Surely, once reviewing our team we have seen that the files on our computer have different extensions that are indicated at the end of it and that vary according to the type of file in question (images, documents, spreadsheets, music, among others).
You’ve probably also seen the extension .docx , which is nothing more than the default format in which Microsoft Word saves its files.
If you still don’t know what a .docx file is and what its use is, you will surely learn it after reading this post, which among other things will also teach you how to open these files with different programs and what are the differences of this type of files with those of its predecessor (.doc).
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What is it and what are files with extension used for? docx?
Files with DOCX extension are files based on the XML format, they can contain several separate elements in different formats, but can be stored within the same file.
This extension is the one that Microsoft Word uses by default to save your files since 2007, while previous versions use the DOC extension. These files are usually text documents in a certain style or format that can contain various objects in it.
In general, DOCX files are used to replace conventional documents in the middle of the digital era, thus adapting the advances in technology to the needs of companies, institutions and human beings.
How to open .docx files on smartphones or computers?
Once we know what they are, it is important that we know how we can access them from different platforms on computers or mobile devices.
On Windows PC or Mac
If you use Windows, the application par excellence to open DOCX files is undoubtedly the famous Microsoft Office Word. To open your files on a Windows computer you will simply have to locate it and double click on the file.
Another way to do it is by opening the program, for this we go to:
- «Start menu»> «All programs»> «Microsoft Office»> «Word»
- We wait for the program to load
- Let’s go to «File»> «Open»> «Computer»> «Browse»
- There you locate the folder and select the file you want to open.
Although in MacOS to have Microsoft Word you have to buy it and it is usually quite expensive, there are alternatives to open our DOCX files without problems.
To open our document in MacOS we will use a free word processor called TextEdit. The first step will be to use the key combination “Cmd (⌘) + Shift + A” from the desktop to display the list of applications and from them we will open TextEdit by double clicking.
Once we have opened TexEdit we will go to the “File”> “Open” option and select the document with the DOCX extension that we wish to open.
On Android and iOS mobile phones
Yes, we already know that our needs are expanding and that we not only need to open text documents on our computers, but we want them to be within reach of our mobile devices. Therefore we will also tell you how to open these DOCX files on Android or iOS.
In the case of Android you can choose from a wide variety of office applications that will allow you to view and edit your files with DOCX extension quickly and easily. We can choose between OfficeSuite or WPS Office, to name a few programs. As simple as installing the application, open the word processor that includes any of these apps and from there open the file we want.
We can also use Microsoft Office Mobile as long as we use a mobile device, since this app developed by Microsoft is not available for tablets.
If we use iOS devices, we have the possibility of using a native Apple program like Pages or we can pay to use the premium version of Docs To Go.
LibreOffice Writer
Writer is the name that the OpenOffice program’s open source word processor receives that can be used on Linux, Windows or MacOS. It is certainly one of the best alternatives to Microsoft Word to open our files with a DOCX or DOC extension.
OpenOffice Writer
Although LibreOffice has displaced you, OpenOffice is still a very good alternative and its Writer word processor is suitable for us to open our files DOCX on our computer.
WPS Writer
Although the popularity of WPS Office has been given in its version for mobile devices, it is also at our disposal so that in our computer we have this great office application. Your word processor is a pretty good option to open files with a DOCX extension.
AbiWord
It may not be the best option in terms of word processors and as it is outdated for Windows, we may not find the same functions in Microsoft Word. But, this open source program will also be useful if we want to open and edit our DOCX files.
Google Docs
One of the best options we have at our disposal is undoubtedly Google’s function that we can save, view and edit files in the cloud. We will only have to enter Google Drive and access with our Gmail account. There we will have the opportunity to upload the documents we want or create a new one.
Word Online
Finally, we also have the possibility to use the Microsoft Office Online tool, which unlike the desktop is completely free. Although this option is not as fast as Google Docs or the Microsoft Word application for our computer, it means an important alternative if we want to open our DOCX files.
What are the differences between .Doc and .Docx files? Can they be converted?
The difference between files with DOC extension and DOCX goes beyond appending a letter at the end. After the universal use of the DOC format for a long time, Microsoft decided to develop files based on Extensible Markup Language (XML) as a way forward in view of the increasing pressure exerted by the popularity of OpenOffice, its open source competitor .
Consequently, the DOC format was replaced by DOCX in the 2007 version of Microsoft Word, at the same time as XLS by XLSX in Excel and PPT by PPTX in the case of Power Point.
Currently, there are not many reasons to continue using the DOC extension files, except in the case that we want to recover some old file or we have a very outdated word processor, which could be the case of earlier versions of Word.
If for some reason we want to convert a DOCX file to DOC we will simply have to open it in Word or in any of the other word processors mentioned above and use the «File» function > «Save as», selecting DOC as the new format.
However, it is not absolutely necessary that you perform the file conversion since Microsoft already allows us to download and install on our computer an add-on for old versions of Office that will allow us to open and edit these DOCX files Great, right?
If you still prefer to convert the file and you don’t have a text processor of the aforementioned ones at hand, you can have some specialized software to convert these files as Docx2rtf or through online services such as Zamzar.com so you can open your file even if you have an old version of Microsoft Word.