How To Loop Google Slides

Google Slides is an essential tool for business and education both online and offline. Thanks to this program, we get free access to myriad presentation features without needing additional software.

Google Slides are constantly improving; today, you can make your slides advance automatically and loop for the smoothest presentation possible. How do you enable this option? Read on to find out.

When presenting your Google Slides, you can use your keyboard’s arrow buttons to move on to the next screen. You can also press the slide number and hit Enter to go to a specific slide. While this certainly gives you great control, it can be a bit of a hassle when you just want your slides to loop in the background as you give a presentation. Without the loop option enabled, you need to press number 1 on your keyboard and then Enter to go back to the beginning of the presentation.

The ability to loop your slideshow is included within the auto-play functions of Google Slides, which were introduced in 2019. This feature allows you to set the duration of your slides and enable the slideshow to play repeatedly until you pause or stop it manually.

Looping your slides is a fantastic solution in numerous situations. You can use it to display information or promotional material at a trade show or enhance an oral presentation with a few images. Therefore, learning how to use it can come in handy. Read the guide below to learn how to loop Google Slides on several platforms.

How to Loop Google Slides on a PC

You’ll need to open your presentation and enter Slideshow mode to enable looping. Here’s how to do it on a PC.

1. Launch Google Chrome and open the Slides web app.
   
2. Pick the presentation you want to edit.
   
3. Hit the “Slideshow” button in the top right corner of the screen.
   
4. Move your cursor to the bottom left corner of the slide. Click the three-dot menu next to the slide number.
   
5. Move your cursor to the “Auto-play” option.
   
6. Select how long you want your slides to be displayed.
   
7. Enable “Loop” at the bottom of the dropdown menu.
   
8. When you’re ready to start your presentation, click “Play” at the top of the same dropdown menu.
   

The slides will loop indefinitely. If you need to pause the presentation to answer some questions or similar, find the pause button in the following way:

1. Move your cursor to the lower left corner of the screen. Press the three dots in the toolbar.
   
2. Hover your cursor over “Auto-play.”
   
3. Press “Pause” at the top of the menu.
   

You’ll need to enable looping every time you’re presenting from Google Slides, as you can’t save these preferences within the app itself. Nevertheless, you can publish your slideshow with auto-play and loop enabled in the following way:

1. When you’re done with your presentation, click “File.”
   
2. Select “Publish to the web.”
   
3. Pick how fast you want your slides to auto-advance.
   
4. Make sure “Restart the slideshow after the last slide” is checked.
   
5. You might also want to enable the “Start slideshow as soon as the player loads” option. Otherwise, the viewer will need to click “Play” for the presentation to start.
   
6. Share the presentation in your preferred way or copy its shareable link.

Whenever you open the slideshow through its shareable link, auto-advance and loop will be enabled by default.

How to Loop Google Slides on an iPhone

Google Slides is undeniably more limited on mobile platforms than on PC. However, having this app in your pocket can still be useful at times. You can make various edits to your presentations, publish or share your slideshow, and present your slides straight from your iPhone. One feature you might have trouble finding is looping your presentation, though.

Slideshow mode gives little flexibility to mobile Google Slides users. If you want to loop your slides while presenting from your iPhone, you’ll need to publish your presentation with this option enabled from a PC and open the shareable link on your phone. Follow these steps to get it done.

1. Open Google Slides and then the presentation you want to edit using your PC.
   
2. Click “File,” then “Publish to the web.”
   
3. Enable “Restart the slideshow after the last slide” to loop the presentation.
   
4. Open the link in your Iphone.
   
5. Press the three vertical dots in the bottom toolbar.
   
6. Click “Play” under the “Auto-play” option to begin your looping presentation.
   

You can always edit the auto-play settings of your published presentation in the same three-dot menu.

How to Loop Google Slides on an iPad

Google Slides is more user-friendly on an iPad’s large screen than on iPhone. That said, the features available on this platform are still more limited than the PC version. If you want to present a looping slideshow from your iPad, you’ll need to publish the presentation on your PC with the appropriate settings first.

1. Go to Google Slides on your PC and find the presentation you need.
   
2. Press “File” and select “Publish to the web.”
   
3. Click the checkbox next to “Restart the slideshow after the last slide.”
   
4. Share the link with your iPad and follow the same instructions with the steps listed above, the same with iPhone.

How to Loop Google Slides on an Android

As we mentioned, Google Slides has limited features on mobile platforms. If you’re planning to present looping slides from your Android device by sharing or Chromecasting your screen, you’ll need to take extra steps on your PC beforehand.

1. Open Google Slides in your PC browser.
   
2. Select the presentation you want to loop.
   
3. Once loaded, click “File” in the menu bar, then “Publish to the web.”
   
4. Select an auto-advance option and make sure “Restart the slideshow after the last slide” is enabled.
   
5. Share the file with yourself or simply send the shareable link to your Android device.
   
6. Open the link in your email.
   
7. Tap the three vertical dots in the bottom left corner of your screen.
   
8. Select “Auto-play” and hit the “Play” option to begin the presentation.
   

The slides will advance at the speed you chose when you exported the presentation, but you can modify this anytime in the same “Auto-play” menu.

Additional FAQs

Can I loop slides without auto-advance?

Google Slides may lead you to believe that you can loop your slides without turning auto-advance on. After all, you can uncheck auto-advance time intervals while still having “Loop” on within the auto-play settings. However, loop doesn’t actually work without auto-advance. This can be a little inconvenient, especially since auto-advance doesn’t offer custom time intervals. Nevertheless, you can still go back to the beginning of your presentation without looping by pressing your number 1 key and hitting Enter.

How can I loop videos in Google Slides?

If rather than a slideshow, you want to put a video on loop, you can similarly do so in Slideshow mode.

1. When you get to your video slide during your presentation, right-click the video.

2. Enable “Loop” in the dropdown menu. The video will loop until you move to the following slide manually.

Much like slide loop, you’ll need to enable this feature on your video every time you’re presenting.

Can I set my auto-advance and loop preferences before presenting?

At the time of writing this article, pre-setting your slideshow preferences isn’t an option in Google Slides. However, publishing your slideshow to the web with the appropriate settings will ensure that your presentation plays automatically and loops every time it’s opened. Follow the instructions above to publish your presentation this way.

Round and Round

The loop feature makes Google Slides perfect for background slideshows, but this option can come in handy in many different situations. You can loop your presentation in Google Slides on PC or publish the slideshow to present it on other platforms with loop already enabled.

Did you manage to find the loop option in Google Slides? How do you think this feature could be improved? Let us know in the comments section below.