Resize Text Boxes on a Slide in PowerPoint 2016 for Mac

Text boxes in PowerPoint may need to be moved and resized within different areas of the slide. While you may think that selecting and resizing is all that is to be done, that's not the entire truth because there's so much more you can do even with mere resizing, if you know that these options exist! As emphasized within our Move Text Boxes on a Slide in PowerPoint 2016 for Mac tutorial, you should only resize text boxes, and not text placeholders most of the time since the size of the latter in best controlled by the Slide Master.

Now that you are more aware of why you should not resize the text placeholders, let us tell you that all techniques on this page apply to both text placeholders and text boxes. Actually they also apply to any shapes in your slides that contain text.

Follow these steps to resize your text boxes in PowerPoint 2016 for Mac:

1. Open any slide which has a text box, as shown in Figure 1. Note that of the three text containers on this slide, only one is a text box; and that's the one on the right half of the slide (which is highlighted in blue).
2. 
   Figure 1: Slide with all text containers selected
2. Click on the edge of the text box so that it shows a solid line with selection handles on its perimeter as shown highlighted in red within Figure 2.
3. 
   Figure 2: Text box selected
3. The selected text box now also shows several handles, as shown in Figure 3. These handles are explained below:
1. Four handles on the corners (highlighted in red within Figure 3). These are round shaped and are on the corners of the text box.
2. Four handles on the sides (highlighted in blue within Figure 3). These are also round shaped and placed at the midpoint of each of the four border lines on the text box.
3. 
   Figure 3: Text box with transform points
4. Note that if you have selected the Resize shape to fit text option as explained in our Text box Autofit Options in PowerPoint 2016 for Mac tutorial, you may not be able to resize the text boxes as you wish. It is possible only when you have selected the Do not Autofit option. So, first select the Do not Autofit option and then you will be able to resize the text box using these eight square handles as explained below:
1. Drag any of the handles inwards, and you reduce the size of the text box.
2. Drag any of the handles outwards, and you increase the size of the text box.
3. To maintain the width:height proportion of the text box, hold the Shift key while you drag any of the four corner handles. The Shift key does nothing to the four side handles.
4. To resize equally on opposite sides of a text box, press the Option key while you drag one of the four side handles.
5. To resize equally from the center on all four sides of a text box, press the Option key while you drag one of the four corner handles.
5. In Figure 4 you can see that the selected text box is being resized by dragging one of the corner handles (hilighted in red). You can also see a tool-tip mentioning the height and width of the text box being resized.
6. 
   Figure 4: Text box being resized
7. Tip: Resizing your text box is changing the position of your text box? You need to control Autofit Options for the particular text box or Placeholder you are resizing.
4. Figure 5 shows the resized text box. Compare it to Figure 2 shown earlier on this page.
5. 
   Figure 5: Text box is resized
5. Make sure to save your presentation often.

This tutorial looked at resizing text boxes by dragging. If you want to move text boxes more accurately, explore our Resize Text Boxes Accurately on a Slide in PowerPoint 2016 for Mac tutorial.