Data Recovery
Restore RAR, ZIP and More Archives Easily
You are much likely to have a file in the format that comes with .rar extension. What is a RAR archive? Standing for Roshal Archive, RAR is a proprietary archive file format that supports data compression, error correction and file spanning. RAR algorithm features in reducing file size without affecting its original quality. For this reason, RAR files creation enables computer users to free up disk storage space and transfer data faster.
Files missing or corruption is always an annoying issue. What makes this issue more unacceptable is, a damaged or deleted RAR archive enclosing a bunch of important files. Relax, this post will provide a quick guide on repairing corrupted RAR files and recovering deleted RAR files.
Best Data Recovery for Windows and Mac
Restore RAR, ZIP, ISO and More Archives Easily
- Restore RAR files lost or deleted under different situations
- Repair damaged documents, videos, photos in RAR
- Recover RAR files from both internal and external disk
- Filter RAR files quickly by keyword, date created, file size, etc.
- Also retrieve archives in ZIP, ISO, etc.
- Repair MP4, MOV, MKV, AVI, etc, also repair photos
- Recover unsaved Word, Excel, PowerPoint documents
- Preview photos, videos and other recoverable documents
- Support crashed computer recovery
- Save recovered files to local drive or cloud storage platforms
Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7 Free Download macOS 10.9 or later
Recommended Tool to Recover RAR File
Essentially, RAR files have little difference from any other data in normal formats. That’s why data recovery tools can come to the rescue in event of RAR archives corruption, lost or deletion.
Among a considerable number of RAR file retrieval programs in the market, Cisdem Data Recovery for Windows or Mac is highly recommended. This software is capable of restoring trash-emptied, permanently-deleted, formatted files or any other files lost because of various situations, also repair damaged videos, photos and documents in the RAR archive. It has the reputation for high recovery rate, professional research teams and responsible customer service.
Highlights of Cisdem Data Recovery:
- Recover 200+ types of files (image, video, audio, document, archives, etc.), including RAR
- Repair damaged videos, photos, documents in the RAR format
- Repair corrupted videos in mp4, mov, avi, mkv, m4v and so on
- Support automatic repair of corrupted images and documents
- Preview files before recovery to pick the wanted ones only
- Quick scan and deep scan both applied to find most files
- Scan status loaded for resuming scanning at anytime
How to retrieve RAR archives on Mac or Windows?
- Download and install Cisdem Data Recovery.
Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7 Free Download macOS 10.9 or later
- Select and scan the drive.
Go to Hardware Disk. All storage partitions detected by the program will be listed on its right panel. Select the exact drive where your RAR archive files lost, and click "Search for lost files" to initiate the scanning process.
- Preview and specify RAR files.
After scan completion, scan results will be displayed on the left panel based on different categories. Go to Type > Archives, to locate RAR files quickly, you can enter keyword in the search box.
- Recover RAR files to a safe location.
Select the RAR files and click "Recover" to undelete them into local drive or cloud storage platform.
Tips:
To recover corrupted video in a RAR, you can extract and upload the damaged videos to Video Repair tool, Cisdem will fix the damaged videos in batch.
To repair Word, Excel, Text or photos in a RAR, you can extract the files first, then start the scanning in Cisdem, it will auto repair these files during the Preview (double click the file to preview) process.
How to Repair Damaged RAR File (Online Free Incl.)?
Why do RAR files get corrupted? There are many reasons causing RAR corruption, following are the common ones:
- The RAR opener cannot recognize the header file accurately
- Transfer error when downloading the RAR file
- Incomplete download of a RAR file
- Bad sector or physical damages of the hard disk where you save the RAR file
- Virus
- The RAR file is too large
Basing on these reasons, you are recommended to open the RAR file with another RAR viewer to make sure the file itself is corrupted or not. If damaged, in face of this challenge, 4 potential avenues are offered for fixing corrupted RAR archive files freely.
#1 Fix damaged RAR file online free
To repair a RAR file with minor corruption, you may find some online RAR files repair websites. SecureData Online File Repair is such a tool for your reference. Here’s the tutorial about using it to repair your RAR archive online for free.
