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word-import-template

README.md

page_type sample
urlFragment word-import-template
products
office-word
office
m365
office-teams
languages
javascript
extensions
contentType technologies createdDate
samples
Add-ins
03/08/2024 4:00:00 PM
description Shows how to import templates in a Word document.

Import templates in a Word document

Summary

This sample shows how to import a Word document template with an add-in.

Description

The user updates their Word document with the content from another Word document, treating the external document like a template. The user selects a Word document through the add-in UI then it's applied to the current document.

Import template add-in task pane.

Applies to

  • Word on Windows
  • Word on Mac
  • Word on the web

Solution

Solution Authors
How to import a template in a Word document Microsoft

Version history

Version Date Comments
1.0 03-08-2024 Initial release
1.1 07-07-2025 Add support for the unified manifest for Microsoft 365

Decide on a version of the manifest

Add-in only manifest

Run the sample

Use one of the following add-in file hosting options to run the sample.

Use GitHub as the web host

You can run this sample in Word on Windows, on Mac, or in a browser. The add-in web files are served from this repo on GitHub.

  1. Download the manifest.xml file from this sample to a folder on your computer.
  2. Sideload the add-in manifest in Word by following the appropriate instructions in the article Sideload an Office Add-in for testing.
  3. Follow the steps in Try it out to test the sample.

Use localhost

If you prefer to configure a web server and host the add-in's web files from your computer, use the following steps.

  1. Install a recent version of npm and Node.js on your computer. To verify if you've already installed these tools, run the commands node -v and npm -v in your terminal.

  2. You need http-server to run the local web server. If you haven't installed this yet, run the following command.

    npm install --global http-server

  3. Use a tool such as openssl to generate a self-signed certificate that you can use for the web server. Move the cert.pem and key.pem files to the root folder for this sample.

  4. From a command prompt, go to the root folder and run the following command.

    http-server -S --cors . -p 3000

  5. To reroute to localhost, run office-addin-https-reverse-proxy. If you haven't installed this, run the following command.

    npm install --global office-addin-https-reverse-proxy

    To reroute, run the following in another command prompt.

    office-addin-https-reverse-proxy --url http://localhost:3000

  6. Sideload manifest-localhost.xml in Word by following the appropriate instructions in the article Sideload an Office Add-in for testing.

  7. Follow the steps in Try it out to test the sample.

Unified manifest

Prerequisites

  • If you want to run the web server on localhost, install a recent version of npm and Node.js on your computer. To check if you've already installed these tools, from a command prompt, run the following commands.

    node -v
npm -v

  • If you want to run the sample using GitHub as the web host, install the Microsoft 365 Agents Toolkit command line interface (CLI). From a command prompt, run the following command.

    npm install -g @microsoft/teamsapp-cli

Run the sample

You can run this sample in Word on Windows, on Mac, or in a browser. Use one of the following add-in file hosting options.

Use GitHub as the web host

The quickest way to run the sample is to use GitHub as the web host. However, you can't debug or change the source code. The add-in web files are served from this GitHub repository.

  1. Download the manifest-configurations/unified/word-import-template.zip file from this sample to a folder on your computer.
  2. Sideload the add-in manifest in Word by following the appropriate instructions in the article Sideload Office Add-ins that use the unified manifest for Microsoft 365.
  3. Follow the steps in Try it out to test the sample.

Use localhost

If you prefer to host the web server on localhost, follow these steps:

  1. Clone or download this repository.

  2. From a command prompt, go to the root of the project folder /Samples/word-import-template.

  3. Copy the files from the manifest-configurations/unified subfolder to the root folder.

  4. Run the following commands.

    npm install
    npm start

    This starts the web server on localhost and sideloads the manifest.json file to Word.

  5. Follow the steps in Try it out to test the sample.

  6. To stop the web server and uninstall the add-in from Word, run the following command.

    npm stop

Try it out

Once the add-in is loaded, use the following steps to try out the functionality.

  1. Open Word on Windows, on Mac, or in a browser.

  2. To open the add-in task pane, go to the Home tab and choose Show Task Pane.

  3. In the "Template" section of the add-in UI, select Choose File. Navigate to the location of your .docx file then open the file. The template is automatically applied to your document, replacing any preexisting content.

    The initial screen displaying the button to choose a file.

    For convenience, the resources folder of this project includes a template example.docx file.

    Screen showing the imported template.

  4. In the document, update the text and other content.

Make it yours

The following are a few suggestions for how you could tailor this to your scenario.

  • Include single sign-on (SSO) to support managing sessions and persisting settings for the user.
  • Provide personalized or company-approved templates for users to access.
  • Enable users to personalize templates and save to shared location.

Related content

Questions and feedback

  • Did you experience any problems with the sample? Create an issue and we'll help you out.
  • We'd love to get your feedback about this sample. Go to our Office samples survey to give feedback and suggest improvements.
  • For general questions about developing Office Add-ins, go to Microsoft Q&A using the office-js-dev tag.

Copyright

Copyright (c) 2024 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

This project has adopted the Microsoft Open Source Code of Conduct. For more information, see the Code of Conduct FAQ or contact opencode@microsoft.com with any additional questions or comments.

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