Many organizations still rely on large libraries of legacy content written in raw HTML. These materials include training manuals, blog post archives, and internal knowledge bases. Over time, the problem isn’t that the information becomes useless, but that the format becomes harder to manage.
Converting this content into modern editing environments like WordPress saves time, prevents data loss, and gives teams more flexibility. This is where the need for an HTML-to-WYSIWYG workflow emerged. It lets you migrate old HTML into WYSIWYG editors where users can manage text, images, and links without touching code.
This article explains why migration matters, what “HTML to WYSIWYG” conversion involves, and why this could beat other migration methods. Additionally, you’ll learn about the benefits of this process as well as the challenges you should expect.
Key Takeaways
Legacy content often holds valuable institutional knowledge that needs preservation or modernizing.
An HTML-to-WYSIWYG approach makes old content editable for all types of users.
WYSIWYG editors that support HTML clean up outdated markup while preserving structure and functionality.
This shift enables faster migration, better team collaboration, and long-term flexibility.
Challenges in formatting, security, and training exist, but with HTML content review, security best practices, and an intuitive editor, you can address these accordingly.
Why Legacy Content Migration Matters
Before you look at how conversion works, it’s worth asking why migration is so important.
Preserving Institutional Knowledge
Older websites, intranets, or training portals often carry years of valuable content. For instance, a university might store old course materials, or a company might keep policy manuals. Throwing these archives away risks losing intellectual property and documented best practices.
On the other hand, migrating this content into a modern system helps ensure the knowledge stays accessible and editable for current needs. New educators or employees could benefit greatly by preserving, and eventually modernizing, what existed years before they arrived.
Supporting Modern User Expectations
Users no longer expect to edit content with raw HTML tags like <p> or <table> (think MySpace in the 2000s). They prefer rich text editors with simple controls, drag-and-drop support, and Markdown for formatting. When organizations migrate legacy content, users can update web copy, revise old documents, or refresh presentations without calling a developer.
For those who prefer coding web content, modern WYSIWYG HTML editors allow users to switch to and from code view. The benefit is that they’ll see how the content renders as they’re editing it.
Avoiding Platform Lock-in
Legacy systems often store content in outdated or proprietary formats. This creates a kind of “lock-in” where content gets stuck. By converting through an HTML to WYSIWYG workflow, organizations free their content from dependence on one system.
After converting the content into WYSIWYG format, users can move, republish, or reuse it across different platforms.
What “HTML to WYSIWYG” Conversion Really Means
You may already have an idea about the “HTML to WYSIWYG” phrase that you keep seeing across this article. But let’s unpack what this phrase actually covers in this section.
Translating Code to Editable Content
As we all know, raw HTML contains tags for structure, like <h1> for headings or <a> for links. An HTML-to-WYSIWYG process translates these into editable text blocks, clickable links, and formatted sections inside an HTML editor.
In this setup, a heading tag turns into a styled title. A table tag turns into a table you can edit with a toolbar. Think of it as “modernizing” old HTML into Google Docs files, CMS (content management system) blogs, or even webpage content.
This shift empowers people who are not too familiar with HTML to easily manage content.
Cleaning and Standardizing Markup
Legacy HTML often includes outdated tags like <font> or <center> and inline styles that no longer match modern design standards. Converting these removes unnecessary markup and transforms it into cleaner, standardized code that today’s editors can handle. This cleanup makes formatting more consistent across browsers, devices, and platforms.
Note: Standardization also improves accessibility. Screen readers and assistive technologies often struggle with messy code. Cleaner markup follows accessibility guidelines and benefits everyone in terms of providing similar experiences regardless of ability.
Maintaining Functionality While Upgrading Experience
A strong migration keeps links, media, and formatting intact while offering modern features like drag-and-drop or visual editing. For example, an embedded image remains in place after a smooth migration. But now, users can resize or caption it, or even apply filters, without touching HTML.
This approach preserves the core functionality while upgrading the overall user experience.
Benefits of “HTML to WYSIWYG” for Organizations
Now that you know what’s involved, let’s look at the broader benefits that this approach provides.
Faster Migration, Less Manual Work
Rewriting hundreds of pages of HTML by hand is inefficient, or at the very least, exhausting. Automated conversion tools or modern WYSIWYG editors that support HTML speed this up by processing large batches at once. This reduces repetitive work and makes large-scale migrations, like moving a corporate knowledge base, feasible in weeks instead of months.
For example, we have this use case where a company has to migrate and modernize some old but important documents. These are strong policies that some senior members established using HTML some 20–30 years ago.
However, times have changed, and they need to rewrite some content. And at the same time, management requested to include supplementary images that help explain these policies better.
Manually, such a task is taxing, and it would take either a large team of proofreaders or a long time. With HTML-to-WYSIWYG conversion via HTML-friendly editors, this turns into a simpler task that involves copy-pasting followed by visual editing.
