Using Apple Pages: Save as Word File Guide

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Using Apple Pages: Save as Word File Guide
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Apple Pages: How to Save As Word Documents

For those of us who find Apple Pages to be a superior word processing program for some of the more everyday uses, such as writing term papers and composing letters, but find that most others need our documents in a Microsoft Word format (.doc), we must learn how to correctly save our .pages files as Word documents. Follow the steps below: Apple Pages save as Word.

256x-word2011icon-tjl

Step-by-Step Guide to Convert Pages to Word

  1. Open the Pages document that you want to convert in Pages.
  2. Once this file is open, you will want to click on File in the Menu bar that runs across the top of the screen.
  3. From the File drop down box, click Save As…
  4. This will bring up the dialogue box pictured below. Check the empty box next to “Save copy as”
  5. Make sure the copy is set to “Word Document”
  6. Choose where you want these documents saved, and click Save.

Once you’ve completed those steps, you’ll have two copies of the same document, one in a .pages format and another in a .doc format. Remember that if you continue to do work in Pages, you will need to re-save, following the instructions above. Unless you save another copy, Pages will only save the changes you make to the Pages version, not the Word version. It’s best to do this conversion after you’ve finished creating, revising, and editing the document.

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A Few More Tips

There are a couple of things that you’ll want to be aware of as you are following this procedure. After you convert your Pages document to a Word format, open the document in Word (if you can) to verify that nothing has been lost in the conversion. I would specifically check things like spacing, indentations, blocked quotes, and special characters. I’ve had issues with some of these in the past, especially blocked quotes when it came time to print. Just take the time to double check.

Also, if there is ever the option on a later version of Pages that prompts you to save as either a .doc or .docx, it would be a good idea to choose .doc unless you are certain that the person that will be opening this file uses Word 2007 or later. Prior versions of Word will only open .doc files, not .docx (crazy, I know, right?). So, until the newer versions of Word become more ubiquitous, I would suggest playing it safe with the .doc designation. We don’t want to run into any compatibility issues.

If you’re having trouble figuring this process out, please feel free to leave a comment and ask any questions that you have. But, once you do this once or twice, you won’t have any problem at all turning your Pages Files into Word documents.

References

Apple Pages icon from https://aepdev.org/images/pages.png?1267674900

Microsoft Word icon from https://www.blogcdn.com/www.tuaw.com/media/2010/11/256x-word2011icon-tjl.jpg

Screenshot copyrighted by Apple, Inc.