How to Convert Docx
Converting docx to other file formats such as doc, or pdf used to be a challenge, but with Microsoft’s commitment to the docx format other applications have begun to support the format, in some cases natively for opening, editing, and then saving. Of course converting docx to doc or pdf may still be a requirement if compatibility with older applications or archival procedures is required.
The easiest, and some would say most reliable way of converting docx to doc requires MS Word 2007, either as part of the MS Office bundle, or included within MS Works 9.0 since docx is the native file format of this version of Word and selecting a different file format for saving is trivial.
MS Word isn’t able to export to pdf format, but Microsoft make a free plugin available known as “Microsoft Save as PDF” which allows MS Word 2007 to convert docx to pdf. Unfortunately this is only available for the 2007 version of MS Office, so Windows users with older versions will need additional software such as Adobe’s Acrobat application, but note that the Acrobat reader isn’t able to convert docx to pdf.
An approach that many users of docx find convenient is to bookmark one of the many online converters, websites that have an upload form for the docx file, which is converted using their software, and a download link then given so that the new doc or pdf file can be saved back to the users hard drive. For basic documents this can be a convenient and efficient solution.
A downside to using an online converter is lack of security, can the website doing the conversion be trusted not to store a copy of the file that has been converted, either explicitly or within their cache. Business documents or any document containing confidential information probably shouldn’t be trusted to online conversion sites.
In these instances the free, and highly capable, OpenOffice suite of applications might be a solid solution, with native handling of docx and the ability to seemlessly convert any open document to doc or pdf formats. Version 3.0 of OpenOffice is required, and converting a docx is a simple matter of saving the document to another format.
Additional Reading on Docx Files
- What is a docx file?
- How to convert docx to doc.
- How to open docx files.
- What is a docx viewer?
- What is a docx converter?
