Why is Keynote not exporting drop shadows/glows in PNG or JPEG?

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Level 1

4 points

Why is Keynote not exporting drop shadows/glows in PNG or JPEG?

Hello,

I’m creating YouTube thumbnails in Keynote (Mac, latest version). On the canvas, my text has a clear drop shadow/glow effect (blur + color). But when I export the slide as PNG or JPEG, the effect disappears or becomes almost invisible.

Things I tried:

Exporting both PNG and JPEG (no quality options for PNG).
Adjusting shadow blur, opacity, and offset.
Centering the shadow to simulate an outer glow.
Checking on different backgrounds.

In Keynote, the glow looks perfect, but the exported image doesn’t keep it. Is this a known bug? Any workaround or settings I’m missing to preserve shadows/glows in exports?

As you can see in attached images, there is no drop shadow around SUNSET MEDITATION title.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

[Edited by Moderator]

MacBook Pro 14″, macOS 15.6

Posted on Sep 10, 2025 6:14 AM

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Answer 1

Camelot

Level 9

58,101 points

Sep 12, 2025 10:40 AM in response to IgorShanghai

I just tried this OMM (MacOS 26/Keynote 14.4) and can't reproduce the problem. Both JPEG and PNG images show the text effects as expected.

That leads me to think there's something specific about the slide itself.

I only tried a single text block, on a single slide in a new presentation - if you do that, does it work? It may be a case of simplifying until you find what triggers the problem.

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