diff --git a/tests/test_text_format.py b/tests/test_text_format.py
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..84342fa6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/test_text_format.py
@@ -0,0 +1,163 @@
+"""
+Tests for the --text output format, --discard_empty flag, and the
+--json/--text mutual exclusivity added in the "Add options for a bare
+text format & removing empty documents" change.
+
+Background
+----------
+wikiextractor's default output wraps each article in a
+<doc id="..." url="..." title="...">...</doc> XML-style header/footer.
+--json instead emits one JSON object per line. --text is a third,
+simpler option: just the body text (the same `text` list used by the
+other two formats), with no header/footer/metadata at all -- intended
+for corpus-building use cases (e.g. char-LM training data) where the
+wrapper is pure noise. --discard_empty skips writing anything at all
+for articles whose body extracts to nothing (redirects, category-only
+stubs, etc.), and applies uniformly across all three output formats
+(the check happens before the format branch, not inside it).
+
+Run with:
+    python -m unittest tests.test_text_format -v
+or, from the tests/ directory:
+    python -m unittest test_text_format -v
+"""
+
+import json
+import subprocess
+import sys
+import unittest
+from io import StringIO
+
+sys.path.insert(0, '..')  # allow running directly from tests/ without installing
+
+from wikiextractor.extract import Extractor
+import wikiextractor.extract as ex
+
+
+class TextFormatTestCase(unittest.TestCase):
+    """Base class that resets wikiextractor's module-level template state
+    and output-format flags before each test, so tests don't leak state
+    into one another.
+    """
+
+    def setUp(self):
+        ex.templates.clear()
+        ex.templateCache.clear()
+        ex.redirects.clear()
+        ex.Extractor.templatePrefix = "Template:"
+        # Reset all three output-format flags to their defaults; each
+        # test sets only the ones it needs.
+        ex.Extractor.to_json = False
+        ex.Extractor.to_text = False
+        ex.Extractor.discard_empty = False
+
+    def make_extractor(self, article_text, article_id=1, title="Test Article"):
+        return Extractor(article_id, str(article_id),
+                          f"https://test.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid={article_id}",
+                          title, [article_text])
+
+    def extract_output(self, article_text, **flags):
+        for name, value in flags.items():
+            setattr(ex.Extractor, name, value)
+        extractor = self.make_extractor(article_text)
+        out = StringIO()
+        extractor.extract(out, html_safe=True)
+        return out.getvalue()
+
+
+class TextFormatOutputTests(TextFormatTestCase):
+    """--text should contain the article body and nothing else -- no
+    <doc> wrapper, no XML/JSON metadata.
+    """
+
+    def test_text_format_has_no_doc_tags(self):
+        article_text = "This is a plain paragraph of article text."
+        output = self.extract_output(article_text, to_text=True)
+
+        self.assertNotIn("<doc", output)
+        self.assertNotIn("</doc>", output)
+        self.assertIn("This is a plain paragraph of article text.", output)
+
+    def test_doc_format_still_has_tags_by_default(self):
+        # Regression check: adding the --text branch must not disturb the
+        # default (no flags set) <doc> format.
+        article_text = "This is a plain paragraph of article text."
+        output = self.extract_output(article_text)  # all flags default False
+
+        self.assertIn("<doc", output)
+        self.assertIn("</doc>", output)
+        self.assertIn("This is a plain paragraph of article text.", output)
+
+    def test_json_format_unaffected_by_text_option(self):
+        # Regression check: --json must still produce valid JSON with no
+        # <doc> tags, unchanged by the new --text branch existing.
+        article_text = "This is a plain paragraph of article text."
+        output = self.extract_output(article_text, to_json=True)
+
+        self.assertNotIn("<doc", output)
+        data = json.loads(output)
+        self.assertIn("text", data)
+        self.assertIn("This is a plain paragraph of article text.", data["text"])
+
+
+class DiscardEmptyTests(TextFormatTestCase):
+    """--discard_empty should skip writing anything for articles whose
+    body extracts to nothing (verified: clean_text() returns [] for
+    redirects and category-only stubs, which is falsy and triggers the
+    'if self.discard_empty and not text: pass' check), and this must
+    apply the same way regardless of output format.
+    """
+
+    REDIRECT_BODY = "#REDIRECT [[Other Page]]"
+    NORMAL_BODY = "A real article with actual content in it."
+
+    def test_discard_empty_skips_redirect_in_text_format(self):
+        output = self.extract_output(self.REDIRECT_BODY,
+                                      to_text=True, discard_empty=True)
+        self.assertEqual(output, "")
+
+    def test_discard_empty_skips_redirect_in_doc_format(self):
+        output = self.extract_output(self.REDIRECT_BODY,
+                                      discard_empty=True)  # default doc format
+        self.assertEqual(output, "")
+
+    def test_discard_empty_skips_redirect_in_json_format(self):
+        output = self.extract_output(self.REDIRECT_BODY,
+                                      to_json=True, discard_empty=True)
+        self.assertEqual(output, "")
+
+    def test_discard_empty_does_not_affect_normal_articles(self):
+        output = self.extract_output(self.NORMAL_BODY,
+                                      to_text=True, discard_empty=True)
+        self.assertIn("A real article with actual content in it.", output)
+
+    def test_without_discard_empty_flag_redirect_still_writes_something(self):
+        # discard_empty is opt-in: without it, a redirect/empty article
+        # should still produce the usual (near-empty-bodied) output
+        # rather than being silently skipped.
+        output = self.extract_output(self.REDIRECT_BODY,
+                                      to_text=True, discard_empty=False)
+        self.assertNotEqual(output, "")
+
+
+class MutuallyExclusiveFlagsTests(unittest.TestCase):
+    """--json and --text are declared as a mutually exclusive argparse
+    group; passing both should be rejected at the CLI level before any
+    input file is even opened.
+    """
+
+    def test_json_and_text_together_rejected_by_cli(self):
+        # argparse validates mutually-exclusive groups during
+        # parse_args(), which happens before the (nonexistent) input
+        # file is ever opened -- so this doesn't need a real dump file.
+        result = subprocess.run(
+            [sys.executable, "-m", "wikiextractor.WikiExtractor",
+             "--json", "--text", "nonexistent_input_file.xml"],
+            cwd="..", capture_output=True, text=True
+        )
+        self.assertNotEqual(result.returncode, 0)
+        self.assertIn("not allowed with argument", result.stderr)
+
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    unittest.main()
diff --git a/wikiextractor/WikiExtractor.py b/wikiextractor/WikiExtractor.py
index 8934bab4..6290265a 100755
--- a/wikiextractor/WikiExtractor.py
+++ b/wikiextractor/WikiExtractor.py
@@ -49,6 +49,10 @@
 
