RAR Extractor

About the RAR Extractor

RAR (Roshal Archive) is a proprietary compressed archive format created by Eugene Roshal in 1993. Two on-disk variants exist: RAR4 (signature 'Rar!\x1A\x07\x00', used 1993–2013) and RAR5 (signature 'Rar!\x1A\x07\x01\x00', introduced with WinRAR 5.0 in 2013, which added 256-bit AES-NI encryption, BLAKE2sp file checksums, and 1 PB volume support). Unlike ZIP, the format spec is closed and the decompression source code is licensed under terms that restrict redistribution, which is why most browser-based extractors lean on WebAssembly ports of libunrar or unrar.js. This tool reads your RAR file entirely in the browser via FileReader, lists every entry (file name, size, packed size, compression ratio, CRC32 checksum), and lets you download individual files or the whole archive. Encrypted entries (password-protected RAR4 with -p flag or RAR5 with -hp encrypted headers) cannot be cracked here — for those use WinRAR, 7-Zip, or our 7Z Extractor which has broader format coverage. The 200 MB cap exists because browsers buffer the whole archive in memory; larger archives need a desktop tool that streams chunks from disk.

What is the difference between RAR4 and RAR5, and which version do you support?

RAR4 (the 'RAR' format used 2001–2013) uses a custom variant of LZSS plus an arithmetic coder, has up to 1 TB volume size, and supports AES-128 encryption when you set a password. RAR5 (introduced with WinRAR 5.0 in 2013) replaced both: it uses an improved LZSS variant called RAR-Optimized, supports AES-256-CTR encryption, optional BLAKE2sp checksums (replacing CRC32 for paranoid integrity checks), and 1 PB volumes. The on-disk signature distinguishes them — open the file in a hex viewer and look at the first 7-8 bytes. This extractor reads the entry listing and pulls files from both variants. Content-encrypted entries are supported too: open the archive, type the password in the field that appears, and click Extract again. The only case we cannot handle in the browser is header-encrypted archives (made with `rar a -hp`), where even the file list is encrypted — use a desktop tool for those.

How do I extract a password-protected RAR archive here?

Open the archive as usual. When the tool detects encrypted data, a password field appears below the file info — type the archive password and click Extract Files again. The password is passed straight to the WebAssembly decoder running in your tab and is never sent to a server, so your file and your password stay on your device. This works for content-encrypted RAR4 and RAR5 archives (the common case, made with WinRAR's password dialog or `rar a -p`). The one case the browser cannot handle is header-encrypted archives (`rar a -hp`), where the file list itself is encrypted and cannot be read until decryption — for those, use WinRAR, 7-Zip (free, open-source), Keka (macOS), or The Unarchiver (macOS), which implement the AES-NI hardware path natively. If you get a wrong-password message, double-check capitalization and any trailing spaces.

What does the CRC32 or BLAKE2sp checksum in the listing mean?

Every entry in a RAR archive carries a checksum so the extractor can verify the file came out byte-identical to what went in. RAR4 uses CRC32 (a 32-bit polynomial checksum, the same algorithm used in Ethernet frames, ZIP, and PNG); RAR5 defaults to CRC32 but can optionally use BLAKE2sp (a parallel cryptographic hash much harder to spoof). If extraction completes but the checksum mismatches, the source archive is corrupt (bit-rot on the medium, an incomplete download, or a malicious tampering). Re-download the archive or run `rar t archive.rar` in WinRAR's CLI to test integrity. CRC32 is *not* cryptographic — anyone can craft a different file with the same CRC32 — so do not treat checksum match as proof of authenticity, only of accidental-corruption detection.

Can I extract multi-part (split) RAR archives like .part1.rar, .part2.rar?

Partial support. RAR splits a large archive into volumes named filename.part01.rar, filename.part02.rar, etc. (old style: filename.rar, filename.r00, filename.r01). To extract, the tool needs every part loaded together; the browser cannot reach across separate uploads automatically the way WinRAR does on a disk folder. Workaround: combine the parts into one stream first using a desktop tool (`cat *.part*.rar > combined.bin` on Linux/macOS, or just point WinRAR at part1 and let it follow the chain). For browser-only workflows, our 7Z Extractor handles 7Z multi-volume splits more cleanly. The 200 MB cap applies to the assembled archive — for a 5-volume 1 GB split, you must use desktop software.

What is the difference between RAR, ZIP, 7Z, TAR, and which should I use?

ZIP (PKZIP 1989, RFC 9018 in 2024) — universal compatibility, every OS opens it natively, uses Deflate compression (1990s-era), no solid mode, weak default encryption. RAR — better compression than ZIP (typically 5–15% smaller on text and code), supports solid mode (treats the entire archive as one stream so similar files compress against each other), recovery records (can repair bit-rot), but proprietary and closed-source. 7Z (7-Zip, 1999) — best compression ratio of the four (LZMA2 algorithm, 10–25% smaller than ZIP on typical content), free open-source, AES-256 encryption with proper header protection, but slower to compress. TAR (tape archive, 1979) — just a wrapper that concatenates files; you pair it with gzip (.tar.gz), bzip2 (.tar.bz2), or xz (.tar.xz) for compression; the Unix and scientific computing default. Use ZIP for max compatibility, 7Z for max compression, RAR if your recipient asks for it, and TAR.GZ/XZ for Linux software distribution.

How is RAR's solid compression mode different and is it worth it?

Solid mode (the default since RAR 3.0 for archives with many small files) treats the entire archive as one continuous LZSS stream rather than compressing each file independently. Files compress against the dictionary built from all previous files in the archive, so 10 nearly-identical photos or 1000 small source files yield dramatically smaller archives — typically 10–40% smaller than non-solid mode for similar content. Trade-offs: extracting a single small file requires decompressing everything before it in the stream (slow random access on huge solid archives), and a corrupted byte early in the stream can break extraction of every file after it (recovery records mitigate but do not eliminate this). For backup archives that will be extracted whole, solid mode is a clear win; for archives you will dip into for one file at a time, non-solid is faster.

Is extracting RAR files online safe and private?

No. The extractor uses the browser's FileReader API and a WebAssembly port of libunrar to parse the archive entirely in your tab. Your file is loaded into a JavaScript ArrayBuffer in browser memory, decoded locally, and the extracted files are produced by Blob/Object URL APIs on your device. Nothing is uploaded to our server, logged to analytics, or cached server-side. Open your browser DevTools Network tab before clicking Extract — you will see zero outbound POST requests for the file content. The page itself loads CSS, JS, and the WebAssembly module from our CDN, but those requests carry no user data. Closing the tab purges the buffer immediately.

What's the file size limit and what should I do for larger archives?

The maximum is 200 MB. The constraint is browser memory: JavaScript engines (V8 in Chrome/Edge, SpiderMonkey in Firefox, JavaScriptCore in Safari) cap a single ArrayBuffer at around 2 GB but practically struggle past a few hundred MB on mobile devices and tabs with other content open. We set 200 MB to keep the experience smooth on a typical phone. For larger archives — game mods, full disk images, dataset dumps — install WinRAR (Windows trial, paid), 7-Zip (Windows free), Keka (macOS paid €5), or The Unarchiver (macOS free, also handles RAR4 and RAR5). On Linux, `unrar x archive.rar` from the unrar package or the open-source bsdtar handles RAR4. Streaming desktop tools never load the whole archive into RAM, so they handle multi-gigabyte files fine.