How to View MSG Files Without Outlook in Windows? - Complete Guide

“I am using Outlook application for mailing purpose since a long time and I have lots of MSG files saved in my account. Sometimes, I need to open Microsoft Outlook MSG file because generally, I need to travel for the business purpose where I can’t carry my laptop. But, it is required to carry some important files with me. Thus, I want to know a suitable solution to answer the question how to view MSG files without Outlook?”

Are you also stuck in the problem to read MSG files? Do you know how to perform this task? Do you need a reliable solution to view MSG files without Outlook with their attachments? If yes, then you don’t need to worry. Because, in this write-up, we have come up with the simple, easy and efficient solution to open .msg files.

MS Outlook is the most popular email client that stores its entire data in PST format. It also uses some another file extensions like MSG format to store single Outlook email. The Outlook email client generates MSG file automatically when users receive a new message. However, MSG file is the common file format among Mozilla Thunderbird, Eudora, Entourage, etc. In such case, if a non Outlook user wants to view MSG files without Outlook then it will tedious task for them. So, here we will provide you both manual and automatic solution to read MSG file. Before, going towards the resolution method, let’s go through some scenarios where a user needs to view and access MSG file without Outlook.

Some Scenarios to View MSG Files Without Outlook

1. MS Outlook and the other mailing clients like Thunderbird, Eudora, Entourage, etc. use multiple file formats for storing their data. MSG is one of the widely used email extension, as it does not need a MAPI Application for opening it.

2. If the users are not making use of MS Outlook application, then the users can face the difficulties while answering the question how to view MSG Files without Outlook as there is no other email application that can read MSG files.

What is an MSG file?

Microsoft Outlook stores their single emails, contact, appointment, or task in MSG file. It may consist one or more than one email fields, which includes the To, Cc, subject, date, sender, recipient, message body, contact information, appointment details, etc. Moreover, the MSG files are also compatible with the other email clients that use Microsoft's MAPI (Messaging Applications Programming Interface).

How to View MSG Files Without Outlook Manually?

In order to open and read Outlook MSG files, you have to change the extension of MSG files to HTML. After changing the extension of the .msg file, you can easily open your MSG file in a browser. Follow the steps below to change the extension of .msg to .html file:

1.First of all, select MSG file that you need to convert into the .html format.

2. After that, click on the File menu.

3. Then, select Save As Alternative option from the File menu

4. Finally, choose HTML file extension.

After employing the manual procedure, you can open and view the MSG files in the browser as a .html format. But, by using this method, you can’t view the attachments of MSG file because this Manual Approach will not help in converting the attachments.

Direct Solution to Open .msg File Without Outlook

The above discussed manual solution can be used to view MSG files without Outlook but it is more prone to data loss and data corruption. Therefore, in order to read Outlook MSG files with the help of manual method, the browser is required. So, If a user wants to directly read Outlook MSG files then, it is suggested to use a third-party tool i.e SysTools MSG Viewer tool. This is the correct solution that is capable to easily open, view and read Outlook emails without using Outlook email application. However, the user can view MSG files into multiple views like Attachment view, Hex view, Properties view, Header view, MIME view, HTML view, RTF view.

Key Features of MSG Viewer Software

1. The tool can easily view Outlook MSG files with their attachments in different styles.
2. It provides advanced search option where users can filter emails & attachments.
3. There is no requirement to install the Outlook application in your system.
4. It is compatible to work with the latest version of Windows 10 and all below versions.

Time to Wrap Up

In this blog, we have discussed the techniques on how to view MSG files without Outlook. Here, both manual and automated solution is described. With the help of this MSG Viewer, you can easily open and read MSG files and their attachments with or without using Outlook.