Open email files on a Chromebook

The problem

Chromebooks are great until someone sends an Outlook email as a file. The ChromeOS Files app has no preview for .msg files, can’t unpack winmail.dat, and shows .eml files as plain text full of codes at best. The Windows version of Outlook doesn’t run on ChromeOS, and Outlook on the web is built for your mailbox, not for opening files from your Downloads folder.

Open the file in Chrome

1. Save the attachment to your Downloads folder (or anywhere in Files).
2. On this page, press Choose a file, or drag the file from the Files app onto the page.
3. The email opens with its sender, recipients and date, the message itself, and a list of attachments you can save one by one.

The page runs in your browser on the Chromebook, so school and work files never leave the device. It also keeps working if your connection drops after the page has loaded.

Which files work

• .msg: emails saved or forwarded from Outlook on Windows, including emails attached inside other emails.
• winmail.dat: Outlook’s package of attachments, unpacked into the real files.
• .eml: the standard email file most mail programs save.
• .mbox: whole mailboxes, such as a Gmail export from Google Takeout.

Managed school and work Chromebooks

If your Chromebook is managed, your administrator may block some sites or downloads. This page doesn’t need extensions or special permissions; if it loads, it should work. Saving an attachment uses a normal browser download.

Keeping a copy

To keep the email itself in a form anything can open, use Print on the email and choose Save as PDF as the destination in Chrome’s print dialog. More on saving emails as PDF.

Attachments inside attachments

Email files often nest. A .msg can hold another forwarded .msg, an .eml can carry a winmail.dat, and a winmail.dat can hold the real PDF. Each layer opens in turn on the same page: press Open on an attached email to read it, and use the trail above the message to step back out. Files packed inside a winmail.dat are listed right under it, so you can save them without opening anything else.