     {"id": "", "revid": "", "url": "", "title": "", "text": "..."}
 
+If the program is invoked with --text, then the output will not include
+the <doc> tags and will have just the content instead.  This is mutually
+exclusinve with --json
+
 The program performs template expansion by preprocesssng the whole dump and
 collecting template definitions.
 """
@@ -546,8 +550,11 @@ def main():
                         metavar="n[KMG]")
     groupO.add_argument("-c", "--compress", action="store_true",
                         help="compress output files using bzip")
-    groupO.add_argument("--json", action="store_true",
-                        help="write output in json format instead of the default <doc> format")
+    groupOFormat = groupO.add_mutually_exclusive_group()
+    groupOFormat.add_argument("--json", action="store_true",
+                              help="write output in json format instead of the default <doc> format")
+    groupOFormat.add_argument("--text", action="store_true",
+                              help="write output in text format (body only, no title) instead of the default <doc> format")
     groupO.add_argument("--discard_empty", action="store_true",
                         help="discard empty articles (such as redirects) rather than writing just the title")
 
@@ -586,6 +593,7 @@ def main():
     if args.html:
         Extractor.keepLinks = True
     Extractor.to_json = args.json
+    Extractor.to_text = args.text
     Extractor.discard_empty = args.discard_empty
 
     try:
@@ -610,6 +618,13 @@ def main():
     if args.debug:
         logger.setLevel(logging.DEBUG)
 
+    if args.json:
+        logger.debug("Outputting to json format")
+    elif args.text:
+        logger.debug("Outputting to text format")
+    else:
+        logger.debug("Outputting to <doc> format")
+
     input_file = args.input
 
     if not Extractor.keepLinks:
diff --git a/wikiextractor/extract.py b/wikiextractor/extract.py
index e23354f5..564f5f2d 100644
--- a/wikiextractor/extract.py
+++ b/wikiextractor/extract.py
@@ -923,6 +923,8 @@ class Extractor():
     ##
     # Whether to produce json instead of the default <doc> output format.
     to_json = False
+    # Whether to produce text instead of the default <doc> output format.
+    to_text = False
 
     ##
     # Whether or not to discard empty (title only) documents
@@ -994,6 +996,9 @@ def extract(self, out, html_safe=True):
             out_str = json.dumps(json_data)
             out.write(out_str)
             out.write('\n')
+        elif self.to_text:
+            out.write('\n'.join(text))
+            out.write('\n\n\n')
         else:
             header = '<doc id="%s" url="%s" title="%s">\n' % (self.id, self.url, self.title)
             # Separate header from text with a newline.