What .eml and .msg files are
They are the same thing — one email, saved as a file — in two different containers.
- .emlis the message exactly as it travelled between mail servers: plain text headers (From, To, Date, Subject) followed by the body and the attachments, encoded in MIME. It is an open standard, so Apple Mail, Thunderbird, Gmail's exports and most other programs write and read it.
- .msgis Outlook's own format: a small file system in a file (the same Compound File container old .doc files used), with each part of the message stored as a separate property. Outlook writes it when you drag a message to a folder or attach one email to another. Outside Outlook, very little opens it.
Apple Mail also keeps messages as .emlx: an .eml with a byte count in front and a few of Apple's notes after it. The viewer opens those too.
Open one in four steps
- Open the EML & MSG viewer in any current browser — Chrome, Edge, Safari or Firefox, on a computer or a phone.
- Drop the file onto the page. Several at once is fine: each opens in its own tab above the message.
- Read it. The subject, sender, recipients and date sit at the top; the message appears below with its formatting and the pictures that were sent inside it.
- Save what you need: attachments, a PDF of the message, or an .eml copy of a .msg.
Getting the attachments out
Every attachment is listed under the header with its size. Click the download arrow beside one to save it, or Download all (.zip) when there are several. They come out byte for byte as they were sent, with their original names — Korean and other non-Latin file names included.
When the attachment is itself an email — a forwarded message, which Outlook attaches as a .msg — the viewer shows Open here beside it, and the inner message opens as another tab. Pictures that were placed inside the body, like a logo in a signature, are shown in the message rather than listed as attachments.
Saving an email as a PDF
Click Print / Save as PDF and choose Save as PDF (or Microsoft Print to PDF) as the printer. The PDF starts with the subject, sender, recipients, date and the names of the attachments, then the message itself — the record most people need for an invoice, a complaint or a legal file.
The attachments are not inside that PDF; save them separately. If the remote images matter to the record, click Load them before printing.
Turning a .msg into an .eml
For a .msg, the viewer offers Save as .eml. The new file keeps the sender, recipients, date, subject, both the plain and the formatted body, the inline pictures and every attachment, written as standard MIME that Apple Mail, Thunderbird and most other mail programs open directly.
What does not survive is Outlook-only detail: categories, flags, follow-up dates and the like, which the standard format has no place for. Outlook keeps the original transport headers only for messages it received, so a .msg of a sent or draft message has none to carry over.
Why remote images are blocked
An email can carry its pictures inside it, or point to pictures on a web server. The second kind is how newsletters and sales tools know you opened their message: each copy points to its own invisible one-pixel image, and the server notes when it is fetched, from which network, on which device.
A mail program fetches them as soon as you open the message. The viewer does not: it counts them, tells you how many there are, and fetches them only when you click Load them. For an old message in an archive, that is usually the right default.
Other ways to open them
- Outlook opens both formats. If you have it, double-click the file.
- Apple Mail, Thunderbird, Windows Mail open .eml files, but not .msg. Convert the .msg to .eml first.
- Online viewers work on any device but most upload the file to a server to read it. For anything personal or confidential, choose one that does not.
- Renaming .eml to .txt shows the raw message in a text editor — readable for short plain mail, unreadable once there is formatting or an attachment.
If a file will not open
- The name ends in .msg but it is not from Outlook. Some phone and voicemail systems use .msg for other things. The viewer says when a file is not an Outlook message.
- It is an Outlook data file (.pst or .ost). Those hold a whole mailbox, not one message, and need Outlook or a mailbox converter.
- It is encrypted or signed with S/MIME.The protected content can only be read with the recipient's certificate, in their mail program.
- It was cut off in transfer. A truncated file loses the end of the message and usually its attachments; get a fresh copy.
Frequently asked questions
How do I open an .msg file without Outlook?
Drop it onto PDFGami’s EML & MSG viewer. The message opens in your browser with its sender, recipients, date, formatted text and attachments, with nothing installed and nothing uploaded. To keep it in another mail program, click Save as .eml.
What program opens .eml files?
Most mail programs do: Apple Mail, Thunderbird, Windows’ Mail app and Outlook itself. Double-clicking one usually opens it in whichever is installed. A browser-based viewer opens it on any device, including phones and Chromebooks, without loading the remote images a mail program would load.
Can I convert an email to PDF?
Yes. Open the .eml or .msg in the viewer, click Print / Save as PDF and choose Save as PDF as the printer. The PDF starts with the subject, sender, recipients, date and the list of attachments.
Is it safe to open an email file online?
Only if it is not uploaded. Most online viewers send the file to their server. PDFGami reads it in your browser tab, never runs scripts in the message and blocks remote images until you ask, so neither the site nor the sender learns anything from you opening it.
Why does my .msg show plain text only?
Because that is all it holds. Messages written as plain text in Outlook have no formatted version. Messages written in rich text keep their formatting as RTF; the viewer recovers HTML that Outlook wrapped inside RTF, and otherwise shows the text version.