Have you written a school research, an essay or even a book in Microsoft Word saving each chapter as a separate file and now are you looking for a way to bring it all together? Maybe I can help you out and help you understand how to merge Word files . There are various ways to do this, each with its pros and cons.
You can take advantage of the famous software included in Microsoft’s Office suite, an alternative software or take a slightly more complex path – the creation of a script – and keep the formatting of all the documents to be merged in an almost perfect way. It is up to you to choose the solution that best suits your needs.
How do you say? Do you prefer to use an online service or a smartphone app? Don’t worry, there is a solution for you too. To find out in detail all the steps to take, read on. Find everything explained below!
Index
- How to merge Word files into one file on PC
- Microsoft Word (Windows/macOS)
- LibreOffice (Windows/macOS/Linux)
- How to merge Word files into one online file
- Aspose
- GroupDOCS
- App to merge Word files into one file
How to merge Word files into one file on PC
Combining two Word files to create a single text from two separate documents is a very simple operation that can be performed in various ways and with different tools. Whether you want to know how to proceed from Windows or how to merge two Word files on Mac , fear not: everything is explained below.
Microsoft Word (Windows/macOS)
Word is Microsoft’s Office package writer, available as a subscription service or one-time purchase software ( more info here ), but if you’re on this tutorial you probably already have it.
Therefore, if you have Word and are dealing with documents without special formatting (therefore mostly composed of text and without images or tables), you can merge them using the Insert file function included in all the most recent editions of the software.
All you have to do is open the first file to be merged, place the Word cursor at the end of the document (or in any case where you want to import the other files) and select the Insert tab located at the top left.
At this point, click on the arrow located next to the Object button (the window icon located in the upper right corner), select the Text from file item from the menu that appears and choose the Word files you want to add to it that you have already opened. If you don’t know how to select multiple files at the same time, just hold down the Ctrl key on the keyboard ( cmd on Mac) and click on the icons of the documents to be selected.
Now, use the mouse pointer to arrange the documents in the order you prefer (just move their titles to the left sidebar) and save the final result as a DOCX , ODT , PDF or XPS file according to those you are your needs.
Note: Documents added in Word only retain basic formatting, i.e. bold, italicized text etc. The color of the text, the order of the images, tables and other “complex” elements are often lost or, in any case, are not reported faithfully compared to the original documents.
If, on the other hand, you are dealing with documents with complex formatting and you want to merge them while keeping the contents intact, you can “get your hands dirty” with the code and use a macro . What is it about? Of a small script that, once pasted in the Visual Basic panel included in Word, allows you to automate the process of unification of DOC or DOCX documents.
Before starting, gather all the documents to be merged in the same folder , make sure they are all of the same format (so DOC or DOCX) and rename them so that their alphabetical order respects the order in which you want to merge them (then change their names in something like document1 , document2 etc., so you can be sure they are all precisely in order).
Once all the files to be merged have been prepared, open Microsoft Word and activate the display of the Developer tab in the program toolbar. If you don’t know how to do it, don’t worry, all you have to do is click on the File button located at the top left, go to Options and select the Ribbon Customization item from the left sidebar. At this point, put the check mark next to the Development item located in the Main Cards panel (on the right), click OK and you’re done.
You are now ready to take action! Start the creation of a new Word document, select the Development tab from the program toolbar and click on the Macro icon located at the top left.
In the window that opens, type any name for your macro (eg MergeDocs , the important thing is that it is without spaces), click on the Create button and paste the following code in the Visual Basic panel deleting everything already written in the window.
Sub MergeDocs() Dim rng As Range Dim MainDoc As Document Dim strFile As String
Const strFolder = “C:\Documenti\”;
Set MainDoc = Documents.Add strFile = Dir$(strFolder & “*.docx”) Do Until strFile = “” Set rng = MainDoc.Range rng.Collapse wdCollapseEnd rng.InsertFile strFolder & strFile strFile = Dir$() Loop End Sub
Instead of C:\Documenti\you have to enter the complete path of the folder where you gathered the documents to be merged (don’t forget the \final one) while instead of strFile = Dir$(strFolder & “*.docx”)you can write strFile = Dir$(strFolder & “*.doc”)if the files to be merged are in DOC format and not DOCX. If you want to quickly copy the path of the folder where you copied the documents to be merged, right-click on it while holding the Shift key on the keyboard and select the Copy as path item from the menu that opens.
