FAQ & Help Center

Here you can find answers regarding WinRAR installation, usage, licensing, and troubleshooting. Whether you are a first-time user or an expert, you'll find the support you need.

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Licensing & Purchasing
Download & Installation
Usage & Features
Troubleshooting

Licensing & Purchasing

WinRAR licenses are perpetual. This means you can install and use that version for as long as you wish. However, to stay updated, you may need to purchase the "Support & Maintenance Package" to receive all upgrades and updates for 12 months. If you do not purchase maintenance, you can use the version you bought forever.

WinRAR is "try before you buy" software (Trialware). We provide a 40-day free trial for all users. After the trial period ends, continuing to use WinRAR without purchasing a valid license is a violation of our End User License Agreement (EULA).

Usually, after paying for the license, you will receive an email containing the registration key file (usually rarreg.rar). If you did not receive it, or lost the key due to computer failure, please contact us via our Technical Support Email and provide your order information (such as name, email, or order number), and we will assist you in retrieving it.

You can find it in the WinRAR software under the "Help" menu > "About WinRAR", or view the license.txt file in the installation directory. You can also visit our official website to view the online version of the EULA.

Download & Installation

  1. Download the latest version of the WinRAR installer for your language from our download page.
  2. Double-click the installer and follow the prompts to complete the installation.
  3. If you have purchased a license, unzip/copy the rarreg.key or rarreg.rar file from the email attachment to the WinRAR installation directory (usually C:\Program Files\WinRAR).

Yes, WinRAR can be installed on a server. For commercial environments, a separate license must be purchased for each computer/client installing or running the software. If used in a network environment (client/server), a license must be purchased for each client accessing WinRAR.

Upgrading is very simple: just download the latest version of the installer and run it. It will automatically detect the old version and update it, while preserving your registration information and settings. It is recommended not to uninstall the old version before installing the new one.

Usage & Features

RAR is WinRAR's native compression format. Compared to ZIP, RAR typically offers higher compression ratios, supports split volumes, recovery records (for repairing damaged files), and stronger encryption. ZIP has broader compatibility; Windows systems support opening ZIP files by default, while opening RAR files usually requires WinRAR installed.

After installing WinRAR, you can open them by:
  • Double-click: Double-click the RAR file directly in File Explorer.
  • Context Menu: Right-click the file and select "Open with WinRAR" or "Extract to...".
  • Drag & Drop: Open the WinRAR main program and drag the file into the window.
Once opened, click the "Extract To" button on the toolbar to extract files to a specified directory.

The file size WinRAR handles is practically unlimited (up to 8,589,934,591 GB). The actual limit usually depends on your operating system's file system. For example, the FAT32 file system does not support files larger than 4GB, while the NTFS file system does not have this limit. It is recommended to use NTFS format for handling large files.

In the archive creation dialog, find the "Split to volumes, size" option. You can select a preset size from the dropdown list (e.g., CD, DVD, FAT32 limit) or enter a size manually (e.g., 100M). WinRAR will automatically split the file into multiple parts (part1.rar, part2.rar...), and you only need to open the first volume to automatically merge them during extraction.

Troubleshooting

Unfortunately, WinRAR's encryption is very strong (AES-256), and there are no backdoors or universal methods to bypass the password. If you forget the password, data recovery is usually impossible. Some third-party "password recovery tools" on the market actually use brute-force attempts, which may take years for complex passwords.

This indicates that the file data is corrupted. You can try:
  1. Use the Repair function: Select the file in WinRAR and click the "Repair" button on the toolbar (or press Alt+R). If a recovery record was added when the archive was created, the success rate is high.
  2. Keep broken files: In the extraction dialog, check the "Keep broken files" option, so at least the uncorrupted parts can be extracted.
  3. If it is a split volume archive, try re-downloading the volume that reported the error.