Broader Team Collaboration
When content turns editable through WYSIWYG, teams across departments can participate. Marketing can adjust campaign materials, operations can update SOPs, and training staff can revise guides. This reduces reliance on developers and speeds up updates since more people share ownership of the content.
Let’s go back to our previous example with the policy modernization. With a modern WYSIWYG HTML editor, proofreaders can copy-paste the old content into the editor and work on it simultaneously. And with features like autosaving, comments and mentions, and real-time collaboration, WYSIWYG editors streamline content editing with multiple people.
Long-Term Flexibility
Once the content is in WYSIWYG, end users will have an easier time adapting it to future systems. Modern editors evolve to support new file formats, accessibility guidelines, and mobile workflows. By converting legacy content, organizations set themselves up for smoother transitions tomorrow, instead of facing another round of legacy lock-in.
Why “HTML to WYSIWYG” Conversion Outperforms Other Migration Methods
When organizations migrate legacy content, they often face a choice. Should they rewrite everything from scratch, archive it in static formats, or keep maintaining plain HTML files? Compared to these alternatives, HTML-to-WYSIWYG conversion could offer the best balance of accuracy, usability, and scalability.
Manual Rewriting vs. Automated Conversion
Manual (paste, rewrite old code) vs automatic (paste old code, use toolbar buttons) code migration
Manual rewriting slows everything down. The (human) converters have to retype, format, and check every page. Even if they copy-paste the content, they would have to manually replace all old code. This eats up time and resources.
Human error increases with scale. Even experienced writers may skip details or introduce inconsistencies across thousands of pages. And even though humans could also produce errors in converted content, the chances would be lower with a smaller scale.
HTML-to-WYSIWYG conversion automates the heavy lifting. Instead of rewriting, it transforms existing code into editable, user-friendly content. Afterwards, users can rely on the editor’s toolbar to easily edit the migrated content as needed. Teams save time and preserve the original intent of the content.
PDF Archiving vs. Editable Content
PDFs are static snapshots. They lock information in place, making it hard to update or repurpose. Most PDF editing also requires additional costs for that specific feature.
Accessibility suffers in PDFs. Readers using assistive technologies or mobile devices often struggle to interact with archived documents.
In a WYSIWYG editor, content stays alive. Teams can edit, improve, expand, and collaborate on old material without starting over.
Plain HTML Maintenance vs. User-Friendly Editors
Raw HTML requires technical know-how. Only developers or people comfortable with coding can maintain or edit the content. WYSIWYG editors, on the other hand, allow both developers and non-technical users to freely edit content.
This creates bottlenecks. Non-technical teams and users, like marketing or training staff, must always wait for developer support with plain HTML maintenance. They could also learn basic HTML, but even that takes time.
WYSIWYG removes barriers. Everyone, regardless of coding ability, can update or improve migrated content directly. This means that non-technical users can implement advanced formatting, embeds, or other features just as easily as developers.
Challenges to Watch Out for
Converting legacy content isn’t without its challenges. However, with the right approach, you can manage them better. Here are some common issues you might face, as well as how you can address them.
Formatting Inconsistencies
Not every piece of legacy HTML maps perfectly into a rich text editor. For example, tables with custom styling or nested lists may need manual adjustments after conversion. To ensure consistency and readability across all content, implement a review step and keep track of these hard-to-modernize elements.
Security and Clean Code
Old HTML sometimes contains inline scripts or outdated principles like embedded JavaScript in <script> tags. These can pose some security risks if carried over. Conversions should always sanitize content, removing scripts and restricting file types, to protect both users and the platform.
Tip: Always implement validation layers during migration. This ensures unsafe content doesn’t reach production environments. Having code editing capabilities also lets you review the HTML easier with modern syntax highlighting. Furthermore, having an AI-capable WYSIWYG editor allows users to gain security or best practices insights as they migrate legacy content.
Training and Change Management
Even with a simpler editor, staff may need some training. WYSIWYG tools often have advanced features like embedding media or managing tables. A short onboarding session, a quick-start guide, or some easy documentation pages may help non-technical users build confidence.
Having a WYSIWYG editor with an organized toolbar layout, proper tooltips, and easy navigation addresses this challenge much better.
Conclusion
Migrating legacy content doesn’t have to mean starting over. An HTML-to-WYSIWYG approach gives organizations a structured way to bring old materials into modern workflows. It protects and modernizes valuable knowledge, empowers non-technical teams, and prevents future lock-in.
By balancing technical accuracy with usability, conversion delivers both immediate benefits and long-term resilience. The result is clear: organizations preserve the past while preparing for the future.
To get started with your legacy content migration process, check out this GitHub repo that can guide you with implementing code view, table handling, and more.
This article was originally published on the Froala blog.
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