Differences between the OpenDocument Text (.odt) format and the Word (.docx) format
OpenDocument (.odt) files are compatible with Word and open source applications like OpenOffice and LibreOffice, but you might see formatting differences and some Word features aren't available in .odt files. Word documents (.docx) are compatible with most applications.
Switch your default file format
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Do one of the following:
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In Word 2016, 2013, or 2010, click File > Options.
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In Word 2007, click the Microsoft Office Button
> Word Options.
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Click Save.
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Under Save documents, in the Save files in this format list, click the file format you want to use by default.
What is supported when I save a Word document in the OpenDocument Text format?
The table below shows which Word features are fully, partially, or not supported in the OpenDocument (.odt) format.
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Supported Both Word and the OpenDocument Text format support this feature. Content, formatting, and usability won't be lost.
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Partially Supported Both Word and the OpenDocument Text format support this feature, but formatting and usability might be affected. No text or data are lost, but formatting and how you work with text or graphics might be different.
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Not Supported This feature isn't supported in the OpenDocument Text format. Don't use the feature if you plan to save your Word document in the OpenDocument Text format, because you risk losing content, formatting, and usability in the part of your document that the feature affects.
To see information about graphic features, see the Graphic Elements table at the end of this article.
| Area | Subarea | Level of support |
| Collaboration | Address Book | Supported |
| Collaboration | Blog | Supported |
| Collaboration | Comments | Partially Supported When you save the document in .odt format and open it again in Word 2007, comments about a group of words becomes a single point. The single point is usually indicated at the end of the group of words. Tables are not supported in comments. The contents of the table are maintained in the comment but the structure is lost. |
| Collaboration | Compare-Merge Documents | Supported |
| Collaboration | Document Protection | Not Supported When you save the Word 2007 file in .odt format, the feature is removed and .odt files with this feature cannot be opened. |
| Collaboration | Information Rights Management (IRM) | Not Supported When you save the Word 2007 document in .odt format, the feature is removed and .odt files with this feature cannot be opened. |
| Collaboration | Mail Merge | Supported ADDRESSBLOCK and RECIPIENT fields are converted to plain text. The connection to the data source must be established again if the document is edited by another ODF application. |
| Collaboration | Reviewing Pane | Supported |
| Collaboration | Track Changes | Not Supported When you save the Word 2007 document in .odt format, all changes are accepted. |
| Content | Bibliography | Not Supported Bibliography section is converted to plain text. |
| Content | Captions | Not Supported SEQ fields are converted to plain text. When you add new captions, the caption number is not automatically incremented. |
| Content | Content Controls | Not Supported |
| Content | Cross References | Supported |
| Content | Document Building Blocks | Not Supported |
| Content | Equation Editor | Supported |
| Content | Equations | Supported |
| Content | Footnotes-Endnotes | Supported Custom separators not supported. |
| Content | Frames | Partially Supported When you save the Word 2007 document in .odt format:
Content that is not supported causes frames to be lost but not the content. The content that is not supported includes: tables, AutoShapes, text boxes, frames, and SmartArt graphics. |
| Content | Framesets | Not Supported |
| Content | Header-Footer | Supported |
| Content | Index | Supported Multiple columns indices currently not supported. |
| Content | Insert Break | Partially Supported When you save the Word 2007 document in .odt format, continuous section breaks might lose some properties, such as top/bottom margins, headers/footers, borders, and line numbering. |
| Content | Office Art | Supported See the Graphic Elements table for details. |
| Content | Page Numbering | Supported |
| Content | Pictures | Supported Pictures from a document created in OpenOffice are not displayed. |
| Content | Tables | Partially Supported Tables with more than 64 columns are not supported. Theme formatting is converted to cell level formatting. |
| Content | Templates and Wizards | Supported |
| Content | Text boxes | Partially Supported Text boxes cannot be nested. |
| Content | Table of Contents (TOC) | Partially Supported TOC loses items labeled with a SEQ field. |
| Content | Table of Authority (TOA) | Not Supported |
| Content | Table of Figures (TOF) | Not Supported |
| Content | E2O | Supported See the Graphic Elements table for details. |
| Editing | AutoComplete | Supported |
| Editing | AutoCorrect | Supported |
