How to Open RAR Files in Windows 11 and 10 (Free)

Jake lost a customer over a file he couldn't open. The part that stings: on his other laptop, the same file would have opened with a double-click.

If you're on Windows 11 (version 23H2 or newer), that double-click is the entire answer — Windows has opened RAR files natively since October 2023, no software needed. On Windows 10, Windows genuinely can't do it, so install 7-Zip — free, from 7-zip.org.

That's the fix. The rest of this page is for the awkward files: the ones that say part1, part2, part3, the ones that demand a password, and the ones Windows insists are "corrupt" when they're perfectly fine.

Now, the six minutes that cost Jake a sale.

He runs a small mobile phone shop. His supplier had emailed the new quarter's price list — 400 handsets, wholesale rates, the lot — as an attachment called Q3-pricing.rar. A customer was at the counter asking what a particular phone would cost him.

Jake double-clicked. Windows offered to open it in Notepad. He said yes, because what else do you say, and got several thousand lines of characters that looked like a cat had fallen on the keyboard. He tried Paint. Somehow that was worse.

Six minutes in, the customer put the phone back on the counter and left.

So Jake did what almost everybody does next. He searched. He landed on a page telling him to install WinRAR. He clicked the biggest, greenest Download button on the page.

By that evening his browser had a new toolbar, a homepage he didn't choose, a search engine he'd never heard of, and adverts appearing on websites that don't carry adverts.

"Ethan," he said down the phone, "I wanted to read a price list. Now my laptop is possessed."

Ethan — the friend Jake calls when technology stops making sense — asked exactly one question before anything else. It's the question this whole article turns on, and it's the one almost no other guide bothers to ask:

"Which version of Windows is that laptop running?"

Jake didn't know. Which, as it turned out, was the reason for all of it.

First, a Confession About This Article

We first published a guide to opening RAR files in December 2016. It told you to install WinRAR — because in 2016, that was the correct answer.

It stopped being the correct answer in October 2023. We left the page up unchanged anyway, which means some of you followed our advice into exactly the kind of download page that wrecked Jake's laptop. That one's on us.

So this isn't a refresh with a new date stamp. The main recommendation has been reversed, and here's precisely what changed underneath it:

We're telling you this because a ten-year-old blog has one thing a brand-new content farm can never fake: we were here when the old answer was true, and we'll tell you when we were wrong. Hold onto that, because further down we're going to tell you something Windows 11 can't do that Microsoft doesn't advertise.

What a RAR File Actually Is

"Two minutes on this," Ethan said, "and you'll never be confused by an attachment again."

A RAR file is a container. A cardboard box for files.

Jake's supplier had a spreadsheet, forty product photos and a PDF. Rather than attach forty-two things to one email, they put all forty-two in a box and taped it shut. That box is the .rar file.

The box earns its keep two ways:

• It squashes the contents. A 40 MB folder might travel as a 6 MB RAR. That's why suppliers, printers and anyone emailing large files reach for it.
• It keeps everything together — one attachment arriving with its folder structure intact, instead of forty loose files landing in your Downloads.

"So it's just a ZIP file with a different name?"

Same idea. Different brand. And the brand is the entire problem.

ZIP is the format Microsoft baked into Windows decades ago, which is why ZIP files have always opened without fuss. RAR was created by a developer named Eugene Roshal — RAR stands for Roshal Archive — and Microsoft never licensed it.

That's the whole reason you're reading this page. Nothing is broken on your computer. Your download isn't corrupt. Windows was simply never taught the format.

Then Microsoft quietly changed its mind

In the Windows 11 23H2 update of October 2023, Microsoft added native support for RAR — along with 7z, TAR, GZ and several others — straight into File Explorer, built on an open-source library called libarchive.

They announced it at a developer conference and then said remarkably little more about it. Which is why, three years on, the change is still missing from most of the search results you'll find. Pages written before 2024 are handing Windows 11 users instructions they haven't needed in years.

One Question Decides Your Method

Other guides hand you six methods and leave you to sort it out. You don't need six. You need the one that matches your machine.

Find your Windows version — 30 seconds

1. Press Windows + R. This opens the Run box — a small text field for launching things by name. It's the fastest route into nearly every Windows tool, and once you know it exists you'll use it constantly.
2. Type winver and press Enter.
3. A small window appears. The first line says Windows 10 or Windows 11. The line beneath gives the version: 22H2, 23H2, 24H2 and so on.

The numbering reads as year-and-half: 23H2 means the second half of 2023. So anything 23H2 or higher has native RAR support built in.

Route A — Windows 11, With No Software At All

There are two different things you might want here, and people conflate them constantly.

If you just want to look inside

1. Double-click the .rar file.
2. File Explorer opens it like a folder. Browse around. Double-click any individual file to view it.

