When a client has Microsoft Word documents that need to be converted to HTML, my tool of choice has been Word2CleanHTML.
It’s a free online site that allows you to paste the content of your Word document into an online form and quickly convert the content to clean HTML.
I liked Word2CleanHTML so much that I decided to write about it.
I’ve been happily using it for my conversions until last month, when one of the people I’ve met through Twitter introduced me to a different HTML conversion tool.
And after testing it out, I agreed. It’s a much better tool. And yes, I’ve switched.
Word HTML
Another free online tool, I discovered Word HTML has more conversion features than Word2CleanHTML.
In addition, it offers wider support for multiple document formats, including Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, Google Docs, and Google Sheets.
Like Word2CleanHTML, you copy your content from your source document into the Word HTML online form.
When you visit the form, you’ll notice a world of options for editing the content in the Word Editor tab, similar to the options you find in many word processing applications.
You can copy the format of your existing content into the form. Or reformat the content with different headings, font styles, or colors. Add a table if you choose.
Or you can even start a new file from scratch.
Once you’re ready to convert your content, select the HTML tab to see your converted code.
And here’s where you’ll find more ways that Word HTML shines.
The HTML code is much cleaner, with no added line breaks or extra spaces.
Additionally, the options in the HTML tab allow you to:
- Set code indentation (which I love!)
- Compress the HTML code
- Enable/disable encoding
- Remove inline styles
- Remove classes and IDs
- Delete empty tags or tags with one space
What You Need to Know about Word HTML
I’ve used Word HTML to successfully convert structured Microsoft Word and Google Docs documents, with images, to HTML.
Documents are converted quickly into clean code; headings are converted to the appropriate HTML h(x) headings. There are no issues with paragraph or list conversion.
Alternative text for images are included in the HTML code, something that Word2CleanHTML doesn’t do.
Other than adding code indentation, which Word HTML does easily, there’s no extra work I need to do after document conversion to HTML code.
Closing Thoughts
Like anyone who works on the web, I have a toolkit of my favorite tools and resources that I use in my projects.
And I regularly review which ones to keep and which ones need to be replaced. Thanks to Tadeusz Szewczyk for recommending Word HTML to me.
It makes converting documents to HTML a lot quicker and easier, with no extra work on my part. What a great find!
