Original video in Chinese.
Key Takeaways
- Codex is my preferred tool for AI presentations. With the Presentations plugin, it can research a topic, build the structure, generate slides, inspect screenshots, and deliver an editable PowerPoint file.
- Work in stages: approve the slide text first, then load the plugin to build the deck. Preparing your own text and sample slides gives you greater control.
- Separate the logic of the text from the logic of the visuals. Finalize the wording in a document before designing the slides—a principle I developed over more than a decade in public relations and marketing.
If you want AI to make a PowerPoint presentation, Codex is currently my first recommendation. Its strength is the ability to connect research, slide text, visual production, screenshot checks, and an editable PPTX into a workflow you can control. Approving the content before using the Presentations skill for the visuals gives more consistent results than handing over the entire task at once.
The complete Codex presentation workflow
Codex started as a programming tool, but its capabilities have expanded into everyday office work and other general tasks.
Its plugin library contains useful tools, including Presentations, which is designed for slide decks. Here is how I used it.
Open the plus menu at the lower left of the input box to see your installed plugins. Select Presentations and paste in your request. In this example, I asked it to create a presentation introducing Harness Engineering from scratch.
Codex first read the plugin instructions to understand how to create and export the deck. It then worked out the narrative structure and began producing the slides.
The process took about eight minutes. One detail I particularly appreciated was that Codex captured a screenshot of every slide at the end and performed a visual review. Presentations are complex: writing the code and seeing the final rendering are different things, so you need to inspect the actual output.
After two rounds of quality checks, the deck was ready to view in the right sidebar. I was broadly satisfied, with three small changes: add a cover slide, use Alibaba PuHuiTi, and adopt a minimalist technology aesthetic.
After those revisions, the Harness Engineering presentation was finished. Codex handled both the research and the production. The result was a PowerPoint file with editable text boxes and other elements.
Approve the text before building the visuals
That first example showed what Codex could do when given a free hand. For actual production, I recommend preparing the content yourself, including the text for each slide, or asking Codex to draft it for approval before building the deck.
I repeated the same request, this time asking Codex to list the text as P1, P2, and so on.
After researching the topic, it produced all the text, starting with the title slide. Problems became easy to spot: the cover did not need a subtitle, which diluted the focus, and slides two and three had too much text.
Once Codex had revised the wording, I loaded the Presentations plugin and asked it to begin production.
I spent more than a decade in public relations and marketing, where making presentations was an everyday activity. My rule has always been to handle the logic of the text and the logic of the visuals separately.
Start in a document and write the text for every slide. Open PowerPoint only after the wording is settled. Working on wording and layout simultaneously creates repeated revisions and makes the whole process painful and inefficient.
AI does not change that principle. I still finalize the text first. I also make two slides myself and give them to Codex as a style reference.
These steps improve control over the result. In production work, control over AI output matters enormously.
Test environment and delivery criteria
This workflow was first tested in May 2026 and reviewed on August 24, 2026. The test used the Codex desktop app and the Presentations skill. The deliverable was an editable PPTX, rather than a rendered image alone.
Acceptance checks should cover approved slide text, consistent fonts and layout, screenshot review, editable elements, and a final file that opens correctly in PowerPoint or compatible software. Product interfaces and skill names may change; consult the official documentation for the current entry point.
There are many AI presentation products on the market. In my experience, they still fall short. Taken as a whole, Codex is my preferred option, and I encourage you to try it.
Primary sources and further reading
- OpenAI: Codex Skills documentation
- Complete Wiki guide: the Codex presentation workflow (Chinese)
- Make animations with Codex and Remotion
- Use Codex for content creation
That is all for this episode. If you want to understand AI, become a more capable independent creator, and meet people with similar interests, join the newtype community. See you next time.