- Quick specs
- Price: Free to try (40-day trial, some features disabled); $29.00 to buy (Buy it now)
- Operating system: Windows 95, Windows Me, Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows NT, Windows 98
- Date added: October 12, 2005
- Total Downloads: 71,544,207
- Downloads last week: 316,497
- See full specifications
A newer version of WinRAR is available.
(Download doesn't provide access to previous versions of this program.)
- CNET editors' rating: stars
- Average user rating: stars out of 1364 votes
See all user reviews
CNET editors' review
Reviewed by: CNET Staff
There are plenty of solid compression utilities to choose from, but this shareware powerhouse offers the features and ease of use that might place it at the top of its category. WinRAR is easy to use, lightweight, and flexible. An intuitive interface lets you mouse over icons to see their functions and if you don't like their candy-coated appearance, you can always choose from several themes at the developer's site. The Folder Tree Panel, a recent addition to the interface, makes sifting through your directories to find files for archiving easier than ever. But once you see the size savings of a RAR archive (with a compression ratio of 8 percent to 15 percent better than the ZIP format), you'll understand why so many users and developers are making the switch from other compression apps. You might even be prepared to forgive the slightly slower decompression speeds and lack of integrated virus protection.
Beyond its good looks and right-click readiness for basic compression and unzipping, WinRAR offers unpacking support for a large number of archive formats, including ACE, BZ2, JAR, ISO, and ZIP. WinRAR's advanced features are icing on the cake, with Unicode support for international formatting, embedded file comments, repair of damaged archives, archive locking, self-extracting archives, and easy encryption. Anyone seeking an all-in-one archiving solution would be remiss to not evaluate WinRAR.
Watch the CNET video review of WinRAR:
Publisher's description
From RARLAB :WinRAR is a 32-bit Windows version of RAR Archiver, an archiver and archive manager. RAR files can usually compress content by 8 percent to 15 percent more than ZIP files can. WinRAR's main features include strong general and multimedia compression, the ability to process non-RAR archive formats, ZIP compression and decompression, support for long filenames, programmable self-extracting archives (SFX), repair of damaged archives, authenticity verification, embedded file comments, and encryption. Unicode is supported in archive filenames, allowing non-English filenames to be handled painlessly. You can manipulate the parameters of many archives at once and view a volume sequence as a single archive. WinRAR can convert other archive formats to RAR and search for specified text and files in archives.
WinRAR 3.51 may include unspecified updates, enhancements, and bug fixes.
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User reviews of WinRAR 3.51
- Average user rating: 4.1 stars out of 1364 votes
- My rating: 0 stars Write review
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Showing 5 of 80 user reviewsSee all 80 user reviews
This software version | All versions -
76 out of 107 people found this review helpful
Version: WinRAR 3.51
"Opens faster than WinZip and saves you space!"
Pros: WinRAR's compression ratio is about 1/2 of WinZip's, so if you archieve a lot of files it will save you space on your hard drive. It also unzips files faster than the other zip programs on the market. More and more downloaded files are RAR today, than in the past, and I would be lost without WinRAR. Try it, it comes with a free trial! 5 Stars and Two thumbs Up!
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8 out of 9 people found this review helpful
Version: WinRAR 3.51
Pros: Well, after used winrar i uninstalled winzip, rar more powerful compared with winzip, and winrar supported rar. even zip. format, i will buy it. Love it! Dont believe what i said? Just get a try.
Cons: Not at all!
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6 out of 9 people found this review helpful
Version: WinRAR 3.51
Pros: I think all users can agree : this is essential software , traditional but still the best . No computer can do without
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2 out of 2 people found this review helpful
Version: WinRAR 3.51
Pros: kick ass software this is the best off all. high compresion zip. and advanced sfx archiving is perfect.
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3 out of 4 people found this review helpful
Version: WinRAR 3.51
"This is the Name of Reliability"
Pros: I use it for a long time. I compress and decompress many files, and always it works as a pleasant breeze.
Cons: Highly reliable. I recommend you to use WinRAR.
- See all 80 user reviews Write review
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