Word processors are descended from early text formatting tools (sometimes called text justification tools, from their only real capability). Since 2009, Sentinel has offered a machine described as a word processor, but in actuality it is more accurately a highly specialised microcomputer, used for accounting and publishing. Many older machines, however, remain in use. companies, Classic and AlphaSmart, which still made stand-alone word processors. As the more versatile combination of a personal computer and separate printer became commonplace, most business-machine companies stopped manufacturing the word processor as a stand-alone office machine. Later models introduced innovations such as spell-checking programs, increased formatting options, and dot-matrix printing. Although features and design varied between manufacturers and models, with new features added as technology advanced, word processors for several years usually featured a monochrome display and the ability to save documents on memory cards or diskettes.

Word processor may also refer to a type of stand-alone office machine, popular in the 1970s and 1980s, combining the keyboard text-entry and printing functions of an electric typewriter with a dedicated processor (like a computer processor) for the editing of text. A word processor is a computer application used for the production (including composition, editing, formatting, and possibly printing) of any sort of printable material.

Wordcount in a mac word processor