| Editing | AutoSummary | Not Supported |
| Editing | AutoText | Supported AutoText entries are stored in Word templates (.dotx). If you save a Word template with autotext entries in the .odt format, the autotext entries are not saved in the .odt version. |
| Editing | Change Case | Supported |
| Editing | Click and Type | Supported |
| Editing | Cut-Copy-Paste | Supported |
| Editing | Drag and Drop | Supported |
| Editing | Envelopes and Labels | Supported |
| Editing | Selection | Supported |
| Editing | Sort | Supported |
| Editing | Undo-Redo-Repeat | Supported |
| Editing | Word Count | Supported |
| File Operations | Binary File Format | Supported Can save to binary .doc and .dot file types. |
| File Operations | Bulletproofer | Supported |
| File Operations | Encryption | Not Supported |
| File Operations | Fixed File Format | Supported Can save to .pdf and .xps file types. |
| File Operations | HTML File Format | Supported Can save to .html file type. |
| File Operations | Master Documents | Not Supported |
| File Operations | Open XML File Format | Supported Can save to .docx and .dotm file types. |
| File Operations | Organizer | Supported |
| File Operations | RTF File Format | Supported Can save to .rtf file type. |
| File Operations | Text Converters | Supported |
| File Operations | Text Encoding | Supported |
| File Operations | Trust Center | Supported |
| File Operations | Word Converter | Supported |
| File Operations | WordML File Format | Supported Can save to WordML file type. |
| File Operations | WSS Integration | Supported |
| Formatting | Background | Not Supported |
| Formatting | Borders and Shading | Supported Patterns on shading not supported. Picture border styles are not supported. They are converted to a solid line. |
| Formatting | Bullets and Numbering | Supported Spacing between number/bullet and text might be slightly different. Spacing between list items increased to match line spacing of document. Default bullets in OpenOffice change appearance when .odt file is opened in Word 2007. |
| Formatting | Drop Caps | Supported Anchors to some regions of the margin are not supported. |
| Formatting | Format Consistency Checker | Supported |
| Formatting | Format Painter | Supported |
| Formatting | Highlighter | Supported The highlighting is converted to character background color when you save the document in .odt format. |
| Formatting | Horizontal Lines | Supported |
| Formatting | Paragraph | Supported |
| Formatting | Reveal Formatting | Supported |
| Formatting | Styles | Supported There is an increase in the number of styles after you save the document in .odt format, and all formatting in ODF is style based. |
| Formatting | Tabs | Supported Positional tabs are not supported. |
| Formatting | Text Columns | Supported Some properties associated with the section might be lost, for example, top/bottom margins, headers/footers, borders, or line numbering. |
| Formatting | Text Orientation | Partially Supported The following text orientation formats are supported:
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| Formatting | Themes | Not Supported |
| Formatting | Watermark | Not Supported |
| Formatting | Live Preview | Supported |
| Formatting | Positioning | Partially Supported The position of some text boxes, frames and shapes might change depending on the type of anchor used. |
| Infrastructure | Acetate | Supported When you save in the .odt format, content with content controls are converted to regular text. |
| Infrastructure | Bookmarks | Supported |
| Infrastructure | Boot-Quit | Supported |
| Infrastructure | Cicero - Handwriting - Speech | Supported |
| Infrastructure | DataBinding | Not Supported |
| Infrastructure | DDE | Not Supported Contents of field are converted to plain text. Link to data source is lost. |
| Infrastructure | Fields | Partially Supported Fields that are not supported are converted to plain text. Fields that are supported continue to be retained as fields. SEQ fields are not supported and affects the behavior of TOCs and captions. |
| Infrastructure | ActiveX/Forms | Not Supported |
| Infrastructure | Freeze Dry | Supported |
| Infrastructure | Help | Supported |
| Infrastructure | Hyperlinks | Supported Documents from OpenOffice do not have the hyperlink style applied but are still functional. |
| Infrastructure | Ink Comments | Not Supported |
| Infrastructure | Keyboard Customization | Not Supported |
| Infrastructure | OCX | Not Supported |
| Infrastructure | OLE | Partially Supported Objects embedded in document created in OpenOffice are not displayed. The image type is not supported, and the link is relative. |
| International | IME | Supported |
| International | Insert Symbol | Supported |
| International | Pluggable UI | Supported |
| International | Two Lines In One | Supported |
| MODI | OCR | Supported |
| Navigation | Document Map | Supported |
| Navigation | Find-Replace | Supported |
| Navigation | GoTo-GoBack | Supported |
| Printing | Supported | |
| Printing | Page Setup | Supported |
| Printing | Print Preview | Supported |
| Programmability | Addins | Partially Supported |
| Programmability | C-API | Partially Supported |
| Programmability | COM Addins | Partially Supported |
| Programmability | Events | Partially Supported |
| Programmability | Macros | Not Supported |
| Programmability | Object Model | Supported |
