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Importing your novel from Word (.docx)
Importing your novel from Word (.docx)

How to import your novel into Novelcrafter

Updated over a week ago

What do you do if you have already started a novel? How do we easily get it into Novelcrafter to continue our work?

How to import your novel

We have you covered in the import feature. In this video, I’ll first show you how to import a novel, and then give you three real-time examples of importing different novel structures.

To import your novel into Novelcrafter, you need to:

  1. On the homepage, go to import

  2. Select the format of your novel. Currently, you can either import as a .docx, or in markdown.


  3. Choose your document

  4. Determine if you want to import as prose or scene summaries, and if you want blank lines between paragraphs, or symbols to indicate new scenes.

    Note. For the summaries, you can only import one summary per chapter (i.e. you cannot yet split them into scenes)

  5. Click Preview Import.

  6. If everything looks as if it has formatted correctly, you can press Confirm Import. The preview will also identify word count and the number of acts, chapters, and scenes in your document.


We currently do not support other document formats, however you can save your document as a .docx in many word processors, for example google docs, libre office, and others. You are not required to have Microsoft word.

How to format your novel for importing

The following guidelines apply right now:

  1. Acts should use Heading 1

  2. Chapters should use Heading 2

If you don't use any acts, only use Heading 1 throughout your document for the chapter titles.

To import separate scenes, please use the universally recognised "***" as a divider.

Example Documents

You have acts, chapters, and scenes

Acts - Heading One

Chapters - Heading Two

Scenes - separate with “***”

You have only chapters

Chapters - Heading One

You have a prologue or epilogue

Ensure that the Prologue has it’s own “act”/heading one section in addition to the chapter/heading two in order to separate it from the main prose.

Troubleshooting (As of November 2024)

Do you have a table of contents?

Currently, our system does not support Table of Contents (TOC). The TOC may interfere with the system's ability to recognise the correct headings, resulting in your document being rejected.

If your document contains a TOC and you are experiencing issues with uploading, we recommend removing the TOC and re-uploading your document.

Can I keep any additional covers, author bios, etc.?

No, please create a document that only contains the actual book (prologue and epilogue chapters are fine). Novelcrafter does not support inline images yet.

What browser are you using to upload the document?

If you are using the Safari Browser, please make sure you are using at least version, or at least 16.5. Otherwise, try either Firefox or Chrome during the import.

Nothing's happening?

If you are using the Safari Browser, please make sure you are using at least version, or at least 16.5. Otherwise, try either Firefox or Chrome during the import.

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