How to open Pages documents on Windows in Word and Office

Photo by Ana Rivarola on Unsplash

Apple users have access to a free and effective Microsoft Word alternative called Pages, but one of the most frequent errors Pages users make is to send files saved in that format to Windows users. Here’s what to do if you receive a Pages file on a Windows system.

How to open Pages documents on Windows

Pages is a useful application if you want to design attractive documents, posters or other items of stationery. While I use Word most of the time, I find Pages to be a much easier to use tool for creative work. All the same, I’ve fallen for the fault of accidentally sending people a file in the application’s default .pages format, which will only open in Pages – unless you know this tip.

All it takes is a little file modification.

The answer in brief:

Open the Pages document, change the extension to .zip and it will open fine in Word or Office on Windows systems. You can also use an online file conversion utility such as CloudConvert or Zamzar.

How it’s done

• Save the Pages document to your Windows system where it can be found using Windows Explorer.
• Make a copy of the document.
• Right-click on the copy and choose rename.
• Delete the .pages extension and replace it with .zip.
• (You may need to open Folder Options>View>Uncheck.
• Tap Enter to save the change.

Now when you choose to open the renamed Pages document with the .zip extension it will open happily in Word or Office.

You may find some formatting problems if the page layout is complex.

An alternative solution

There are online file conversion sites that will convert documents for you via your web browser. While I can’t recommend these for any confidential documents, unless you run a security check against these services to satisfy they are secure enough for you, here are two good services that will convert Pages files for you.

CloudConvert: Create .doc files from Pages documents. Will convert a massive range of additional document formats.

Zamzar: Another online utility which will convert files for you.

The best solution

If saving documents in Pages, why not save them as PDFs to share with others on other devices and platforms?

Please explore even more tips here.

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