RAR files are cool files that can store multiple other files inside them just like zip files. But, if you have a RAR file on your Android phone and you want to open it, it’s unfortunately not very obvious how you can do that.
But don’t worry, because in this article, I’m going to show you how to open a RAR file on your Android phone or tablet to access all the files that are inside it.
Prefer to watch a video about how to open a RAR file on Android? Click here.
How To Open A RAR File On Android
Most Android phones (if any) don’t have a built in ability to open RAR files, so you’ll actually have to install a third party app called “RAR” in order to get your RAR file opened.
To do that, simply open the Google Play Store, type “RAR” in the search box, and press search.
Now, the “RAR” app should be the first result to come up, and you’ll need to tap on it…
And then, tap on the “Install” button to begin installing the app.
The app will take a few seconds to install, but then, once it’s done, tap on the “Open” button to open it.
Now, as soon as you open the app for the first time, you will probably be taken to a settings screen where you’ll need to allow the app to access all your phone’s files.
This part might look a bit different depending on what kind of phone you have (I have a Google Pixel), but you’ll most likely get some kind of screen that looks fairly similar to this, and you’ll just need to tap on the “RAR” app…
And then, toggle a switch or tick a box or whatever it takes on your phone to allow the app to access your files.
Once you’ve allowed the app to access your files, you’ll then just need to tap the back arrow to go back…
And then, tap the back arrow one more time to get back to the main screen of the app.
Alternatively, if your phone is a bit older or possibly from a different manufacturer, you might just get a popup message asking you to allow the app to access your files, and you’ll just need to tap “Allow”.
Now, with that out of the way, you might also see a pop up message asking if you would like to subscribe to the app for $1.59 per year.
This is completely optional, and the subscription doesn’t give you anything extra, but if you’re feeling generous and would like to support the team who created the app, you could tap “SUBSCRIBE”. Or, if you don’t want to pay anything and just want to proceed for free and extract your file, you can just tap “DISMISS”.
And now that all that is finally done, you can finally begin actually extracting your RAR file. All the folders on your phone should now be showing in the RAR app, and to extract your RAR file, you’ll need to tap on the folder that your RAR file is in.
If you’ve downloaded the RAR file from somewhere, it will probably be in your downloads folder, and that’s where my RAR file is so I’m going to scroll down and tap on the folder named “Download”. But if your RAR file is in a different folder, you’ll just need to tap on that folder now.
Now, you’ll be inside that folder, so you should see your RAR files somewhere here, and you’ll need to tap on it when you find it.
Now, you’ll see a list of the files that are in the RAR file which is at least something, but you’ll have to extract them before you can actually view or use them. To do that, you’ll need to tap on the icon that looks like a stack of books and an up arrow at the top of the screen…
And then you’ll now see a whole lot of extraction options. You can fiddle with these if you want, but the default settings are all perfectly fine for this purpose, and it’s really easiest to just leave them as they are, and then tap on the “OK” button in the bottom right hand corner to begin the extraction.
The extraction process should only take a few seconds, but it could be slightly longer for large RAR files. But then, once it’s done, you should see all the files that were in the RAR file!
And that’s it! Your RAR file is now extracted!
Now, if you open the regular files app on your phone and go into the folder where your RAR file was (probably the downloads folder), you’ll see the RAR file is still there, but there will now also be a new folder with the same name as the RAR file. And if you tap on that folder to go inside it…
You’ll see all the files that were inside the RAR file are now in this folder!
And they’re just like any other files on your phone, you can view them, edit them, share them, delete them, move them, whatever you want. And, now that the files have been extracted from the RAR file, you can delete the RAR file if you no longer want it.
