The wxrks Editor automatically picks a preview mode for a Work Unit based on its file type, so you can see roughly what the finished, translated file will look like while you work. This article lists which file extensions map to which preview mode, and calls out a few exceptions worth knowing about.
💡 Who is this for? Anyone translating or reviewing content in the wxrks Editor — Vendors, Project Managers, and Account Admins — who wants to know what preview to expect for a given file, or why a file isn't previewing the way they assumed.
How preview mode is chosen
Open any Work Unit in the Editor and look at the preview mode selector in the bottom-left of the screen. It lists only the modes that make sense for that file's format — the Editor picks a sensible default automatically, but you can switch between the available options at any time.
For a full tour of the Editor's layout — including where this selector sits relative to the segment list and the top bar — see wxrks Editor.
Supported extensions by preview type
Preview type | File extensions | What you see |
Docs Preview | doc, docx, docm, dot, dotx, dotm, ppt, pptx, pptm, pot, potx, potm, pps, ppsx, ppsm, xlt, xltx, xltm, odt, ott, odp, otp, odg, otg, ods, ots, pdf, vsdx, key, pages, numbers | The file rendered as a document, matching the original layout. |
Xlsx Preview | xlsx, xlsm, xlsb, xls, csv, tsv | An interactive spreadsheet grid instead of a flat document render. |
Web Preview | html, htm — or any file, once you type a URL into the Web Preview panel | The live webpage, with your confirmed translations swapped in. |
Code Preview | txt, json, yaml, yml, xml, md, po, properties, resx, xliff, xlf, strings, wep, and other plain-text or structured formats not covered above | The raw text/markup, so you can see formatting tags and placeholders exactly as they appear in the source. This is also the default when a file's format doesn't match any other preview type. |
Video Preview | mp4, webm, ogg, mov, avi, mkv — plus srt, vtt, ass, ssa subtitle files when they belong to a video transcription Work Unit | The video itself, with subtitles synced to your translated segments. |
A few formats are exceptions to the pattern above. Excel templates (xlt, xltx, xltm) and OpenDocument spreadsheets (ods, ots) render in Docs Preview, not Xlsx Preview — only true .xlsx/.xlsm/.xlsb/.xls/.csv/.tsv files get the interactive grid.
Apple iWork files (key, pages, numbers) use Docs Preview, but the preview is an approximation, not Apple's own rendering. A Numbers file shows as a spreadsheet with one tab per sheet. See iWork: how wxrks handles Pages, Keynote and Numbers files for what to check in the delivered file.
A few preview types aren't extension-based
Some Work Units get a dedicated preview automatically based on how the file was created or imported, rather than by file extension: Figma designs, Marketo email templates, InDesign files paired with an uploaded PDF guide, and image projects backed by a PSD file. These don't appear in the table above because they're not chosen by extension — they follow the setup of the connector or workflow that generated the Work Unit in the first place.
XML and XLIFF files with an XSLT stylesheet. An XSLT stylesheet is a file that turns XML into a formatted HTML page. When one is attached to an XML or XLIFF file (xml, xlf, xliff, xliff2, sdlxliff), the Editor opens that Work Unit in XSLT Preview instead of Code Preview, showing the translated file laid out by the stylesheet. If the file also has a Web Preview URL, the Editor opens Web Preview first, and you can switch to XSLT Preview in the preview mode selector. To attach a stylesheet, see How to preview XML and XLIFF files in the editor with an XSLT stylesheet.
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