How to Extract Files from Corrupt or Broken RAR Archives

Recently I downloaded a huge file in the form of a RAR archive, only to find out that it was broken. When I opened it in WinRAR program, it informed me that the RAR file had unexpected end of archive. I tried the archive repair feature of WinRAR but it yielded no results. This sunk my heart for a couple of minutes, but a quick going through the different options of the wonderful WinRAR software showed me an option that I had not seen before. WinRAR had an option to extract broken files using which you can actually extract the broken or corrupt files – ignoring all the errors no matter what. This way you can have at least some portion of the corrupt file which is great especially if you are dealing with media files.

Extract Broken Corrupt RAR Files

Here is how you can extract corrupt or broken files from any RAR archive using the WinRAR archiving utility:

  1. First of all, you would need WinRAR installed on your Windows PC. If you have not already installed it, then you can download it from http://rarlabs.com/.
  2. Open the RAR file in WinRAR and select the files that you want to extract. You can select them all or select a few, as you prefer, but you should be selected the files that are causing problems during regular extraction. Then click on the Extract To button in the toolbar.Extract Broken Corrupt RAR Files
  3. In the Extraction options window that appears on your screen, you can choose the destination folder where you want to extract the files, among many other options. But most importantly, you have to choose the Keep broken files from the Miscellaneous options category.Extract Broken Corrupt RAR Files
  4. Now click on the OK button to start the extraction and you will find that this time WinRAR extracts all the files and they are not deleted even after they cause extraction problems.

Conclusion: Even if a RAR file is broken or corrupt, it can be extracted pretty easily using the WinRAR archiver. So before you download the corrupt RAR file again from the internet, you may want to extract it again using special options in WinRAR to see what happens.