RAR Extractor 13.9.6 — Mac version
RAR Extractor works on any Mac running macOS 11.5 (Big Sur) or newer, on both Intel and Apple Silicon machines. If you have an older Mac that still does the job, this app keeps up.
Drag to desktop, unpack right there
- Quick, no-fuss extraction. Drag an archive to the desktop and it unpacks right there — or double-click and let the app handle it as your default opener.
- Picking out single files. You can extract just one file or folder from an archive instead of the whole thing. Handy when someone sends a big zip and you only need the document inside.
- Oddball formats. Alongside RAR and ZIP, it opens 7Z, TAR, CAB, ISO, APK, winmail.dat files from Outlook, and plenty more. If a compressed file lands on your desk, this probably opens it.
- Seeing what's inside first. Fast preview lets you peek at the file list before you commit to extracting.
Reads far more formats than it writes
- Requires macOS 11.5 or later. Anything older won't run it.
- Some features are only available in the paid edition.
- Creating archives is supported, but the format list for extraction is longer — it reads far more than it writes.
Opens locked RARs when you have the password
Does it handle password-protected archives? Yes. If someone sends you a locked RAR or ZIP, RAR Extractor asks for the password and extracts just fine. It also creates encrypted ZIP and 7Z archives using AES-256, so anything you pack yourself stays private.
Can I use it instead of the unarchiver built into macOS? Absolutely. Set it as the default archive app once and it'll take over from Archive Utility — double-click any supported file and RAR Extractor opens it. The built-in tool chokes on password-protected RARs and winmail.dat files, so this fills the gaps nicely.
What about those winmail.dat attachments from Outlook users? That's one of the things people search for a rar file extractor for mac to solve. The preview window shows what's inside a winmail.dat before you extract, saving you from dumping a folder of mystery files onto the desktop.
Does it slow down an older Mac? Not really. It's a lightweight utility, not a suite of background processes. If you've gone looking for a rar download mac app that doesn't drag the system down, this one stays out of the way until you feed it something to unpack.
Will it open split archives? Yes — multi-part RAR files (the ones ending in .part1.rar, .part2.rar and so on) extract as one when you open the first part. No extra steps needed.
A quick workflow: handling a password-protected RAR from a client
Say a client emails over a project folder packed as a RAR with a password. Here's how it goes, soup to nuts.
- Save the attachment somewhere obvious — Downloads or a project folder on the desktop.
- Drag the .rar file onto the RAR Extractor dock icon. The app opens and shows the file list straight away, so you can see whether you need everything inside.
- If a password prompt appears, paste or type it in. The preview updates to show the decrypted contents.
- Decide what to keep. Maybe you only need the PDF and a folder of images. Select just those items in the list, then hit extract. The rest stays packed.
- Pick a destination — a client folder on the desktop, for example — and let it finish. You now have exactly the files you need, no clutter.
The same steps work for 7Z files, TAR bundles, or anything else the app supports. The preview-first approach stops you from spraying forty files across a clean desktop before you know what they are.
Toggle it to open all your archives
Out of the box, RAR Extractor works fine, but a couple of tweaks make it feel more like yours.
Set it as the default archive opener. In the app preferences, there's a toggle to make it handle all supported formats when you double-click a file. Turn that on and you won't end up in Archive Utility by accident. If someone suggests you need a winrar for mac download, this does the same job without hunting for a port.
Choose where files land. By default, extracted files appear next to the original archive. You can change that to always ask, or always use a specific folder — useful if you like to keep downloads messy but extractions tidy.
Switch to dual-window view. The two-pane layout puts the archive contents on one side and the destination folder on the other. It feels more like a proper file manager and makes dragging files between panes dead simple. Find it in the View menu.
Turn off automatic preview for large archives. If you work with multi-gigabyte ISO or NRG files, the preview can take a moment. The preference to disable auto-preview on files over a certain size keeps things snappy. You can still preview manually when you need to.
- macOS 11.5 or later
- Apple Silicon or Intel 64-bit Mac
Questions from the bench
Can RAR Extractor open winmail.dat files?
Yes, it includes a preview and extraction option for winmail.dat attachments sent from Microsoft Outlook.
What Mac does it need?
It needs macOS 11.5 or later and runs natively on both Intel 64-bit and Apple Silicon Macs.
Can I pull out just one file from a big archive?
Yes, you can select a single file or folder inside an archive and extract only that, without unpacking the rest.
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