---
title: "LibreOfficeFileConverter"
id: libreofficefileconverter
slug: "/libreofficefileconverter"
description: "A component that converts office files (documents, spreadsheets, presentations) between formats using LibreOffice's command line interface."
---

# LibreOfficeFileConverter

A component that converts office files between formats using LibreOffice's command line interface (`soffice`).

<div className="key-value-table">

|  |  |
| --- | --- |
| **Most common position in a pipeline** | Before a document converter (e.g. [`DOCXToDocument`](./docxtodocument.mdx)) when the source files need to be converted to a format that the converter supports |
| **Mandatory run variables**            | `sources`: File paths or [`ByteStream`](../../concepts/data-classes.mdx#bytestream) objects; `output_file_type`: The target file format |
| **Output variables**                   | `output`: A list of [`ByteStream`](../../concepts/data-classes.mdx#bytestream) objects |
| **API reference**                      | [LibreOffice](/reference/integrations-libreoffice) |
| **GitHub link**                        | https://github.com/deepset-ai/haystack-core-integrations/tree/main/integrations/libreoffice |
| **Package name** | `libreoffice-haystack` |

</div>

## Overview

`LibreOfficeFileConverter` converts office files from one format to another using LibreOffice's `soffice` command line utility. It supports a wide range of document, spreadsheet, and presentation formats and is useful when your pipeline receives files in a format that downstream converters don't support.

Unlike most converters, `LibreOfficeFileConverter` outputs [`ByteStream`](../../concepts/data-classes.mdx#bytestream) objects rather than Haystack Documents. This means it's typically chained with a document converter (such as [`DOCXToDocument`](./docxtodocument.mdx) or [`PyPDFToDocument`](./pypdftodocument.mdx)) to produce the final Documents.

**Requires LibreOffice to be installed** and available in `PATH` as `soffice`. See the [LibreOffice installation guide](https://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/install-howto/) for details.

### Supported conversions

| Category | Input formats | Possible output formats |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Documents | `doc`, `docx`, `odt`, `rtf`, `txt`, `html` | `pdf`, `docx`, `doc`, `odt`, `rtf`, `txt`, `html`, `epub` |
| Spreadsheets | `xlsx`, `xls`, `ods`, `csv` | `pdf`, `xlsx`, `xls`, `ods`, `csv`, `html` |
| Presentations | `pptx`, `ppt`, `odp` | `pdf`, `pptx`, `ppt`, `odp`, `html`, `png`, `jpg` |

This is a non-exhaustive list. See the [LibreOffice filter documentation](https://help.libreoffice.org/latest/en-GB/text/shared/guide/convertfilters.html) for all supported conversions.

## Usage

Install the LibreOffice integration:

```shell
pip install libreoffice-haystack
```

### On its own

```python
from pathlib import Path
from haystack_integrations.components.converters.libreoffice import (
    LibreOfficeFileConverter,
)

converter = LibreOfficeFileConverter()
result = converter.run(sources=[Path("sample.doc")], output_file_type="docx")
bytestreams = result["output"]
```

You can also set `output_file_type` at initialization to avoid passing it on every `run()` call:

```python
converter = LibreOfficeFileConverter(output_file_type="pdf")
result = converter.run(sources=[Path("report.pptx")])
```

### In a pipeline

A common pattern is to chain `LibreOfficeFileConverter` with a document converter. The example below converts a legacy `.doc` file to `.docx` and then extracts it as a Haystack Document:

```python
from pathlib import Path
from haystack import Pipeline
from haystack.components.converters import DOCXToDocument
from haystack_integrations.components.converters.libreoffice import (
    LibreOfficeFileConverter,
)

pipeline = Pipeline()
pipeline.add_component(
    "libreoffice_converter",
    LibreOfficeFileConverter(output_file_type="docx"),
)
pipeline.add_component("docx_converter", DOCXToDocument())

pipeline.connect("libreoffice_converter.output", "docx_converter.sources")

result = pipeline.run(
    {"libreoffice_converter": {"sources": [Path("legacy_report.doc")]}},
)
documents = result["docx_converter"]["documents"]
```