That's a preview, not an unpack — perfect when you want one spreadsheet out of twenty.

If you want the files out properly

1. Right-click the .rar file.
2. Choose Extract All…
3. Pick a destination. The default — a new folder beside the archive — is almost always the right answer.
4. Tick Show extracted files when complete, then click Extract.

"I'm on Windows 11 and double-click does nothing"

Three causes, in order of likelihood:

1. You're older than 23H2. Confirm with winver. If you've been postponing updates, the feature you want is sitting inside the update you keep dismissing. Our guide to controlling Windows updates without switching them off entirely shows how to catch up on your schedule rather than mid-sale.
2. An old copy of WinRAR is installed and has claimed the file type. Uninstall it, or right-click → Open with → Choose another app → Windows Explorer → tick Always use this app.
3. The archive is encrypted or split. See the hard cases — Route A fails on both, and it fails without explaining why. That's how perfectly good files end up deleted as "corrupt".

Route B — Windows 10, and How to Install 7-Zip Without Getting Burned

Windows 10 supports ZIP and nothing else. It never got native RAR support, and having reached end of support in October 2025, it never will. You need a tool — and the download is the dangerous part, not the tool.

Installing it safely

1. Type 7-zip.org directly into your address bar. Do not search for "7zip download" and click a result. The sponsored results sitting above the genuine site are the entire problem — that's how Jake's laptop got its toolbar.
2. Download the 64-bit x64 .exe. That's correct for essentially every PC built in the last fifteen years. Not sure? Our guide to checking whether your Windows is 32-bit or 64-bit settles it in half a minute.
3. Run it and click Install. There are no bundled offers, no toolbars, no pre-ticked boxes to hunt for. The absence of them is the entire point.

If Windows shows a blue "Windows protected your PC" box, that's SmartScreen reacting to a file it hasn't seen you download before — not a virus warning. Click More info → Run anyway, provided you typed the address yourself and the publisher line reads Igor Pavlov. If it says anything else, you're on a copy. Delete it and start again. If installing software is new to you, our walkthrough on installing programs safely covers the whole process.

Opening your file

1. Right-click the .rar file. (On Windows 11: Show more options first.)
2. Hover 7-Zip, then choose:
   • Open archive — look inside without unpacking.
   • Extract to "<name>\" — the one you want. Creates a tidy folder named after the archive.
   • Extract Here — dumps everything into the current folder. Fine for a one-file archive; a catastrophe when the archive holds two hundred loose photos.

"Extract to the named folder. Every single time," Ethan said. "'Extract Here' is how people end up with a Downloads folder they can never find anything in again."

"Should I just use WinRAR?" — the honest answer

WinRAR works well. It's from the people who invented the format. But two facts usually get skipped:

It's trialware, not free software. Forty days, then a purchase reminder every time you open it — while continuing to work indefinitely. So many people have used it unpaid for so long that they assume it's free. It isn't. It's unenforced, which is a different thing, and on a business PC that distinction matters the day anyone audits your software.

The one thing only it can do is create RAR files. The RAR compression format is proprietary, so 7-Zip and PeaZip can read RAR but can't write it. If a supplier insists on receiving .rar specifically, that's a genuine reason to buy a licence. Otherwise send ZIP — every device on earth opens ZIP, including your recipient's phone.

The Four Hard Cases Nobody Documents

Everything above is the easy 80%. These four are where readers actually get stuck — and where most articles go quiet.

Case 1 — part1, part2, part3

Jake hit this the following week. Product photos arrived as five files:

photos.part1.rar
photos.part2.rar
photos.part3.rar
photos.part4.rar
photos.part5.rar

He opened part2, because that's the one he happened to click first. It failed. He assumed the download was broken and asked the supplier to resend all five. They did. It failed again.

These aren't five archives. This is one archive cut into five pieces — almost always because an email system refused anything over 20 or 25 MB.

Three rules, and they're absolute:

• Every part must sit in the same folder.
• You open only part1. It pulls in the rest by itself.
• If one part is missing or incompletely downloaded, extraction fails around the point where that piece belonged — which looks exactly like corruption, and isn't.

Older split sets use different naming: .r00, .r01, .r02 alongside a single .rar. Same principle — keep them together, open the .rar.

Case 2 — It asks for a password

Two things here, one of which you won't enjoy.

First: Windows 11's built-in extractor cannot open encrypted archives at all. It doesn't prompt you. It doesn't explain. It just fails — which reads as corruption and sends people down entirely the wrong path. Microsoft has acknowledged the limitation in its own community forums; it simply isn't mentioned anywhere you'd naturally look. Use 7-Zip, which asks for the password like a civilised program.

Second: if you don't know the password, you're not getting in. RAR uses genuine AES encryption — not a latch on the lid. There's no trick, no hex editor, no hidden setting. The only route is asking whoever created the archive.

