The Beginner’s Guide to Google Docs

If you’re just getting started with Google Docs, its extensive features and add-ons can be a little overwhelming. Here are some tips to help you get started with this powerful alternative to Microsoft Word.

What is Google Docs?

If you’ve heard of Google Docs before, feel free to skip ahead. If you’ve never heard of it before, here’s a crash course on what you need to know. We’ll go over the basics and get you brushed up with what Google Docs is and how you can get started right away.

Google Docs is a free, web-based word processor offered by Google as part of its complete office suite—Google Drive—to compete with Microsoft Office. The other main services included in the cloud-based suite are Sheets (Excel) and Slides (Powerpoint).

RELATED: What is G Suite, Anyway?

Google Docs is available on all devices and platforms; all you need is an internet connection and a web browser (or, in the case of mobile, the applicable apps). Google does the rest and handles the brunt of the heavy lifting while it runs the software in the cloud.

Docs supports several different file types, including .doc, .docx .txt, .rtf, and .odt, making it easy to view and convert Microsoft Office files directly from Google Drive.

And since Docs is an online word processor, you can share and collaborate with multiple people on the same document, tracking revisions, changes, and suggestions all in real time.

Have you heard enough? Let’s get started.

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