Differences between the OpenDocument Text (.odt) format and the Word (.docx) format

When you save a file from Microsoft Word 2010 in the OpenDocument Text (.odt) format, and then open it again in Word 2010, you might notice some formatting differences between the Word 2010 version and the OpenDocument version. Likewise, you might also see formatting differences when you open an OpenDocument file in Word 2010. This is because of the different features that the file formats support.

Note The differences you will experience when you work with two file formats is generally constrained to formatting differences and feature availability. Data and content will convert, but how you format and interact with the data and content might be different between the formats.

If you want to switch your default file format to or from ODF or OpenXML (or other formats) , do the following:

Click the File tab.
Under Help, click Options.
Click Save, and then under Save documents, in the Save files in this format list, click the file format that you want to use by default.

What happens when I save a Word 2010 document in the OpenDocument Text format?

The table below shows which Word 2010 features are fully, partially, or not supported in the OpenDocument (.odt) format.

Supported Both Word 2010 and the OpenDocument Text format support this feature. Content, formatting, and usability will not be lost.
Partially Supported Both Word 2010 and the OpenDocument Text format support this feature, but formatting and usability might be affected. No text or data is lost, but formatting and how you work with text or graphics might be different.
Not Supported The feature in Word 2010 is not supported in the OpenDocument Text format. If you plan to save your Word 2010 document in the OpenDocument Text format, do not use this feature or you risk losing content, formatting, and usability of that part of your document.

For information about graphic features Microsoft Office 2010 in that are fully, partially, or not supported in the OpenDocument Format, see the Graphic Elements table at the end of this article.

Area	Subarea	Level of support	Comments
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 2010, 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 2010 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 2010 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 2010 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 2010 document in .odt format: Frames are converted to text boxes. Anchors to some regions in the margin are not supported. Content that is not supported causes frames to be lost but not the content. The content that is not supported include: 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 2010 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 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 are 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 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 14 Converter	Supported
File Operations	WordML File Format	Supported	Can save to WordML file type.
File Operations	WSS Integration	Supported
Formatting	AutoFormat
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 2010.
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: rltb: right to left, top to bottom lrtb: left to right, top to bottom tbrl: top to bottom; right to left Text orientation in a table cell is not supported.
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	Not Supported
Programmability	VBA Recording	Supported
Programmability	VBE Integration	Supported
Programmability	WordBasic	Supported
Proofing	Custom Dictionaries	Supported
Proofing	Grammar	Supported	Areas of text that 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 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 Features

The table below shows which Word 2010 graphics features are fully, partially, or not supported in the OpenDocument Format (.odt).

Supported The Word 2010 format and the OpenDocument Format support this feature. Graphics using this feature generally appear and behave the same in either format.
Partially Supported The Word 2010 format and the OpenDocument Format support this feature, but graphics might appear different between the formats. No data is generally lost between the formats, but formatting and how you work with these graphics might be different.
Not Supported Because of the unique differences of features and implementation between the Word 2010 format and the OpenDocument Format, this feature is not supported in OpenDocument Format. If you plan to save your document in an OpenDocument Format, do not use these features in Word 2010.

Basic Shapes	Level of support	Comments
Shapes	Supported
Text boxes	Supported	Supported except for objects in text boxes that are partially supported for Word 2010. 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 2010 cannot support a group containing a chart so the objects are ungrouped when you open the file in Word 2010.
Signature line object	Not Supported
Ink annotation	Supported	The ink annotation is converted to an Enhanced Metafile (EMF) image.
Group of objects	Partially Supported	Some objects cannot be grouped together in Word 2010, 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 2010.
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

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