Markdown to Word

A Markdown to Word converter that writes real .docx

This online Markdown to Word converter reads your document with a GitHub-flavored Markdown parser and builds the Word file element by element, right in the browser. Every # heading becomes Word's Heading 1–6 style, lists get real numbering (so renumbering and indenting work the way Word users expect), tables become native Word tables, and images are embedded in the file. Nothing is sent to a server — the .docx is assembled on your device and downloaded directly.

That matters more than it sounds: a lot of "convert Markdown to Word" tools render HTML and save it with a .doc extension. Word opens those in compatibility mode, lists turn into typed bullets, and styles are gone. A proper Markdown to DOCX conversion gives you a document your colleagues can keep editing without noticing it started life as Markdown.

How to convert Markdown to a Word document

• Add your Markdown. Paste it, type it, open a .md file, or drag the file onto the editor. Drop image files at the same time and relative image paths like ./images/chart.png get embedded.
• Check the preview. It uses the font and size you pick, so it's a close stand-in for how Word will lay the text out.
• Set up the document. Choose a font (Calibri, Aptos, Arial, Times New Roman, Georgia…), base size, line spacing, A4 or US Letter, margins, page numbers, and an optional table of contents. Settings are remembered in this browser.
• Download the .docx. The file is named after your first heading. Open it in Word, Google Docs, Pages, or LibreOffice.

What each Markdown element becomes in Word

• # to ###### → Heading 1 to Heading 6 styles, bookmarked so [links](#heading) jump inside the document
• **bold**, *italic*, ~~strikethrough~~ → character formatting; `inline code` → the "Verbatim Char" monospace style
• [links](https://…) and bare URLs → clickable Word hyperlinks
• - and 1. lists → Word bullet and numbering definitions, nested up to nine levels, with custom start numbers kept
• - [ ] task lists → ☐ and ☒ checkboxes
• Tables → Word tables with borders, column alignment, a shaded header row that repeats on every page, and widths sized to the content
• ```fenced code``` → the "Source Code" paragraph style: monospace, shaded, syntax-colored
• > block quotes → the "Block Text" style with an indented side bar (nested quotes indent further)
• --- → a horizontal rule; images → embedded pictures scaled to the page width (SVG and WebP are converted to PNG so Word can show them)
• Inline HTML such as <sup>, <sub>, <mark>, <u>, <br>, and <img width> is honored too

The style names match the ones Pandoc uses, so a document made here and a document made with Pandoc look alike, and both convert back cleanly with a Word to Markdown converter.

Markdown to DOCX on the command line with Pandoc

If you convert Markdown to Word regularly — in a build, a script, or a folder full of notes — Pandoc is the standard command-line Markdown to DOCX converter. Install it with brew install pandoc, winget install pandoc, or your Linux package manager, then:

# the basic pandoc markdown to word command
pandoc input.md -o output.docx

# github-flavored markdown, with a table of contents
pandoc -f gfm input.md -o output.docx --toc

# use your own fonts, colors, and heading styles
pandoc -o reference.docx --print-default-data-file reference.docx
#   …edit the styles in reference.docx in word, save, then:
pandoc input.md -o output.docx --reference-doc=reference.docx

# images referenced relative to another folder
pandoc input.md -o output.docx --resource-path=.:docs/images

# convert every .md file in a folder
for f in *.md; do pandoc "$f" -o "${f%.md}.docx"; done

The reference-doc trick is the Pandoc way to get company templates: Pandoc copies the styles (not the content) from that file into every document it writes.

Python: Markdown to DOCX libraries

There's no single pure-Python Markdown to Word library as complete as Pandoc, so the common answers are:

• pypandoc — a thin wrapper around Pandoc and the most faithful option. pip install pypandoc_binary bundles Pandoc itself.
• python-docx + a Markdown parser— python-docx writes .docx files but doesn't understand Markdown. Parse with Python-Markdown or markdown-it-py, then either walk the tokens yourself (full control over styles) or feed the HTML to a helper like htmldocx.

# pip install pypandoc_binary
import pypandoc

pypandoc.convert_file(
    "input.md", "docx",
    outputfile="output.docx",
    extra_args=["--toc", "--reference-doc=reference.docx"],
)

# pip install python-docx markdown htmldocx
import markdown
from docx import Document
from htmldocx import HtmlToDocx

html = markdown.markdown(open("input.md").read(), extensions=["tables", "fenced_code"])
doc = Document()
HtmlToDocx().add_html_to_document(html, doc)
doc.save("output.docx")

Tips for a clean Markdown to Word conversion

• Start the file with a single # title — it names the download and becomes the document title in file properties.
• Don't skip heading levels (# then ###); Word's navigation pane and TOC nest by level, so skipped levels look odd.
• Leave a blank line before lists and tables — Markdown needs it, and without it they turn into plain paragraphs.
• For Google Docs, upload the .docx to Drive and open it with Google Docs; styles map to Google Docs' own heading styles.
• Need a fixed-layout file instead of an editable one? The Markdown to PDF converter prints the same Markdown to a PDF.

Frequently asked questions