Edit a Publisher file without Publisher
Drop the .pub, click the text you want to change and type. The layout stays as Publisher made it; save the result as PDF to print, or as Word to keep working on it.
What you can change
The words in text boxes and table cells, including text that runs on from one column or page into the next. Retype a date, a price, a name or a whole paragraph; Enter starts a new paragraph. New text takes the font, size and colour of the text around it, and a longer story flows on into the next linked box by itself, as it did in Publisher.
Then save it the way you need it: as a PDF for printing, a Word document to keep editing, JPG or PNG pictures, or plain text. Every format gets the changed text.
What stays as it is
Everything else on the page. Fonts, colours and sizes cannot be changed here, boxes, pictures and shapes stay where Publisher put them, and the lettering in WordArt and in pictures stays as it is. Page numbers fill in by themselves and cannot be typed over. Text that no longer fits in its box is hidden, as Publisher hides it, and the page says so; click the box to see all of it and shorten it.
The file cannot be saved back as a .pub: the changed publication leaves as PDF, Word or pictures. Undo all edits brings it back to what is in the file.
Why this is needed now
Microsoft retired Publisher in October 2026, and Macs never had it. A flyer reused every year, a menu with new prices, a certificate with a new name — the change is a few words, but the file was made for a program that is no longer there. Here it opens on a computer without Publisher: Windows without Office, a Mac, a Chromebook.
Questions
- Can I change the font or the colour?
- Not here. New text takes the look of the text around it, which is what a changed date or name needs. For full control, save as Word: every text box there is a Word text box you can format as you like.
- Can I edit several files?
- Yes. Drop a folder or several files, pick each one from the list and change it; files with changes that are not saved yet are marked in the list.
- Which Publisher versions open?
- Files from Publisher 98, 2000 and 2002, and everything from 2003 to Microsoft 365.
- Is the file uploaded?
- No. It is read and changed by this page on your own computer and is not sent anywhere.