File types displayed in the Turnitin Viewer

If an assignment is set to allow any file type, Turnitin will accept any file that:

  • is less than 100MB
  • is less than 800 pages

If an assignment is set to allow only files that Turnitin can check for similarity, Turnitin will only accept files that can generate Similarity Reports. This includes:

  • files less than 100MB,
  • files with a minimum of 20 words
  • file less than 800 pages
  • Microsoft Word (DOC and DOCX)
  • Corel WordPerfect
  • HTML
  • Adobe PostScript
  • Plain text (TXT)
  • Rich Text Format (RTF)
  • Portable Document Format (PDF)
  • OpenOffice (ODT)
  • Hangul (HWP and HWPX)
  • Powerpoint (PPTX)
  • Google Docs via Google Drive

If you are using an unsupported word processor, you may need to save your plain text file as .txt or .rtf in order to upload to Turnitin.

Users whose text files are saved in a file type that is not accepted by Turnitin when the assignment is set to Allow only file types that Turnitin can check for similarity will need to use a word processing program to save the file as one of the accepted types.

Rich Text Format and Plain Text file types are nearly universally available in word processing software. Neither file type will support images or non-text data within the file. Plain text format does not support any formatting, and rich text format supports only limited formatting options.

Google Docs via Google Drive

If submitting with Google Drive, third-party cookies must be allowed in your browser, otherwise, any attempts to sign into Google to upload from Google Drive will fail. Note that Google Drive functionality is not supported in IE8 or below. Do not upload Google Doc (.gdoc) files directly as the file does not store the document, but contains a reference to it online, in Google Docs.

Adobe PDF

Turnitin will not accept PDF image files, forms, or portfolios, files that do not contain highlightable text (e.g. a scanned file - usually an image), documents containing multiple files or files created with software other than Adobe Acrobat. To determine if a document contains actual text, copy and paste a section or all of the text into a plain-text editor such as Microsoft Notepad or Apple TextEdit. If no text is copied over, the selection is not actual text.

Microsoft PowerPoint (.pptx, .ppsx, and .pps)

It is possible to submit PowerPoint files through Turnitin.com, Turnitinuk.com, LTI integrations, Moodle Plagiarism Plugin, Moodle Direct V2, and D2L V2. Turnitin converts the PowerPoint slide deck into a static PDF, leaving all text and images in their original format but leaving out features such as presenter notes, embedded video, and animations. Text with visual effects is not supported, and it is recommended that any visual effects such as shadows and 3D be removed prior to submitting to Turnitin.

The .PPT extension does not work with integrations. Use .PPTX instead.

Microsoft Excel (.xls and .xlsx)

The version of the file that can be viewed in the Document Viewer will look the same as it would if the Excel file had been saved as a PDF and submitted to Turnitin. We highly recommend that users pay attention to the image preview provided in the single file submission to verify that the file is presented in an acceptable manner. Users can adjust the way the file looks by editing the page setup and print area settings for the file prior to saving it and submitting it to Turnitin.

When converting a file to a new file format, users should rename their file with a name other than that of the original file. This is suggested to prevent permanent loss of the original formatting or image content of a file due to it being overwritten.

File types not checked for similarity

Turnitin will not accept the following to generate Similarity Reports:

  • Password protected files
  • Microsoft Works (.wps) files
  • Microsoft Word 2007 macros-enabled .docm files
  • OpenOffice Text (.odt) files created and downloaded from Google Docs online
  • Document (.doc) files created using OpenOffice, as they are not 100% Microsoft Word equivalent
  • Apple Pages
  • Spreadsheets created outside of Microsoft Excel (e.g., .ods)
  • Text with visual effects