Files with the file extension PPT are created using PowerPoint presentation software. This is a slide presentation program associated with the Microsoft Office suite of applications. PowerPoint is used to create slide show presentations that contain graphics, animations, hyperlinks, and video content.
Files that contain the PPT file extension are created with PowerPoint versions up to MS Office 2003. A PowerPoint file, created with more recent versions of the software, will contain a PPTX file extension. If you have been sent a PPT file in your email, there are several ways you can access its contents if you do not have Microsoft Office installed on your PC.
How to Open PPT Files
To make sure you do not already have an application installed on your PC which is capable of opening and reading PPT files, you can first try double clicking on the file to see if your PC will automatically open it in the default application. Since you can open PPT files with more than one type of program, this may save a lot of hassles.
If you are unable to open a PPT file using the above method and you use the Windows operating system, you can download the PowerPoint viewer from the Microsoft website. The viewing software will allow you to open and view PPT files; however, you will be unable to edit them.
If you need to edit PPT files using Windows, you can download OpenOffice which is an open source office suite of applications available for free from the OpenOffice.org. Open Office offers an application called Presentation which is the equivalent to PowerPoint and is compatible with PPT file extensions.
If you use Mac OS X, you can open and edit PPT files with Apple Keynote 5.1 or OpenOffice. Nuance OmniPage Pro X is also useful for opening these files.
For Linux you can use OpenOffice for opening and editing PPT files since both the Linux operating system and OpenOffice are created by a community of open source developers and are compatible with one another.
You can also choose to convert PPT files to another format using a file conversion program. There are a variety of free utilities available online which will allow you to convert PPT files to a variety of different formats, including RTF (Rich Text Format), JPG, HTM, and PNG, to name a few different formats. You can also choose to use a file conversion website such as Zamzar which allows you to browse and select the PPT file you want to convert, choose the format, enter your email address, and within minutes the converted file will arrive in your email inbox.
