Let Claude edit your Word documents — no need to open Office, no copy-pasting. Formatting, fonts, image positions, page layout, and information structure are all preserved — only the text you specify is changed.
Once installed, Claude can modify .docx / .doc files as naturally as plain text:
- Edit text, preserve formatting — bold, italic, fonts, and colors all stay as they were; only the text you specify changes
- Match across style boundaries — search terms split across multiple formatted fragments are found and replaced in one pass
- Zero risk to originals — every edit happens on a copy; the source file is never touched
.docauto-conversion — legacy documents are automatically converted to.docxvia LibreOffice
Use cases: revising lab reports, updating contract clauses, batch-replacing key information across documents, fine-tuning content without breaking formatting.
Copy the following into Claude CLI:
Please install word-chisel for me.
Installation steps:
1. Check that Node.js is available (node --version). If not, tell me to install it.
2. Run: npx word-chisel setup — this automatically registers the MCP server and installs the skill
3. Verify ~/.claude/.mcp.json contains a word-chisel entry
4. Verify ~/.claude/skills/word-chisel.md and ~/.claude/skills/word-format-guard.md have been created
5. Save this memory: when editing Word documents (.docx/.doc) with Claude, first read ~/.claude/skills/word-format-guard.md to scan the format skeleton, then read ~/.claude/skills/word-chisel.md and use the word-chisel MCP tools (list_paragraphs / read_docx / replace_text) for precise text editing.
6. Tell me setup is done and I need to restart Claude Desktop or Claude CLI.
If you encounter errors, explain the cause and tell me how to fix them. Do not install additional software on your own.
Or
npx word-chisel setupAfter installation, you can describe your needs directly to Claude:
"Change 'old text' to 'new text' in paragraph 3 of C:/docs/report.docx"
Option A: Copy to Claude (recommended)
Send the following directly to Claude. The AI will complete the installation and configuration automatically:
Please install word-chisel for me.
Installation steps:
1. Check that Node.js is available (node --version). If not, tell me to install it.
2. Run: npx word-chisel setup — this automatically registers the MCP server and installs the skill
3. Verify ~/.claude/.mcp.json contains a word-chisel entry
4. Verify ~/.claude/skills/word-chisel.md and ~/.claude/skills/word-format-guard.md have been created
5. Save this memory: when editing Word documents (.docx/.doc) with Claude, first read ~/.claude/skills/word-format-guard.md to scan the format skeleton, then read ~/.claude/skills/word-chisel.md and use the word-chisel MCP tools (list_paragraphs / read_docx / replace_text) for precise text editing.
6. Tell me setup is done and I need to restart Claude Desktop or Claude CLI.
If you encounter errors, explain the cause and tell me how to fix them. Do not install additional software on your own.
Option B: Terminal command
npx word-chisel setup| Tool | Purpose |
|---|---|
list_paragraphs |
Scan document structure — paragraph indices, styles, run counts, text preview |
read_docx |
Read full text with per-run formatting details (bold, italic, font, size, color, etc.) |
replace_text |
Replace text while preserving all formatting. Cross-run matching. Two strategies: collapse into the first run's style, or distribute proportionally to preserve each run's formatting |
Every edit follows a copy-then-edit workflow:
.docx→ copied to<outputName>.docx, edits go into the copy.doc→ LibreOffice converts to.docx, edits go into the converted file- The original file is never touched
All tool responses include outputPath (the actual file being edited) and a note explaining what happened.
- Node.js 18+
.doc(Word 97-2003) is a proprietary binary format. word-chisel uses LibreOffice to losslessly convert it to.docxbefore editing.
If you only edit .docx files, no extra tools are needed. For .doc files, you have two options:
Option A: Install LibreOffice (recommended, fully automatic)
word-chisel auto-detects LibreOffice — no PATH configuration needed.
| Platform | Command | Manual download |
|---|---|---|
| Windows | winget install TheDocumentFoundation.LibreOffice |
libreoffice.org/download |
| macOS | brew install --cask libreoffice |
libreoffice.org/download |
| Linux | sudo apt install libreoffice |
sudo dnf install libreoffice (Fedora) |
Don't have Homebrew on macOS? Run
/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"first.
Option B: Convert manually
Open the .doc in Word / WPS → Save As .docx → hand it to word-chisel. No LibreOffice required.
Attempting to edit a .doc file without LibreOffice returns a clear LIBREOFFICE_NOT_FOUND error.
After setup, simply tell Claude in natural language:
Scenario 1: Precise word change
"Change '个人名片设计' to '字典排序' in paragraph 3 of C:/docs/report.docx"
Scenario 2: Global find-and-replace
"Replace all 'Party A Ltd' with 'Party A Technology Group' in C:/docs/contract.docx"
Scenario 3: Cross-format boundary edit
"In C:/docs/resume.docx paragraph 5 — the first half is a bold company name, the second half is a normal-weight job title. Change the company name to 'ByteDance' while keeping the original bold formatting."
Scenario 4: Update lab report content
"Replace the code in the 'IV. Implementation' section of C:/docs/lab.docx with new Python code, preserving the original font and indentation."
Claude automatically uses the word-chisel tools to perform precise replacements without breaking the original formatting.
git clone <repo>
cd word-chisel
npm install
npm run build
npm testMIT