At this point, click on the floppy icon located at the top left to save your script, close the Visual Basic panel and run the macro to merge your documents.
To run the macro, go to the Word Development tab, click on the Macro icon at the top left, select the name of the script you created just now and click on the Run button . Within a few seconds a single Word file will be created containing all the documents you copied to the folder indicated in the script.
To save the final result – no surprise -, click on the File button located at the top left and select the Save as item from the menu that appears. You can export the output document as a DOC / DOCX , ODT , PDF or XPS file according to your preferences.
LibreOffice (Windows/macOS/Linux)
Isn’t Microsoft Office installed on your PC but LibreOffice ? No problem. You can also merge Word files with this excellent free and open source productivity suite: just take advantage of the Master Document function that allows you to easily combine the contents of two or more DOC , DOCX or ODT (OpenDocument) files.
To create a new master document with LibreOffice (or even OpenOffice , the procedure does not change), start the creation of a new standard Writer document , then click on the arrow located next to the sheet icon at the top left and select the item Master document from the menu that appears.
At this point, click on the Insert button located in the window that has just opened (the sheet icon with a horizontal arrow) and choose the File item from the menu that appears. Then select the documents to merge and arrange them in the order you prefer using the mouse. This is an extremely quick and easy operation.
When you are satisfied with the result, click on the floppy icon located at the top left, assign a name you want to assign to the output document and select the folder in which you want to archive it.
You can export the final file in any format you want, including PDF . In the latter case, click on File , then choose Export as> Export to PDF format… and that’s it.
How to merge Word files into one online file
Don’t have Microsoft Word trial period and don’t want to install other software on your computer? Thanks to the online options, with an Internet connection at your disposal, you can easily merge Word documents into a single file without having to go through complex steps. How? I’ll show you the procedure immediately.
I want to clarify that I will not propose Word Online or Google Drive , as apart from the classic manual copy and paste , they do not provide functions dedicated to the union of multiple documents. Also remember that when you use cloud based services you can never have complete control over the sort of your files, which pass through remote servers and theoretically could remain there (better, therefore, not to use them with files containing sensitive data).
Aspose
The first online option that I propose is that of Aspose , a site that allows you to merge up to 10 Word files, with the possibility of setting specific parameters such as the OCR function (for optical character recognition) and the output format (if you want to). transform the destination Word file into a different document, such as a PDF).
All you have to do to use this tool is to go to the official page and click on the Choose Word file button , selecting the ones you want to merge. To be able to easily sort them, I always recommend that you rename them progressively ( document1 , document2 and so on).
After uploading, you will see the names of the files in the central box, click on the green arrows corresponding to each of them to sort them and, when you have completed the operation, click on the button at the bottom right that shows the Merge item .
At the end of the operation you will see several buttons: by clicking on Download you will save the final document on your computer, if you choose Upload to Google you will import the file to Google Drive while if you choose Upload to Dropbox you will save it on the cloud service of the same name .
GroupDOCS
Another useful site for processing Word documents is GroupDOCS , where by loading Word files it is possible to merge them in order to have a single final document. One of the advantages of the site is that it has no file size limitations.
To start using it you have to go to the official page and drag the documents into the central box, where it says Click or drop your file here .
After loading, you will see a new rectangle at the bottom with the files positioned inside: you can move them as you like by clicking with the mouse on each of them and dragging them to the position you want. When you have created the order of your liking, click on the Merge Now button below.
After a few seconds you will see the message The files have been successfully merged , click on Download now to download the final document to your computer.
App to merge Word files into one file
If you have a smartphone or tablet and are looking for apps to merge Word files , there are some solutions that might be for you. Also in this case I do not recommend the Word app as it only provides manual copy and paste and does not function ad hoc for merging files.
Instead, you can think of contacting Aspose.Words , available for Android (also on alternative stores ) and iOS / iPadOS ), which just like the website of the same name I told you about before, provides a function to merge Word documents.
After downloading and installing the app , open it and select the box at the bottom left, where it says Merge . On the next screen, navigate through the folders on your device and choose the first Word file to merge, then tap Add another document and choose the next, continue this procedure until you have selected all the Word files you want.
When finished, choose Merge selected documents and wait for the upload. Rename the document by tapping on MergedDocuments and typing the name you prefer, then tap Save to complete the procedure. Again, the processing takes place on the cloud, take that into account.