How To Open And Extract RAR Files On Mac
What Is A RAR File?
If you already know this, or if you just don't care, feel free to skip down to the next section for the actual instructions.
A RAR file is almost the same thing as a ZIP file. Both are in "archive" file formats which is meant for compressing many individual files into one single file. That way, you would only have to put one file up for download, and the file receivers would only need to download one file instead of many separate ones.
RAR is used to denote the word "Roshal ARchive", named after the Russian software engineer who created the RAR archive format. The RAR format was created to address some of the flaws that was present in the ZIP format and it comes with several benefits: such as smaller file sizes, the ability to split a RAR into multiple chunks, and error recovery options.
That said, we have come a long way since the days of ZIP and RAR, and we now have way better methods to compress, encrypt, and to transfer files. The 7-Zip format is one popular option, but it's far from the standard. As such, it is still important to know how to handle RAR files.
How To Open up And Extract RAR Files On Mac OS
The RAR format is proprietary, so it's no surprise that Mac systems don't come with a built-in utility for handling it. However, the solution is as easy as installing a free third-party tool that can open RAR files.
Here are three RAR extraction options you can pick from.
1. Open RAR Files With Keka
Keka is a compression and extraction tool that's available both in the Mac App Store and as a standalone installation. Once installed, all you have to do is double-click on a RAR file to extract it, or right-click one and select Open.
The downside to using Keka, at least for some users, is that you can't explore the contents of a RAR file without first extracting it. You might never need this functionality, in which case this is a great tool for the job. But if you like having the ability to peek at an archive's contents and only pull out the files you need, Keka isn't the right app for you.
2. Use UnRAR On The Mac Terminal
To extract a RAR file using the Terminal on your MAC, you will need to install something known as Homebrew, which is an all-in-one tool for installing other tools in the system.
For example, using Homebrew you can install a RAR extraction tool with just one command:
brew install unrar
You must type this into the Terminal, which you can access by opening Spotlight (using the Cmd + Space keyboard shortcut), typing "terminal", and launching Terminal.app.
If you get a message saying that UnRAR needs to be built from source, you will have to first install the Xcode command line tools using this command:
xcode-select --install
Once UnRAR is installed, you can extract any RAR file by navigating to that file in Terminal and typing this command:
unrar x example_file.rar
3. Try Using An Online RAR Extractor
An online RAR extractor can come in handy when you’re only looking to extract one or a few archives. With an online tool, you don’t need to install anything on your computer. These tools work through your web browser and let you extract your files just like how your desktop programs do.
Extract.Me is one of the online tools that can help you to extract RAR and many other archive formats using a web browser. You can add your archives from your computer, other cloud storage services such as Google Drive and Dropbox, and even from direct web URLs.
Once you have uploaded an archive, wait a few seconds for the site to extract it. You can then download the individual files inside your archive to your computer.
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