Open a protected folder

Windows' built-in unzip cannot read encrypted archives — it shows the file list, then fails without ever asking for your password. Open yours here instead.

Drop your .zip here or click to choose a file

Nothing is uploaded. The archive is opened by your own browser, on your own computer. It never reaches our servers — there is no request to send it in, and no account is needed to use this page.

Why Windows can't do this. Windows Explorer shows the file names in an encrypted ZIP (those aren't encrypted) and then gives up without ever asking for a password. This page reads both schemes a ZIP can use: the modern strong encryption our own Protect files tool writes, and the old legacy one that Windows' own "add a password", older WinZip and most existing archives produce. We deliberately never write the legacy one — it is broken by a known attack — but plenty of archives out there use it, and you should still be able to open yours. 7-Zip, WinRAR and Keka handle both too, if you can install them.

Questions

Does my file leave my computer?
No. There is no upload. You can disconnect from the internet after this page loads and it will still work.

Do I need a Formatly account?
No. This page is free and needs no sign-in — if someone sent you an encrypted archive, you shouldn't have to buy anything to read it.

It says the password is wrong, but I'm sure it's right.
Check for a trailing space, and remember passwords are case-sensitive. If the archive was altered in transit — a mail gateway rewriting it, for instance — the integrity check fails the same way, because a modified archive and a wrong password are indistinguishable by design.

Can it open .7z files?
Yes — including archives whose file list is itself encrypted, where you need the password before the names are even readable. LZMA, LZMA2, BZip2 and stored entries are all handled.

Which ZIP archives work?
AES-encrypted and legacy ZipCrypto, stored, Deflate, BZip2 and LZMA, including ZIP64. Deflate64, Zstandard and PPMd are not supported; the page names the codec rather than failing silently.

Where do encrypted archives come from?
Formatly's password-protect tool makes them: drop in a folder's worth of files, set a password, send one archive.