What’s the best Python package for converting DOC files to HTML with styling?

If you just want something to share on the web, consider converting DOC files to PDF instead. That way, everyone will see the exact same layout without any issues. It’s a reliable option!

I’d recommend trying out Pandoc for this task. It’s well-regarded for document conversions, although it might not preserve all the styles perfectly. Just be prepared to manually handle the CSS.

Mammoth is great for basic conversions, but you’re right about the styling limits. Have you thought about combining it with a custom CSS generator? That way, you can automate the style mapping process!

There’s actually a Python library for Pandoc you can look into. However, I’m not sure how to automatically transfer the styles as CSS. You might need to do some manual work there as well!

Unfortunately, preserving styles during conversion isn’t straightforward. Mammoth can convert to HTML but doesn’t keep the styles intact; you can provide a style map, but you'll have to write the CSS yourself. The best option I've found is Pandoc, but even it struggles with style preservation. If you want to go that route, you’ll also have to create your own CSS. And if you're dealing with PDFs, good luck! Extracting text in the correct order is almost impossible with those! For quick results, consider using Word’s "Save as HTML" feature, though the output can be quite messy. If you need a batch process, scripting with VBA could also be an option.

Here’s a bit of a hack you could try: Google Docs can import various document formats and export to HTML. You could upload your files there and download them as HTML. Test it out on the web UI first to see how well it converts, and then think about automating the upload/download with Python. It could save you a lot of time if you have multiple files!