The archive is usually a regular file, which name has a ".rar" suffix.

Features:

  • RAR introduces an original compression algorithm. It allows higher compression ratios than other PC archiving tools, especially on executable files, object libraries, large text files, etc.
  • RAR offers an optional compression algorithm highly optimized for multimedia data.
  • RAR provides functionality for creating a 'solid' archive, which can raise the compression ratio by 10% - 50% over more common methods, particularly when packing large numbers of small files.
  • RAR offers the ability to create and change SFX archives using default and external SFX modules.
  • RAR offers the ability to create a multi-volume archive as SFX.
  • RAR offers a number of service functions, such as setting a password, adding archive and file comments. Even physically damaged archives may be repaired and an archive may be locked to prevent further changes. Authenticity information may be added for additional security and RAR will store information on the last update and name of the archive.

What's New:

  • ZIP SFX module refuses to process SFX commands stored in archive comment if such comment is resided after beginning of Authenticode digital signature. It is done to prevent possible attacks with inclusion of ZIP archive into the signature body. We already prohibited extracting contents of such malformed archives in WinRAR 6.01. We are thankful to Jacob Thompson - Mandiant Advantage Labs for reporting this issue.
  • WinRAR uses https instead of http in the web notifier window, home page and themes links. It also implements additional checks within the web notifier. This is done to prevent a malicious web page from executing existing files on a user's computer. Such attack is only possible if the intruder has managed to spoof or otherwise control user's DNS records. Some other factors are also involved in limiting the practical application of this attack. We would like to express our gratitude to Igor Sak-Sakovskiy for bringing this issue to our attention.
  • Where appropriate, SFX archive displays the additional line with detailed error information provided by operating system. For example, previously such archive would display "Cannot create file" message alone. Now this message is followed by a detailed reason like access denied or file being used by another process. In the past this extended error information was available in WinRAR, but not in SFX archives.
  • Switch -idn hides archived names also in 'v' and 'l' commands. It can be useful if only the archive type or total information is needed.
  • If -ibck -ri switches are used together, WinRAR process sets the priority specified in -ri switch. Previous versions ignored -ri and set the priority to low in the presence of -ibck switch.
  • When using "File/Change drive" command, WinRAR saves the last folder of previous drive and restores it if that drive is selected again later.
  • Name of unpacking file is now included into WinRAR incorrect password warning for RAR5 archives. It can be helpful when unpacking a non-solid archive containing files encrypted with different passwords.

Bugs fixed:

  • "Convert archives" command issued erroneous "The specified password is incorrect" message after succesfully converting RAR archive with encrypted file names if new password was set and archive was opened in WinRAR shell;
  • If command progress window was resized up and then quickly resized down to original dimensions, window contents could be positioned incorrectly.

Previous release notes:

  • Ctrl+A keyboard shortcut selects the entire text in WinRAR comment window.
  • If -idn switch is used together with -t or -df in console RAR when archiving, it additionally disables "Deleting " or "Testing " messages, normally issued by these switches. Also -idn disables folder creation messages when extracting a file to non-existing folder.
  • WinRAR and ZIP SFX module refuse to extract contents of ZIP SFX archives if ZIP central directory is resided after beginning of Authenticode digital signature. It is done to prevent possible attacks with inclusion of ZIP archive into signature body.

Bugs fixed:

  • "Convert archives" command could incorrectly convert Unicode comments in RAR archives.
  • if two archive information windows had been opened from Explorer context menu, the compression ratio bar in the first window could erroneously display a value for second archive. It did not affect the ratio and other text details at the right of window. Only the vertical bar at the left could be updated to a wrong value
  • if "Wait if other WinRAR copies are active" option was enabled in extraction dialog, "Waiting for another WinRAR copy" title was not set in command progress window while waiting
  • when extracting a symbolic link, previous versions did not overwrite existing symbolic links even if user requested it in overwrite prompt.