- Visit https://online-file-repair.securedata.com/ with your browser.
- Drag the damaged RAR file into the repair box or click to browse your computer for uploading the archive.
- Click Start Repair button.
- A progress bar will appear to report the repairing completion degree of your RAR file.
- After repairing finished, click Preview Results to download and access the repaired RAR on your computer. Now you can get a new normal RAR file.
What is noteworthy is that this RAR file repair path is not secure even though it’s simple. So it would be better to continue reading for more potential repair solutions.
#2 Repair damaged RAR files by WinRAR
WinRAR is a reputable archiver and archive manager all over the world. The software is versatile enough not only to compress, package, encrypt, backup files on your computer, but also read the contents of a RAR file without extraction. Its built-in file repair function is possible a useful way to get your corrupt RAR files back to their normal state.
How to repair corrupted RAR file with WinRAR?
- Download and install WinRAR on your PC.
- Locate the corrupt RAR file. Right-click on it and choose "Open with WinRAR".
- Click "Tools" at the toolbar and select "Repair archive" from the drop-down menu.
- In the pop-up window, click "Browse" to select a destination location for saving the repaired RAR file. Keep the archive type as RAR and click OK to start repairing.
- Within a few seconds, the corrupt RAR file will be recreated completely. Click the "Close" button.
- Go to the destination location you selected earlier. The name of your repaired RAR file will be "rebuilt.file name.rar".
Tips: If by any chance the damaged RAR file cannot be repaired, it indicates that “Recovery Records” option has not been added during file compression with WinRAR. In this instance, Cisdem Data Recovery can be tried to recover the irreparable RAR file without recovery record.
#3 Force extract corrupted RAR files
To deal with RAR file corruption and damage, force extracting the archive files while overlooking the error messages could be another approach. WinRAR app will still be used here.
How to extract corrupted RAR files?
- Right click on the corrupted RAR archive > select "Open with" > WinRAR archiver.
- From WinRAR tool bar, choose "Extract to" option.
- The Extraction path and options window will pop up. Choose a destination path to store the extracted RAR file.
- Tick "Keep broken files" option under Miscellaneous section.
- Select OK button to start the extraction of your broken RAR archive file. Ignore any error messages if popping up. Finally check to see if you can access to the extracted file.
#4 Repair corrupted RAR file with Recovery Toolbox
In addition to WinRAR, there is one more corrupted RAR file repair software you can try for free --- Recovery Toolbox for RAR. This archive repair tool is designed to recover information from corrupted archives in RAR format, which can be used to completely avoid or at least minimize losses due to compressed data.
- Download and install this RAR Recovery Kit on your PC.
- After installation, this repair software will automatically open.
- Select the damaged RAR file to be repaired > click Next.
- Select the files or folders you need to keep from the damaged RAR archive > click Next.
- Select a destination directory to save the recovered data > click Next to finish. Finally you can get the repaired RAR in the selected path.
Tips to Prevent RAR Files Corruption
As an old proverb goes, a fall into the pit, a gain in your wit. After feeling frustrated about corrupted RAR files and searching hard for solution, it would be wiser for you to take some precautions for avoiding RAR archive corruption in days to come. Check the tips below:
- Apply formal and official RAR compression/extraction programs only.
- Do not download RAR archive files from insecure websites.
- Check internet connect and device battery before downloading to avoid incomplete download
- Install a reliable anti-virus application on your computer and keep updating its latest version.
- Avoid unrestrained use of your computer.
- Check disk performance and repair in time
Final Words
Corrupted RAR files and deleted RAR files are totally 2 different things, you need different solutions to fix or restore the file. And it is always helpful to have Cisdem Data Recovery loaded onto your computer, which recovers deleted and lost RAR files, also recovers corrupted documents, videos or photos in a RAR.
Connie Yu has been a columnist in the field of data recovery since 2011. She studied a lot of data loss situations and tested repeatedly to find a feasible solution tailored for each case. And her solutions are always updated to fix problems from the newest systems, devices and apps.
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Delia Wright
You are right. Online or free RAR repair tools are mostly not reliable. But in contrast, WinRAR is a worthwhile application to deal with corrupted RAR archives.