A basic free ‘Word for the web’ program is also available online for Microsoft account holders. Microsoft Office was designed for the Windows operating system, but you can also install Office apps on other operating systems like Apple’s macOS and Google’s ChromeOS. Word is part of Microsoft Office, which is available as a paid software application or accessed online with a Microsoft 365 subscription. They can include pictures, charts, and graphs, as well as plain or formatted text, and can also contain an editable template. DOC and DOCX are used for formatted text documents like reports, letters or resumes.

Since 2007, Word has used DOCX as standard, although you can still open DOC files and can still save to the older format. DOC was primarily used by Microsoft for its Word program until 2003. You would typically create a PDF if you wanted to ensure document fidelity, to make it more secure, or to create a copy for storage.ĭOC and DOCX are the most common word processing file formats. Creating a PDF can involve compressing a file, making it take up less storage space. They can be viewed on almost all devices. PDF files aren’t typically created from scratch, but are usually converted, saved or ‘printed’ from other documents or images before sharing, publishing online or storing.

It is maintained by the International Organisation for Standardization (ISO). The PDF format is now a standard open format that isn’t just available under Adobe Acrobat. The format has evolved to allow for editing and interactive elements like electronic signatures or buttons. It was developed by Adobe so people could share documents regardless of which device, operating system, or software they were using, while preserving the content and formatting. PDF stands for ‘Portable Document Format’ file.

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