RTF: Rich Text Format

Overview

RTF (Rich Text Format) is a document file format developed by Microsoft in 1987 for cross-platform document exchange. RTF files contain formatted text, unlike plain text files, supporting bold, italics, colors, and various fonts while remaining readable as plain text.

RTF was designed to be a universal format that could be read and written by different word processors across different operating systems. While largely superseded by modern formats like DOCX, RTF remains useful for its simplicity and universal support.

History

Development History

• 1987: RTF 1.0 released by Microsoft
• 1993: RTF 1.3 added tables and OLE objects
• 1999: RTF 1.7 added Unicode support
• 2008: RTF 1.9.1 final specification
• Present: Still supported but less commonly used

Features and Capabilities

Key Features

• Text formatting (bold, italic, underline)
• Font selection and sizes
• Paragraph alignment and spacing
• Colors for text and backgrounds
• Tables and lists
• Images and embedded objects
• Page layout controls
• Unicode character support
• Cross-platform compatibility

Common Use Cases

Common Uses

• Document exchange: Cross-platform compatibility
• Email clients: Rich text emails
• Legacy systems: Older document management
• Clipboard: Copy-paste with formatting
• Simple documents: Letters, memos, basic reports
• Text editors: WordPad, TextEdit default format

Advantages

• Universal software support
• Cross-platform compatibility
• Human-readable format
• Smaller than DOCX for simple documents
• No proprietary lock-in
• Good for clipboard operations

Limitations

• Limited compared to DOCX
• Larger file size than plain text
• Security risks with embedded objects
• Inconsistent rendering across apps
• Not ideal for complex documents
• Less feature-rich than modern formats

Technical Information