How to Convert Excel Spreadsheets to Word

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Although Microsoft Word can't open Microsoft Excel files directly, you can incorporate worksheet data in a Word document to provide numeric support for a sales or profit forecast, project quotation or employee-roster report. Whether you bring Excel data into your word processing file through the clipboard or by converting your Excel worksheet into a file that Word can open, you can incorporate your data in various ways, depending on how you want to use it in Word.

Paste Special

Select the cells that contain the Microsoft Excel data you want to incorporate into a Word file. Press "Ctrl-C" to copy your data to the clipboard. Switch to your Word document and the "Home" tab in the ribbon. Click on the arrow below "Paste" and select "Paste Special" from the drop-down menu that appears. You also can press "Ctrl-Alt-V" to trigger Paste Special.

Select "Paste Link" from the Paste Special dialog box and choose "Microsoft Excel Worksheet Object." The cells you copied appear in your Word file.

Double-click on your pasted Excel data to switch to Excel and edit the material. When you return to Word, your changes appear.

Save As Text

Click on the "File" tab in the Microsoft Excel ribbon. Click on "Save As" to open the Save As dialog box.

Click on the "Save as Type" drop-down menu and select "Text (Tab Delimited)." Choose a location for your text file and save your current worksheet in TXT format.

Switch to Microsoft Word. Press "Ctrl-O" and navigate to the location of the TXT file you saved from Excel. Double-click on its name to open it.

Select the text you exported from Excel. Switch to the Insert tab on the ribbon and click on the arrow below "Tables." Select "Convert Text to Tables" and use the "Tab" option to separate your text.