Word to Markdown Converter

How to convert Word to Markdown

1. Drop a .docx on the box above, or click Choose .docx. Try a sample shows the output first.
2. Check the Markdown against the rendered preview, and edit it in place if anything needs a tweak.
3. Click Copy Markdown to paste it somewhere, or Download .md to save the file.

What each Word feature becomes in Markdown

The output is GitHub Flavored Markdown, so tables, strikethrough, and footnotes use the GFM syntax that GitHub, Obsidian, and most editors render:

Styles, not looks

Word stores two kinds of formatting. A style says what a paragraph is (Heading 2, Quote, List Bullet); direct formatting only says how it looks (18pt, bold, blue). Markdown can only express the first kind, so the converter reads styles for structure and keeps direct formatting only where Markdown has a match: bold, italic, strikethrough, and code.

In practice, a document built with the Styles gallery converts cleanly, and one where headings were made by hand comes out as bold paragraphs. Custom house styles still work when they are based on a built-in heading style, which is how most corporate templates are set up. The Markdown headings guide shows what the # levels mean on the Markdown side.

Lists keep their numbers and their nesting

Whether a Word list is bulleted or numbered is defined in the document's numbering part, not in the text, so the converter looks it up there instead of guessing from the first character. Nested items are indented to the content column of their parent (two spaces under a bullet, three under1.), which is what CommonMark needs for the nesting to survive. The lists guide explains that rule.

Tables, images, and what does not convert

Word tables become pipe tables with the first row as the header. Markdown has no merged cells, so a cell spanning two columns is followed by an empty one to keep the columns lined up, and line breaks inside a cell become <br>. See the tables guide for what pipe tables can and cannot hold.

Images keep their alt text and point at the file inside the .docx. Text boxes, comments, equations, SmartArt, headers, and footers are left out; underline and font colors are dropped because Markdown has no syntax for them (the underline and color guides cover the HTML workarounds).

Word to Markdown for ChatGPT and Claude

A common reason to convert now is to give a document to an AI model. Markdown keeps the heading hierarchy and table structure that a model uses to understand a document, at a fraction of the tokens of the .docx XML. The Markdown for AI guide covers why that structure helps.

Other ways to convert Word to Markdown

A browser tool is quickest for one document. For many files or image-heavy documents, use one of these instead.

pandoc report.docx -t gfm --extract-media=. -o report.md

File → Download → Markdown (.md)

pip install 'markitdown[docx]'
markitdown report.docx -o report.md

Going the other way? The Markdown to Word converter writes a .docx with Word's own heading styles.

Frequently asked questions

How do I convert a Word document to Markdown?

Drop the .docx on the converter above, or click Choose .docx. The Markdown appears next to a rendered preview; edit it if you like, then click Copy Markdown or Download .md. The file is read in your browser and never uploaded.

Can Word save a document as Markdown?

No. Word has no Markdown option in Save As or Export, and its Save as Web Page output is HTML full of Office-specific markup that converts badly. The usual routes are a converter like this one, Pandoc on the command line, or a paid Windows add-in such as Writage.

Why do my headings come out as plain bold text?

Because they were never headings in Word. The converter reads Word's paragraph styles, so text set in Heading 1 becomes # and Heading 2 becomes ##. Text that was only made big and bold has no heading style and comes through as a bold paragraph. In Word, click into the line and pick Heading 1 from the Styles gallery, then convert again. Custom styles based on a Heading style are recognised.

Can it convert an old .doc file?

No. A .doc is Word's binary format from before 2007 and cannot be read in the browser. Open it in Word, LibreOffice, or Google Docs and save it as .docx first.

What happens to images?

Each image becomes a Markdown image with its alt text, pointing at the path Word stores it under, such as media/image1.png. The pictures stay inside the .docx: rename a copy of the file to .zip and the word/media folder holds them. Pandoc's --extract-media option does that step for you.

How do I convert Google Docs to Markdown?

Google Docs can do it on its own: File, Download, Markdown (.md). For a selection, turn on Tools, Preferences, Enable Markdown, then right-click and choose Copy as Markdown. If you already have the document as a .docx, this converter gives the same result without opening Docs.

Are tracked changes and comments included?

Tracked insertions are kept and tracked deletions are dropped, so you get the document as it would read with every change accepted. Comments are not included. Accept or reject changes in Word first if you need a specific version.

Is my document uploaded anywhere?

No. A .docx is a zip of XML files; the converter unzips and reads it with JavaScript in your browser. Nothing is sent to a server, so it works with your network disconnected.