Microsoft PowerPoint runs on Microsoft Windows and the Mac OS computer operating systems. It is widely used by business people, educators, students, and trainers and is among the most prevalent forms of persuasion technology. Beginning with Microsoft Office 2003, Microsoft revised branding to emphasize PowerPoint's identity as a component within the Office suite: Microsoft began calling it Microsoft Office PowerPoint instead of merely Microsoft PowerPoint.

The current version of Microsoft Office PowerPoint is Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007. As a part of Microsoft Office, Microsoft Office PowerPoint has become the world's most widely used presentation program.

Compatibility Issues:
As Microsoft Office files are often sent from one computer user to another, arguably the most important feature of any presentation software, such as Apple's Keynote, or OpenOffice.org Impress, has become the ability to open Microsoft Office PowerPoint files.

However, because of PowerPoint's ability to embed content from other applications through OLE, some kinds of presentations become highly tied to the Windows platform, meaning that even PowerPoint on Mac OS X cannot always successfully open its own files originating in the Windows version. This has led to a movement towards open standards, such as PDF and OASIS OpenDocument.