2.4 – Using An Existing File Lesson

Lesson Overview

Many professionals find themselves reusing older presentations, whether for saving time or keeping core content consistent. However, slides can quickly become outdated or lose visual polish. This lesson introduces you to importing existing presentation files—such as PowerPoints created by you, your team, or with tools like ChatGPT—into Gamma to instantly modernize their design and content. You’ll learn how to leverage Gamma’s import options to either retain most of your original layout (using Visual Import) or let AI reconstruct your slides with entirely new styles and features (using Transform Content).

This approach is especially helpful if you need to breathe new life into archive decks, quickly enhance a file you edited on the fly, or import content from various document types, including Google Drive files or web pages. Whether you’re working with your own legacy decks or materials sourced from elsewhere, these Gamma features give you fast, flexible ways to build more engaging, professional presentations without starting from scratch. This lesson builds on the previous topic—creating from an outline—and sets you up to choose the best workflow for your needs.

Who This Is For

If you work with existing presentations or documents and want to maximize their impact without redoing everything by hand, this lesson will be useful. You’ll benefit if you are:

• Business professionals updating archive or legacy slides for new audiences
• Educators reusing lectures or teaching materials across terms
• Marketers modernizing client-facing presentations with updated branding
• Content creators repurposing materials from blogs, articles, or other web content
• Analysts or consultants needing to present refreshed data or reports
• Anyone who has basic familiarity with PowerPoint, Word, or PDF files
  

Where This Fits in a Workflow

Refreshing and upgrading old presentation files typically comes before an important meeting, report delivery, or new project phase. Once you have your source file, this lesson shows how to import and update it in Gamma—eliminating the need to rebuild slides manually. For example, you might use this process when preparing last year’s sales results for a new pitch, or turning a static client update into a shareable, interactive deck.

Choosing between Visual Import and Transform Content gives you control over how much you change—helping you meet tight deadlines or keep branding consistent. After import, you’ll be able to further edit, add charts, or apply themes, streamlining your workflow and freeing up time for your primary tasks.

Technical & Workflow Benefits

Importing an existing file into Gamma saves significant time compared to manually re-theming or recreating slides slide-by-slide in standard software. With Visual Import, you get a direct refresh of your content and design, ideal when you want to keep most elements intact but need a cleaner look. If you use Transform Content, Gamma’s AI adapts your content into new layouts, adds visuals, and updates formatting—reducing repetitive design work.

For example, a consultant using PowerPoint to track client project milestones can import that file into Gamma, automatically create a more engaging presentation, and instantly convert static charts to editable formats. This speeds up last-minute changes and improves the consistency of the final result. Frequent presentation creators and project teams will appreciate the clear path to upgrading materials across multiple projects or clients, raising the quality without added manual effort.

Practice Exercise

To practice, choose a recently completed PowerPoint presentation (or even a basic export from a Google Slides or Word file). Save it to your computer if it isn’t already. In Gamma:

1. Start a new project and choose Import File or URL.
2. Upload your file, and try both Visual Import and Transform Content options to see the different results each produces. Preview slides, delete any you don’t need, and select a theme.
3. Use the Edit With AI function to convert a static chart—type a prompt in the AI box to create a dynamic chart, then adjust styling or data labels.

Question: Which import method (Visual Import or Transform Content) best preserved your data or made it easier to update the presentation? Consider which will be most useful for your future projects.

Course Context Recap

This lesson is part of the AI-Powered Presentations course, following coverage of creating a new presentation from an outline. Here, you’ve learned how to repurpose and modernize existing slides using Gamma’s import options. Next, the course moves on to creating presentations from a single prompt, giving you even more flexible ways to start. Continue to the following lesson—or explore earlier topics—to master every stage of intelligent, AI-assisted slide creation.