Search results are thick with "RAR password recovery" tools. They divide into two groups: real brute-force programs, which try combinations one at a time and would need years for any decent password; and malware wearing the same name to catch people who are desperate. On a PC holding customer records, neither is worth touching. Keep real-time protection switched on and stay out of that category entirely.

Case 3 — "The archive is corrupt or damaged"

Nine times out of ten this is an incomplete download, not a damaged file.

1. Right-click the file → Properties and read the size.
2. Ask the sender what it should be. If yours is short, there's your answer — download again, ideally on a stable connection.
3. If it's a split set, check every part. One short piece breaks the whole thing.
4. Try 7-Zip even if Windows already refused. It's more tolerant of minor damage and will often extract most of the contents from an archive Windows gives up on entirely.

If it genuinely is damaged, WinRAR has a Repair archive function under Tools. It only works when the archive was created with recovery records — which is uncommon — and it frequently fails outright. Be realistic about it rather than hopeful.

And if that archive held the only copy of something you can't recreate — a year of invoices, the photographs — you're no longer troubleshooting an archive. You're in data recovery, where professional services start in the tens of thousands of rupees and guarantee nothing.

Ethan's line to Jake was blunt: "One copy isn't a backup. It's a countdown." A cloud backup service running quietly in the background, or an external drive with Windows' built-in File History — ideally both — costs a fraction of one recovery attempt. We've written a walkthrough on backing up to an external drive with no extra software. Shops keeping billing records on a single desktop tend to discover this the expensive way, usually on a Saturday.

Case 4 — Windows opens it in Notepad, or refuses entirely

The file association is wrong or missing. Right-click → Open with → Choose another app → 7-Zip File Manager → tick Always use this app.

If the file appears to have no extension at all, Windows is probably hiding extensions — so pricing.rar displays as pricing, and a mislabelled file becomes impossible to spot. Turn them on: our guide to showing hidden files and file extensions covers it, and it's a change worth making permanently for the security reason in the next section.

Handily, 7-Zip identifies archives by their actual contents rather than by file name, so it'll often open a file that Windows has entirely given up on.

Before You Extract Anything That Arrived by Email

Ethan stopped Jake before the next attachment.

"An archive hides its contents from your email provider's scanner. That's precisely why attackers like them. A ZIP or RAR attachment is one of the oldest delivery methods there is, and it still works — because it looks identical to every legitimate file your supplier sends you."

Three habits, worth more than any software you could buy:

• Extract first, read the file names, then open. A "price list" containing invoice.pdf.exe is not a price list. That double extension is the giveaway — and it's invisible if Windows is hiding extensions, which is the second reason to turn them on.
• Treat .exe, .scr, .bat, .cmd, .js and .lnk inside an unexpected archive as hostile. Genuine documents never need them.
• Right-click → Scan with Microsoft Defender before opening anything unexpected — including from suppliers you've worked with for years. Compromised supplier mailboxes are among the most common ways small businesses get hit, precisely because the sender is someone you trust.

Microsoft Defender is genuinely competent and comes free with Windows; for a home PC it's enough. For a shop machine that processes payments as well as email, a paid endpoint security product with web filtering and ransomware rollback is a defensible business expense — the cost of a single day of downtime usually exceeds a year's licence, and the operators targeting small retail know it.

If You're Still on Windows 10, Read This Bit

Not a sales pitch — it's directly relevant to everything above.

Windows 10 reached end of support on 14 October 2025. It still runs, and 7-Zip still works perfectly on it. But it no longer receives free security patches, which matters enormously on the one machine where you open attachments from strangers.

Your options, honestly stated:

• Check whether your PC can take Windows 11. Many machines from 2018 onwards can, and the upgrade is free. Our guide to Windows 11 system requirements and checking your eligibility walks through it, and if you'd rather see someone do it step by step, we wrote up helping my grandfather upgrade from Windows 10 to 11.
• Extended Security Updates (ESU) — Microsoft's paid stopgap, buying you patches while you plan. Reasonable for a business PC you can't replace this quarter.
• New hardware. If the machine is genuinely too old for Windows 11, it's also likely slow enough that an SSD or a replacement would pay for itself in time saved. Before you spend, though, try our guide to speeding up Windows 10 and 11 — a surprising number of "dying" PCs just need a clean-out.

What we'd steer you away from: staying on unpatched Windows 10 indefinitely on a machine that handles money. That's the one option with no ceiling on how badly it goes.

What Jake Actually Did

The unglamorous answer, as usual.

The billing PC was still on Windows 10, so 7-Zip went on from the official site. The price list opened in about four seconds. He removed the browser extension, reset his homepage and search engine, and ran a full Defender scan that came back clean.

