Remove Notes & Comments

Created: 2026-07-31 · Updated: 2026-07-31

Creates a cleaned copy of the presentation with a single click, with the slide notes and/or all comments removed — including the modern (threaded) Microsoft 365 comments that PowerPoint's own "Delete All Comments" often fails to remove completely. The original stays unchanged. Ideal for cleaning up a presentation before sharing it.

Free

This tool is available in all editions, no license required.


Opening

On the ribbon, go to PPPTools → "Tools" group and click Remove Notes & Comments.

A small dialog appears:

Option Effect
Both Removes notes and comments (default)
Notes only Removes the slide notes only; the dialog shows in advance how many slides contain notes
Comments only Removes comments only — classic and modern M365 comments, including the author list

The Open the cleaned variant afterwards checkbox controls whether the new copy is opened right away (default: yes).

Click Clean up… to continue to the save dialog, or Cancel to close without changes.


How it works

For safety, a copy of the current presentation is always created and only that copy is cleaned — so nothing can ever be accidentally and irreversibly deleted from the original. The tool is therefore fully non-destructive:

  1. After Clean up…, a "Save As" dialog appears with a suggested name (e.g. Presentation Without comments and notes.pptx). You can freely change the name and location.
  2. A copy of the current state is written; the open original stays untouched.
  3. The selected content is removed from the copy (including the modern M365 comments).
  4. If Open the cleaned variant afterwards is enabled, the copy is opened. A message reports how many notes and comments were removed.

Good to know

  • The original is fully preserved (with all notes, comments and undo history) — it is neither overwritten nor closed.
  • The name suffix adapts to your choice: Without notes, Without comments or Without comments and notes.
  • Even a presentation that has never been saved can be cleaned — just pick a location for the copy in the save dialog.

What exactly is removed

Content Removed
Slide notes The notes text of every slide
Classic comments The older, position-anchored comments
Modern M365 comments The newer, thread-capable comments incl. the central author list

Other slide content (text, shapes, images, notes placeholders in the layout) remains unchanged.