The contents of a new Word document can be viewed by unzipping its contents. DOCX File Format Specifications - More InformationĪ Docx file comprises of a collection of XML files that are contained inside a ZIP archive. The new file type has added advantages of small file sizes, fewer changes of corruption and well-formatted images representation. By 2007, this new file format became part of Office 2007 and is carried on in the new versions of Microsoft Office as well. Documents under this new Standard were given. It was in early 2000 when Microsoft decided to go for the change to accommodate the standard for Office Open XML. In addition, the competition from Open Office in the form of its Open Document Format, compelled Microsoft to adopt more open and wide standards. Brief HistoryĪfter Microsoft opened the specifications for the DOC file format, it was easy for its competitors to reverse engineer the format and provide the same support in their own applications. Docx files can be opened with Word 2007 and lateral versions but not with the earlier versions of MS Word which support DOC file extensions. Introduced from 2007 with the release of Microsoft Office 2007, the structure of this new Document format was changed from plain binary to a combination of XML and binary files. DOCX is a well-known format for Microsoft Word documents. Our all-time favorite password manager, LastPass has an extension to extend its amazing capabilities to store all your logins to the Edge browser.

Microsoft word file extensions list