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Imagine, you clocked countless hours working on an EXTREMELY important PowerPoint presentation. You exit your presentation, grab a coffee, and when you come back to your computer, you find that your PowerPoint file is missing! What could be more frustrating?!

Of course, the question that immediately pops up in your mind is whether you can recover your beloved presentation or not. If you’re an Office 365 subscriber and you have AutoSave running (that saves your changes in real-time), you should be fine because your file should be autosaving in the cloud. If you’re not an Office 365 subscriber, there are several options to try and recover your PowerPoint file. These are not guaranteed to work but well worth a shot.

Method 1: Recover Unsaved Presentations

If you were interrupted before you ever got the chance to save your PowerPoint file, you can simply look for it in the Microsoft Unsaved Files folder. To do this:

1. Click the “File” tab in the Ribbon.
2. Click the “Open” command on the left side of the backstage view.
3. At the bottom of the pane that appears to the right, you should see a “Recover Unsaved Presentations” button. Click this button to launch an “Open” dialog box. This dialog box displays recovered copies of unsaved presentations.
4. Select the copy to recover from the list. Then click the “Open” button within the “Open” dialog box to reopen the recovered copy. If you successfully retrieve the contents of the file, then immediately save the file you recovered.

Method 2: Retrieve Deleted PowerPoint Slides

Another useful method for restoring a deleted or lost file is to check out any previously stored files. If you don’t have AutoRecover enabled, there’s no other way to retrieve the changes you made to your PowerPoint file. You will have to redo your work from the last save. But if everything looks good, you can then follow these steps:

1. Open a blank Microsoft PowerPoint document and click the File tab.
2. Select the options link at the bottom.
3. Select Save.
4. Under the option of “Save Presentation,” you will see an option which will state “AutoRecover File Location.”
5. Once you find the section with a path showing where your autosaved documents go, select and copy it.
   Pro tip: The amount of new information that the recovered file contains depends on how frequently a Microsoft Office program saves the recovery file. For example, if the recovery file is saved only every 15 minutes, your recovered file won’t contain your last 14 minutes of work before the power failure or other problem occurred. To be extra safe, enter a small number in the minutes box, like 5 or 10. That way, you’ll never lose more than 5 or 10 minutes of work. On the other hand, if you want to make Office slightly faster, try entering a larger number in the minutes box, like 20.

6. Open File Explorer and paste in the copied file path. Hit enter.
7. Select the desired file. Right-click the Microsoft PowerPoint file, and select Open with. Choose PowerPoint, and click OK.

Method 3: PowerPoint AutoRecover

While we start to file initially, the program will create a temporary file for it. You can find it on a network drive or in the temp directory of your operating system. The file that you are likely going to find in the temp section will usually have a few extra letters after the title. Here’s how to find it:

1. Open File Explorer.
2. Navigate to the temp directory. This is usually found at C:\Users[YourUsername]\AppData\Local\Temp.
3. Look for files with the .tmp extension that match the date and time when you last worked on the PowerPoint.
4. Rename the file extension from .tmp to .pptx.
5. Open the file with PowerPoint to check if it contains your lost slides.

Method 4: Restoring from the Recycle Bin

While this step is standard, it is often overlooked. Here are the steps to retrieve your deleted PowerPoint slides from the Recycle Bin:

1. First, go to the Recycle Bin.
2. Search for the desired presentation file.
3. Select it and right-click on it.
4. Choose the option “Restore.”

Method 5: Using a PowerPoint Recovery Tool

If you empty the Recycle Bin or just delete PowerPoint files with “Shift+Delete” keys, it is hard to restore your PPT file manually. But now, you get an easy solution by installing a powerful PowerPoint recovery tool—Recoverit data recovery software. It is a leading recovery tool which can recover lost data caused by any reasons from PC, laptop, or removable devices.

Here's a quick video of how it works:

The Recoverit software allows you to process documents recovery, pictures recovery, audio & video files recovery, emails recovery, and other files recovery including your ZIP and RAR files. It is highly reliable and trustworthy as it does not hamper the quality of the file while recovering it back.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Q1: Can I recover a PowerPoint file that was never saved?

Yes, you can. Use the Recover Unsaved Presentations method by navigating to the Unsaved Files folder in PowerPoint.

Q2: What if I can’t find my file in the Recycle Bin?

If the Recycle Bin doesn't have your file, try using a PowerPoint recovery tool like Recoverit.

Q3: How does PowerPoint AutoRecover work?

PowerPoint AutoRecover saves temporary versions of your file at set intervals. You can adjust these intervals in the Save options.

Q4: Is there any way to prevent losing PowerPoint files in the future?

Always enable AutoRecover and save your work frequently. Consider using cloud storage for real-time backups.

Q5: Can temporary files help in recovering my PowerPoint slides?

Yes, temporary files can sometimes help recover lost work. Look for them in the temp directory of your operating system.

Thanks for spending time with our blog! If it was helpful, please share it with your friends and colleagues.

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