Docs Help

There are different ways of getting started using Google documents: you can create a new online document, you can upload an existing one, or you can use a template from our templates gallery.

Creating and saving a document

To create a new document, go to your Docs list, click the New drop-down menu, and select Document.

As you're working on your document, click the Save button in the top right corner of the document, enter a name for the document in the window that appears, and click OK. Then, you'll see your document in your Docs list.

If you'd like to save and close a document, click the Save & close button.

To save a local copy of a document, you can download it to your computer. To do this, open your document, click the File menu and point your mouse to the Download file as option. You'll see these file types: HTML, RTF, Word, Open Office, PDF, and plain text. Select a file type and click OK in the browser window that appears.

Uploading a document

You can upload existing documents to Google documents at any time. Here's how:

1. Click the Upload button at the top of the sidebar in your Docs list page.
2. Click Browse and select the document.
3. Click Open.
4. Click Upload File. The uploaded file appears in your Docs list.

Using the templates gallery

If you want to quickly create a document, you can pick one of the templates in our templates gallery. Each template has standard text that you can replace with your own, and preset formatting that you can reuse. Learn more in the templates gallery section of our help center.

You can also access the templates gallery from your document by going to File > New > From template...