DeckCraft: a free, open-source Microsoft PowerPoint alternative

Looking for a free alternative to Microsoft PowerPoint? DeckCraft is one option. Its README describes it like this:

Presentations and slide shows; an open-source, clean-room reimplementation of Microsoft PowerPoint, rebuilt in pure Rust.

It's made by the ArtCraft team, licensed MIT OR Apache-2.0, and published for macOS, Windows, Linux and FreeBSD, plus a web build. The latest version is v0.5.0.

What it does well

According to the README:

• Make decks: slide masters and eleven layouts, eight original themes, sections, notes, comments, headers and footers, custom slide sizes.
• Draw: 150+ preset shapes with adjust handles, glued connectors, merge shapes, gradient, picture and pattern fills, shadows, glow and reflections.
• Add content: pictures with crop and corrections, tables, charts, SmartArt basics, audio and video.
• Present: transitions (including Morph), animations and motion paths, full-screen slide show, presenter view, pen and rehearse timings.
• Exchange files: open and save PowerPoint .pptx, export PDF (slides, notes pages, handouts), PNG/JPEG and outlines.
• Automate: 200+ commands with undo, scriptable from the CLI, a JSON control channel and an MCP server.

How far along it is

The README calls DeckCraft alpha, heading for beta: it covers 79% of PowerPoint's features by breadth (92% of the core ones, measured) and is about 55% of the way to replacing PowerPoint for real work (estimated).

What's still missing

The full, ranked list is in the project's docs/gaps.md.

Should you switch?

Try DeckCraft if you want a free, open-source presentation app that feels familiar to Microsoft PowerPoint users, runs on Linux or in a browser, or can be scripted. For client work, test your own files first. The project describes itself as early-stage software.

• How to install DeckCraft
• More free alternatives: the Craft suite

Microsoft PowerPoint is a trademark of Microsoft. It is named here only to describe what DeckCraft is modeled on.