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RAR
What is a RAR file?
A proprietary archive format. Can be unpacked everywhere, created almost nowhere.
What RAR is
RAR is a container: a wrapper that holds streams encoded by something else. It is used for archiving.
The extension is .rar, and the full name is RAR Archive. Both matter less than what the file can hold, which is what the rest of this page is about.
Where RAR came from
win.rar GmbH published it in 1993.
A format that has been readable for that long is a format worth trusting with something you want back in ten years.
The specification belongs to its vendor
Reading it outside the vendor’s own software depends on work done by other people, usually by inspection rather than by documentation. That mostly works and occasionally does not, which is the reason to convert anything you intend to keep.
Nothing is thrown away
RAR stores its content exactly. Saving it again changes nothing, so it can be opened, edited and re-saved as often as you like without accumulating damage — which is what makes it a working format rather than a delivery one.
It can hold a whole folder
RAR stores a directory: names, folders and the structure between them. That is what lets it stand in for a folder in an email attachment.
What it does to protect itself
RAR carries a checksum, so a damaged file is detected rather than silently mis-read and optional encryption.
An encrypted file has to be unlocked before anything can convert it, here or anywhere else — a password is not something a converter can work around, and one that claimed to could not be trusted with the file either.
What opens RAR
WinRAR, 7-Zip and Keka read it, and so do most programs of the same kind.
If a file will not open, the format is rarely the problem — it is more often that the program predates it. Converting to something older is the reliable way past that, and it is what the rest of this site is for.
Opening it in a browser
No browser reads it.
That is the single most common reason to convert it: not that the format is bad, but that the place you want to show the file cannot read it.
It is a delivery format
RAR is meant to be handed over rather than worked in. Editing one is possible and rarely pleasant; the sane approach is to change the source and export again.
What goes wrong with it
The recurring complaints: support outside its home ground is uneven.
None of these is a reason to avoid the format. They are the things worth knowing before you are surprised by one, which is a different claim and a more useful one.
The facts, in one place
| Extension | .rar |
|---|---|
| Media type | application/vnd.rar |
| Published by | win.rar GmbH |
| First published | 1993 |