Version 6.00

  • "Ignore" and "Ignore All" options are added to read error prompt. "Ignore" allows to continue processing with already read file part only and "Ignore All" does it for all future read errors. For example, if you archive a file, which portion is locked by another process, and if "Ignore" is selected in read error prompt, only a part of file preceding the unreadable region will be saved into archive. It can help to avoid interrupting lengthy archiving operations, though be aware that files archived with "Ignore" are incomplete. If switch -y is specified, "Ignore" is applied to all files by default. Previously available "Retry" and "Quit" options are still present in read error prompt as well.
  • Exit code 12 is returned in the command line mode in case of read errors. This code is returned for all options in the read error prompt, including a newly introduced "Ignore" option. Previously more common fatal error code 2 was returned for read errors.
  • If several archives are selected, "Extract archives to" option group in "Options" page of extraction dialog can be used to place extracted files to specified destination folder, to separate subfolders in destination folder, to separate subfolders in archive folders and directly to archive folders. It replaces "Extract archives to subfolders" option and available only if multiple archives are selected.
  • New -ad2 switch places extracted files directly to archive's own folder. Unlike -ad1, it does not create a separate subfolder for each unpacked archive.
  • "Additional switches" option in "Options" page of archiving and extraction dialogs allows to specify WinRAR command line switches. It might be useful if there is no option in WinRAR graphical interface matching a switch. Use this feature only if you are familiar with WinRAR command line syntax and clearly understand what specified switches are intended for.
  • Compression parameters in "Benchmark" command are changed to 32 MB dictionary and "Normal" method. They match RAR5 default mode and more suitable to estimate the typical performance of recent WinRAR versions than former 4 MB "Best" intended for RAR4 format. Latest "Benchmark" results cannot be compared with previous versions directly. New parameters set produces different values, likely lower because of eight times larger dictionary size.
  • When unpacking a part of files from solid volume set, WinRAR attempts to skip volumes in the beginning and start extraction from volume closest to specified file and with reset solid statistics. By default WinRAR resets the solid statistics in the beginning of large enough solid volumes where possible. For such volumes extracting a part of files from the middle of volume set can be faster now. It does not affect performance when all archived files are unpacked.
  • Previously WinRAR automatically resorted to extracting from first volume, when user started extraction from non-first volume and first volume was available. Now WinRAR does so only if all volumes between first and specified are also available.
  • Warning is issued when closing WinRAR if one or more archived files had been modified by external apps, but failed to be saved back to archive, because an external app still locks them. Such warning includes the list of modified files and proposes to quit immediately and lose changes or return to WinRAR and close an editor app. Previous versions issued a similar warning while editing a file, but did not remind it again when quitting.
  • "Move to Recycle Bin" option in "Delete archive" options group of extraction dialog places deleted archives to Recycle Bin instead of deleting them permanently.
  • New "Clear history..." command in "Options" menu allows to remove names of recently opened archives in "File" menu and clear drop down lists with previously entered values in dialogs. For example, these values include archive names in archiving dialog and destination paths in extraction dialog.
  • "File time" options in "Advanced" part of extraction dialog are now available for 7z archives. Additionally to modification time, WinRAR can set creation and last access time when unpacking such archives.
  • ""New" submenu items" options group is added to "Settings/Integration/Context menu items..." dialog. You can use these options to remove "WinRAR archive" and "WinRAR ZIP archive" entries in "New" submenu of Windows context menu. New state of these option is applied only after you press "OK" both in "Context menu items" and its parent "Settings" dialog.
  • , and commands can be inserted before the program name in SFX "Setup" command to run a program in maximized, minimized or hidden window. For example: Setup=setup.exe
  • It is possible to specify an additional high resolution logo for SFX module. If such logo is present, SFX module scales and displays it in high DPI Windows mode, providing the better visible quality compared to resizing the standard logo. Use "High resolution SFX logo" in "Advanced SFX options" dialog to define such logo. In command line mode add second -iimg switch to set the high resolution logo. Recommended size of high resolution logo PNG file is 186x604 pixels.
  • If archive currently opened in WinRAR shell was deleted or moved by another program, WinRAR displays "Inaccessible" before archive name in the window title. Also it flashes the window caption and taskbar button.
  • "Total information" option in "Report" dialog is renamed to "Headers and totals". Now it also adds headers of report columns additionally to total information about listed files and archives.
  • If archive processing is started from Windows context menu in multiple monitor system, WinRAR operation progress and dialogs use the monitor with context menu. While basic multiple monitor support was present in previous versions shell extension for mouse driven commands, now it is extended to operations initiated from keyboard and to dropping files to archives.
  • New -imon switch allows to select a monitor to display WinRAR operation progress and dialogs in the command line mode. Use -imon1 for primary and -imon2 for secondary monitor. For example, "WinRAR x -imon2 arcname" will start extraction on secondary monitor. It works only in the command line mode and does not affect interactive WinRAR graphical inteface also as console RAR.
  • Switch -idn hides archived names output in archiving, extraction and some other commands in console RAR. Other messages and total percentage are not affected. You can use this switch to reduce visual clutter and console output overhead when archiving or extracting a lot of small files. Minor visual artifacts, such as percentage indicator overwriting few last characters of error messages, are possible with -idn.
  • Former "-im - show more information" switch is changed to "-idv - display verbose output" for consistency with console RAR -id[c,d,p,q] message control options and avoid a potential name conflict with newer -imon switch. While WinRAR still recognizes both -im and -idv, in the future -im support can be dropped.
  • It is allowed to add an optional %arcname% variable to compression profile name. Such variable will be replaced with actual archive name. It might be convenient when using with "Add to context menu" profile option. For example, you can create ZIP compression profile and set its name to "Add to %arcname%", to display it with actual ZIP archive name in context menu.
  • Ctrl+C and Ctrl+Ins keyboard shortcuts can be used in "Diagnostic messages" window to copy contents to clipboard.
  • More text is allowed in tray icon hint before a lengthy text is truncated. Also such text is now truncated in the middle of string, so both command type and completion percentage are still visible.
  • In case of clean install, if previous version compression profiles are not present, "Files to store without compression" field in newly created predefined compression profiles is set to: *.rar *.zip *.cab *.7z *.ace *.arj *.bz2 *.gz *.lha *.lzh *.taz *.tgz *.xz *.txz You can change this field and save a modified value to compression profile later. Previous versions set this field to blank for clean install.
  • Destination path history in extraction dialog treats paths like 'folder' and 'folder\' as the same path and displays only 'folder' entry. Previously they occupied two entries in the history.
  • "Enable Itanium executable compression" GUI option and -mci command line switch are removed. Optimized compression of Itanium executables is not supported anymore. WinRAR still can decompress already existing archives utilizing Itanium executable compression.

Bugs fixed

  • "Lock", "Comment" and "Protect" commands could not be applied to several archives selected in WinRAR file list at once
  • SFX archive process did not terminate after completing extraction in Windows 10 if archive comment included "Setup" and "SetupCode" commands, did not include "TempMode" command and setup program was running for more than 8 minutes
  • Compression profiles with quote character in profile name could not be invoked from Explorer context menu.