Transferring content from WPS Office to Markdown requires a few deliberate steps to ensure that the content retains its structure and readability while adapting to the simplicity of Markdown syntax. WPS Office, like Microsoft Word, creates rich text documents with formatting such as bold, italics, headings, lists, and tables. Markdown, on the other hand, is a lightweight markup language designed for easy reading and writing in plain text. The main objective is to translate the visual formatting into its equivalent Markdown representation without losing information.

First, open the document using WPS Writer. Review the document thoroughly to understand its structure. Identify headings, subheadings, paragraphs, lists, links, images, and tables. This preliminary step helps you anticipate what will need to be converted and ensures that no elements are overlooked during the process.

Proceed by saving the document in a widely supported form. The most reliable approach is to export your WPS document as a DOCX file. WPS also offers PDF and HTML export options, DOCX retains richer metadata, enabling smoother downstream conversion. Once you have the DOCX file, use a conversion tool that supports DOCX to Markdown transformation. Pandoc, markedtext, and online converters exist, though Pandoc remains the gold standard. Ensure that Pandoc is installed and accessible via your command line.

With Pandoc installed, open your terminal or command prompt and navigate to the folder containing your DOCX file. Execute this line: pandoc yourfile.docx -o yourfile.md. This command tells Pandoc to read the DOCX file and output a Markdown file with the same name but a.md extension. All formatting is intelligently mapped: for headers, text for bold, text* for italics, - for list items, and tables converted to aligned pipe syntax. Images and links are also translated appropriately, assuming the paths are accessible.

After the conversion, open the resulting.md file in a plain text editor such as Notepad++, VS Code, or Sublime Text. Validate every element thoroughly. Although automated, the result may require fine-tuning. Tables with merged cells or irregular layouts may break, and local image links could point to non-existent paths. Replace any relative paths with correct URLs or move the image files into the same directory as the Markdown file.

If your document contains footnotes, endnotes, or special formatting like columns or text boxes, these may not convert perfectly. Markdown does not natively support columns or text boxes, so you may need to restructure such content using HTML tags or simply describe them in plain text. Pandoc maps footnotes accurately to the [^label] format, compatible with GitHub and other extended Markdown renderers.

Another alternative to Pandoc is using online converters such as CloudConvert or Zamzar. These services allow you to upload your DOCX file and select Markdown as the output format. Their automation is limited and inconsistent with intricate layouts or proprietary formatting. For professional or critical documents, the command line approach with Pandoc is strongly preferred.

Verify the output by viewing it in a dedicated Markdown interpreter. Preview your Markdown using Typora, Obsidian, or directly on GitHub to confirm rendering correctness. Make any final tweaks to spacing, indentation, or syntax to ensure consistency.

The key phases: document review, DOCX export, Pandoc conversion, visual verification, and fine-tuning—yield optimal results. Your documents become universally viewable, editable, and versionable across Windows, macOS, Linux, and mobile. Because Markdown is plain text, it survives software obsolescence and remains legible for decades.