How to Convert From Word to Excel

By Joshua Laud

Word tables can be imported into Excel.
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The Microsoft Office suite contains a set of widely used productivity applications. Microsoft Word is word processing software and Microsoft Excel is spreadsheet management software. Although there's no standard way to export Word data to Excel because the two file types serve different purposes, you can easily copy a table or other separated data from a Microsoft Word document and import it into Excel.

Copy a Table

Step 1

Open the Microsoft Word document containing the table that you want to copy.

Step 2

Mouse over the table so that the four-pointer square icon appears to the top left of the table.

Step 3

Click the pointer icon to select all data in the table.

Step 4

Press "Ctrl-C" on your keyboard. Alternately, click "Edit" and then click "Copy" to copy the data to your system clipboard.

Step 5

Open Microsoft Excel and create a new document by clicking "File" and "New" if an existing document isn't already open.

Step 6

Click the cell where you want your table to begin.

Step 7

Press"Ctrl-V" on your keyboard or click "Edit," then click "Paste" to paste the data you copied from Word into your Excel document.

Copying Other Data

Step 1

Open the Microsoft Word document containing the data you need to copy to Excel.

Step 2

Separate the data by pressing "Tab." A tab will define where a new column begins when Excel imports the data. Separate all data with tabs.

Step 3

Click "File" and select "Save As." Click the "Format" drop-down menu and choose "Plain Text (.txt)" from the list.

Step 4

Click "Save" and "OK."

Step 5

Open Microsoft Excel.

Step 6

Click "File" and then click "Import." Choose "Text File," locate your exported text file from Word, and click "Get Data."

Step 7

Click "Next" in the Text Import Wizard. Under the "Delimiters" options, check "Tab" if it is not already checked. Click "Finish."

Step 8

Choose a location for your imported data in the Excel worksheet and click "OK." Your data will be imported into Excel.

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