All about DOTX files

DOTX – Word Document Template is Microsoft's template format for Word since Office 2007. As part of the Office Open XML family (OOXML, e.g. XLSX or DOCX), it replaces the older DOT format.

The difference to normal DOCX documents is that Microsoft Word automatically creates a new, unnamed document based on the template when opening a DOTX file. The original template file remains unchanged.

DOTX templates can contain predefined text, formatting, styles, headers and footers, and page layouts, and are often used for letterheads, invoices, forms, or form letters.

Last updated on 11. March 2026 by Sören with the experience of more than 127,898,492 converted files since 2013.