.

    Note

    In Office 365 PowerPoint, grouping can be done with all kinds of objects; video, audio, pictures, shapes, etc. It was not possible in earlier PowerPoint versions to group video and pictures together.

    Contributors and Attributions

    CC licensed content, Original
    • Grouping Objects. Authored by: Sherri Pendleton. Provided by: Lumen Learning. License: CC BY: Attribution

    9.14: Grouping Objects is shared under a CC BY license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by LibreTexts.

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