More like a ZIP file, RAR files are also the compressed files that are developed by the WinRAR archive. However, both ZIP and RAR files help to make the process of file transfer (from one device to another) easier and handy; still, RAR files are at a slightly higher level as it offers more effective solutions for error recovery as well. RAR files can also be split into multi-volume archives to deal with large file sets.
Basically RAR file’s proprietary archive is one that has been compressed in order to save file storage space and to make the email transfer process easy for the users. And, just like Zip files needs to be extracted, RAR files also require the same.
Therefore, in order to use all the benefits of RAR files, one needs to extract them otherwise all the benefits of RAR files are useless for you. But it is also true that many of you don’t know exactly how to open/extract a RAR file. So, having that in mind below we have mentioned the steps and procedure of “how to open RAR file on Windows 10 for free”.
But before that, you need to know that one cannot open a RAR File format by default in Windows 10 because for that you have to use the third-party free compression software in order to uncompress a RAR file to extract it. You can use any of the below-listed third party software in order to extract a RAR file:
- WinZip- can create archives in Zip file format and as well as unpack few other archive file formats.
- 7-Zip- uses its own 7z archive format, also can read as well as write several other archive forms.
- WinRAR- can archives in RAR or ZIP file formats and even unpack numerous archive file formats.
- PeaZip- it supports both old and new formats of the RAR file.
- RARopener- can open popular archives like ZIP, TAR, RAR, 7Z, LZH, etc.
- Extract Now- it extracts the contents of many archive files easily and quickly.
- B1 Free Archiver- it decompresses around 20 popular archive formats
This is also the first step to open a RAR File. One can download the above-mentioned third-party software’s compatible version for Windows 10 operating system from RAR Lab that manages RAR files.
Now, as we have to use any of the third-party software to show you how to open a RAR file on Windows 10; let’s use 7-Zip software as it is considered by the majority as one of the best alternatives out of all the above-mentioned software.
7-Zip is a free alternative archiver software that can read and open RAR files and along with that can create archives that are of smaller size. Using 7-Zip ‘RAR file extractor’ you can also open other archive formats such as WIM files, RAR5 archives, GPT, UEFI BIOS files, ext2/ ext3/ ext4 images, VMDK, and single file QCOW2, etc. Isn’t it amazing!
Now, coming to the second step; after downloading the compatible version of 7-Zip software on your Windows 10, what you need to do is within the main-Zip interface in File Explorer locate your RAR file by clicking double those files. Basically, this step is performed to access the content of the RAR files. So, in order to do that, you have to right-click on those RAR files and select ‘7-Zip’ to finally click on ‘Extract files’.
After that, you have to perform the third step by saving the RAR files on your Windows 10 operating system. To do so, what you can do is double-click the RAR file by selecting the path to extract it in the particular program (where you have decided to launch it/save it) on your operating system. Instead of that, you can also extract the RAR files by saving the file to some other appropriate place on your computer. But for that you need to perform few steps such as first of all, you need to highlight the RAR file and then you have to click on the ‘Copy button’ which is beneath the navigation bar. Lastly, in order to save it, select a location in the pop-up window click ‘OK’ to finally extract the RAR file to that specified destination on your Windows 10 operating system. Also, as your RAR files are out in the open, 7-Zip can even help you to protect them as well.
That’s It.! Performing the above three easy steps can this way help you to extract a RAR file on Windows 10 with so much ease but in starting you feel like its a little lengthier process. However, nothing like that as you can also shorten the above-mentioned steps this way (Click right on the RAR files, choose 7-Zip from the dropdown menu, select a program to extract the RAR on your computer)once you get used to the process of ‘how to extract RAR files on Windows 10’.