| Programmability | Smart Documents | Not Supported |
| Programmability | Smart Tags | Feature not available |
| Programmability | VBA Recording | Supported |
| Programmability | VBE Integration | Supported |
| Programmability | WordBasic | Supported |
| Proofing | Custom Dictionaries | Supported |
| Proofing | Grammar | Supported Areas of text that are marked "don't check spelling or grammar" will lose that property. Spelling and grammar will now be checked for that text. |
| Proofing | Hyphenation | Supported |
| Proofing | Intelligent AutoCorrect | Supported |
| Proofing | Language Autodetect | Supported |
| Proofing | Language Properties | Supported |
| Proofing | Spelling | Supported Areas of text that are marked "don't check spelling or grammar" will lose that property. Spelling and grammar will now be checked for that text. |
| Proofing | Thesaurus | Supported |
| Proofing | Translation | Supported |
| Research | Research Pane | Supported |
| View | Draft | Supported |
| View | Outline | Supported |
| View | Print Layout | Supported |
| View | Reading | Supported |
| View | Ruler | Supported |
| View | Scrolling | Supported |
| View | Status Bar | Supported |
| View | Thumbnails | Supported |
| View | Web Layout | Supported |
| View | Windowing | Supported |
| View | Zoom | Not Supported |
| WordMail | Autosignatures | Supported |
| WordMail | Fax | Supported |
| WordMail | HTML | Supported |
| WordMail | Options | Not Supported |
| WordMail | Plain Text | Supported |
| WordMail | RFM | supported |
| WordMail | RTF | Supported |
| XML | Attach Schema | Not Supported |
| XML | Attributes | Not Supported |
| XML | External Source | Not Supported |
| XML | Include Text | Not Supported |
| XML | Merge XML | Not Supported |
| XML | OOUI | Not Supported |
| XML | Selection Behaviors | Not Supported |
| XML | Tree View | Not Supported |
| XML | Validation | Not Supported |
| XML | XSLT | Not Supported |
Graphics Elements
The table below shows which Word graphics features are fully, partially, or not supported in the OpenDocument Format (.odt).
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Supported The Word format and the OpenDocument Format support this feature. Graphics using this feature generally appear and behave the same in either format.
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Partially Supported The Word format and the OpenDocument Format support this feature, but graphics might appear differently between the formats. No data is generally lost between the formats, but formatting and how you work with these graphics might be different.
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Not Supported Because of the unique differences of features and implementation between the Word format and the OpenDocument Format, this feature isn't supported in OpenDocument Format. If you plan to save your document in an OpenDocument Format, don't use these features.
| Basic shapes | Level of support |
| Shapes | Supported |
| Text boxes | Supported Supported except for objects in text boxes that are partially supported. SmartArt graphics, shapes, or text boxes inside a text box are not supported and are lost when you open the file. |
| WordArt | Supported |
| 3D shapes options | Supported |
| Pictures | Supported Supported except for the insert and link option that are not supported by ODF. |
| SmartArt diagrams | Supported Converted to a group of shapes. |
| ActiveX controls | Not Supported |
| Objects in charts | Supported Converted to a group containing the chart and objects. Word cannot support a group containing a chart so the objects are ungrouped when you open the file in Word. |
| Signature line object | Not Supported |
| Ink annotation | Supported The ink annotation is converted to an Enhanced MetaFile (EMF). (In Word 2007, it's converted to a freeform shape.) |
| Group of objects | Partially Supported Some objects cannot be grouped together in Word, so the objects are ungrouped when you open the OpenDocument file. This includes anything grouped with a chart, and a picture grouped with a shape, text box, or OLE object. |
| Object visibility | Partially Supported Invisible objects become visible after saving the file in .odt and opening again in Word. |
| Object borders | Supported Not all border styles are supported. Border styles that are not supported are saved as the default border style (black, solid line). |
| Object fills | Supported Supported except for gradient fills with more than two stops lose all stops after the first two. |
| Line formatting | Supported Not all line and line end styles are supported in ODF. Styles that are not supported are saved as the default, black solid line and open arrow type, respectively. |
| Picture cropping | Supported Regular cropping of a picture is supported. However, cropping a picture with a shape is not supported. |
| Picture recoloring | Partially Supported Some picture recoloring has the equivalent in ODF, such as black and white. Other picture recoloring does not have an equivalent and is flattened. The picture appears the same but the recoloring can no longer be changed or removed. |
| 3D picture options | Not Supported |
| Picture styles | Partially Supported Borders are partially supported, but might not look the same. |
| Themes | Not Supported |
| Hyperlink on shape | Not Supported |
Last updated 2015-8-17
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