His newer laptop runs Windows 11 23H2, and there he installed nothing at all — he double-clicks RAR files and they open. When the supplier sends split photo archives he still switches to 7-Zip on that laptop, because the built-in extractor kept stalling on part1.

Then he did the thing that actually solved the problem permanently. He asked his supplier to send ZIP files instead.

They could. They'd been using RAR out of habit since 2014, and in eleven years not one customer had ever mentioned it.

"Most technology problems," Ethan said, "have a version of that fix. It's just less satisfying than installing something."

Questions You're Probably About to Ask

Can Windows 11 open RAR files without WinRAR?

Yes. Since the Windows 11 23H2 update of October 2023, File Explorer opens .rar files natively. Double-click to browse inside, or right-click → Extract All to unpack. No third-party software required.

Can Windows 10 open RAR files?

No. Windows 10 supports ZIP only, never received native RAR support, and having reached end of support on 14 October 2025, it never will. Use 7-Zip.

Is 7-Zip safe to use?

Yes — downloaded from 7-zip.org by typing the address directly. It's free open-source software with no adware, toolbars or nag screens, and the installer should be signed by Igor Pavlov. Copies from download portals are frequently repackaged with bundled extras; that's where the risk lives, not in the software itself.

Why does my RAR file say part1, part2, part3?

It's one archive split into pieces, usually to get past an email size limit. Keep every part in the same folder and open only part1. Opening part2 alone will always fail, in any tool.

How do I open a RAR file that asks for a password?

Get the password from whoever made the archive. RAR uses real AES encryption that cannot be bypassed, and "password recovery" tools are either impractically slow or outright malware. Also note that Windows 11's built-in extractor can't open encrypted archives at all and fails without prompting — use 7-Zip.

Is WinRAR free?

No. It's trialware — free for 40 days, then a purchase reminder every time it opens while continuing to work indefinitely. To open RAR files you don't need it. To create them you do, because the format is proprietary.

What should I do if a RAR file says it is corrupt or damaged?

Usually the download was incomplete rather than the file damaged. Compare its size against what the sender says it should be and download again if it's short; for split sets, check every part. Try 7-Zip even if Windows refused — it's more tolerant of minor damage. If it's genuinely damaged, WinRAR's Repair archive tool sometimes helps, but only when recovery records were included at creation.

Should I send RAR or ZIP files to other people?

Send ZIP. Every operating system, phone and tablet opens it without extra software. RAR compresses marginally better and splits more gracefully, but you're trading a few megabytes against your recipient having to install something.

Can I open RAR files on Android or iPhone?

Yes. Files by Google on Android and the built-in Files app on iPhone both handle RAR, and free apps cover anything they miss. The password rule is identical on mobile: no password, no entry.

Are online RAR extractors safe?

They work, and they're genuinely useful on a locked-down work computer where you can't install anything. But you're uploading your file to a stranger's server. Never use one for invoices, customer records, identity documents or anything with an account number on it.

How do I create a RAR file?

You need WinRAR — the compression format is proprietary and free tools can read it but not write it. Honestly though: unless someone has specifically demanded .rar, create a ZIP instead. Right-click your files → Compress to ZIP file on Windows 11, or Send to → Compressed (zipped) folder on Windows 10. No software, and everyone can open it.

Extraction is painfully slow. Is something wrong?

Usually your antivirus scanning each file as it lands — correct behaviour for an archive from email. Let it finish. If it happens on every archive from a source you completely trust, most security software supports a narrow folder exclusion. Keep it narrow.

"Not enough space" when extracting?

A 6 MB archive can unpack to 400 MB — that's the whole point of compression. Check free space before blaming the file (here's how to check your drive space), and Storage Sense can clear room automatically. If your drive lives permanently near full, the real fix is an external drive for archives or a larger SSD.

File Explorer freezes when I click the RAR file

Usually a general File Explorer fault rather than an archive one, and common on Windows 10. Our guide to File Explorer crashing and freezing works through the causes in order.

Can I open a RAR file from the command line?

Yes. Windows 10 and 11 both include tar. Open the folder in File Explorer, click the address bar, type cmd and press Enter — Command Prompt opens already pointed at that folder. Then run tar -xf filename.rar. Silence means success; the command line only speaks up when something goes wrong. If you'd like to get comfortable here, our PowerShell commands for beginners guide starts from zero.

Coming Up Next

A week after all this, Jake's drive was mysteriously full again — 25 GB gone with nothing to show for it. The culprit was a folder called Windows.old. What it is, why Windows creates it, and the safe way to remove it is next in this series.

If this was useful, the rest of our Windows Basics series is written the same way: nothing assumed, every term explained the first time it appears, and we tell you when the popular advice is wrong.

Related Guides

Originally published December 2016. Rewritten and re-tested in 2026 after Windows 11 changed the correct answer. Where our earlier advice is now wrong, we've said so above rather than quietly deleting it.