Tag: .eml viewer

Posted on

Open EML Files With EML Viewer Pro

Screen shot showing location of MailDex 'create project' button.

EML Viewer Pro is an advanced reader for EML email files.  EML files are created by email clients, such as Outlook Express, Thunderbird or Windows Live Mail.

EML Viewer Free Download
15 Day EML Viewer Pro Free Trial. Requires Microsoft Windows  7/8/10/Server
EML Viewer Pro main screen
EML Viewer Pro main screen

With EML Viewer Pro, you can search through directories and sub-directories filled with EML files, and manage those files in important ways:

  • Export EML files to PDF,
    • with file attachments extracted to disk
    • with file attachments embedded as files
    • with most file attachments converted to the image
  • Export EML files to MBOX
  • Export EML files to GIF, TIF, BMP, JPG, PNG
  • Export EML files to CSV (excel)
  • Export EML files to HTML or MHT
  • Batch print EML files
  • Search EML files
  • Perform EML file conversion operations from the command line
  • Adjustable User Interface

EML Viewer Pro is a multi-functional email viewer. It is actually six email viewers in one. In addition to EML files, you also use EML Viewer Pro to manage Outlook .PST files, .OST files, .MSG files, Winmail.dat files and MHT or MHTML files.  Microsoft Outlook is not required for EML Viewer Pro to open Outlook .pst or .msg files.

EML Viewer Pro is designed to save you time. The most important functions are quickly accessible through the main toolbar.

EML Viewer Pro toolbar
EML Viewer Pro Toolbar

Toolbar accessible functions include:

  • Reply to Email
  • Reply All to Email
  • Forward Email and attachments
  • Search email messages
  • Print email messages
  • Quick Append Email to a PDF file

As of version 4.6 of EML Viewer Pro, some additional functions have been moved to the main tool bar for your convenience.

Email export function are shown in the EmlViewer Pro toolbar.
Email Export functions on the EML Viewer Pro tool bar

Export EML to PDF

EML Viewer Pro is a great tool for export EML files to PDF format. Using the Export functionality on the toolbar, you can easily exported your selected email messages to PDF and other formats.

Select the emails to convert in the mail list, choose the desired Export Profile (such as PDF – attachments embedded which will convert your selected email to PDF format), then click the Export button (green down arrow). EML Viewer Pro will go to work exporting your email messages.

EML Viewer Pro lets you perform four specific EML to PDF operations:

  1. EML Files can be exported with file attachments extracted.
  2. Embed file attachments within the PDF file. This means that the file is stored within the PDF as a separate file which can later be extracted by any standards compliant PDF viewer (like Adobe Reader).
  3. You can also convert most file attachment within a .eml file into the PDF image. If an attachment is unable to be converted, it will then be embedded within the PDF file to preserve the context.
  4. Export EML files individually to an existing PDF file. This means you can individually export email messages as you discover them, to a single PDF file.

Download a free trial of EML Viewer Pro and use it for 15 full days, with no obligation.

If you need a capable EML viewer without all of the features of EML Viewer Pro, click here to learn about the Lite version, called EML Viewer Lite.

Posted on

How to View a Windows Mail .EML Email File?

Software screenshot.

So you have a Windows Mail .eml file?  What is it, and how can you see what is in it?

It is common to see.eml files as email attachments.  To understand them, let’s consider how a .eml file may come to exist.  If you are a Windows Live Mail user, you may find that the process to save a e-mail message as a .eml file is quite simple. Knowing how this is done makes it easy to share messages with someone without having to forward the message. Sometimes the context of the email message is best preserved when the message is shared in its entirety as a separate file. EML files can simply be included in an email message as a file attachments, while a forwarded message is more susceptible to manipulation.

To create a .eml file using Windows Live Mail, start by going to the program’s main menu.   Second, single click on any email displayed in the message list (don’t open it, just highlight it).  Third, click the the far left button in the tool ribbon, choose “Save as File,” and the select a location to save the file.  Your message will be saved as a .eml file.

Windows live mail screen shot.
Saving a Windows Mail message as .eml (1)
Saving an email in Windows Live Mail as a .eml file.
In Windows Mail, save the message as a .eml file
Another way to create a .eml file from Windows Live Mail is to just drag it out of the inbox and drop it on your desktop. That works, too.

What is a .EML file?

If you want to get technical about it, a  file with a .eml extension should conform to RFC-2822, the internet message format.  This standard establishes a common syntax for text messages so they can be sent between computer users as e-mail. Each .eml file contains a single email message (unless of course another .eml file is embedded inside of the .eml file, but each .eml file is really a separate instance of an email message).  
Most .EML files you will encounter are created by popular email clients such as Microsoft Outlook Express, Windows Live Mail, or Mozilla Thunderbird.  To create a .eml file using either of those two email clients, all you have to do is drag an email message from the inbox and drop it on your desktop.  Voila! Instant .eml file which will contain a header in plain ASCII text,  the main body of the message (text or html), and any file attachments associated with the email, such as spreadsheets, jpg pictures, videos, or text documents.
.EML files can range in size from 1 kilobyte to many megabytes, depending of course on what the sender has chosen to put into the file.
The truth is, not all .eml files conform exactly to RFC-2822. In the wild, you are likely to encounter many exceptions. Different software products that generate .eml files sometimes fail to implement the entire RFC standard. When this happens, emails may not be formatted correctly, or are unable to be opened.  PstViewer Pro is a .eml viewer software application that has identified dozens of these exceptions, and is therefore able to render many non-standard .eml files.
Often many email messages are grouped into larger files, such as a .PST file (Outlook) or a MBOX file (Thunderbird).  While Thunderbird and Windows Mail will allow you to save a single message as a .eml file, Microsoft Outlook does not allow this. Rather, Outlook saves individual emails as a .msg file, which is a Microsoft Office message format that is not RFC-2822 compatible.  As of Outlook 2010, Microsoft Outlook does not save email messages as .eml files.  MessageExport is a third party add-in for Microsoft Outlook that adds this ability to Outlook, allowing Outlook emails to be stored in EML format.