The file extension has been changed. Change file extension in Windows

You listen to audio recordings every day, browse hundreds of photos on the Internet, but when it comes to downloading, your computer refuses to open any file. The automatically installed programs do not support a particular format on the PC, or the phone won't open the file with your favorite image? You should not despair, and even more so, delete documents. Learn how to change the file format to avoid losing data.

What is file format

Information about the content of the document for you and the operating system of the personal computer is the file format. When you see a specific name for a document, you already imagine what it is - music, picture, book, text, video file. The Windows operating system works in the same way: after defining the format, it opens the file using a specific automatically installed program. This information is separated by a period in the document name. In older versions, you may have noticed this, but in newer operating systems, such data is hidden.

Text documents can be of the following types: txt, doc, docx, pdf, excel, fb2, epub, djvu. Some are created using Microsoft Word, suitable for writing articles, abstracts, diplomas. The rest of the formats are more suitable for reading books in electronic mode. Types of graphic documents - jpg, jpeg, png, rav. The first pair is suitable for viewing ordinary raster, pixel images on a computer, phone, and the second - for large format printing. Video files can look like: avi, mp4, flv, mpeg, wmv. Audio audio tracks - mp3, wav, la (Lossless), m4a (Apple Lossless).

How to change the format of a text file to Windows 7, 8, 10

It is impossible to manually rename the names of electronic document file formats, because Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 10 automatically hide this data. Remember that subsequent changes must match the document type. For example, from "doc" to "docx", from "m4a" to "m4r". Otherwise, the computer will give you an error. To change the extension, follow these steps:

• You will need a menu. Go to Start / Control Panel / Appearance and Personalization / Folder Options.
• Open the "View" window, scroll down to the bottom, where we find "Hide extensions for registered file types."
• We remove the check mark.
• Hooray! You can easily change the text files in the title itself.

Using converter programs online

There are simpler solutions that programmers have invented. If you don’t want to dig into the settings to uncheck the box, and it’s more convenient for you when the extension is automatically hidden (you don’t need to constantly edit it when you change the name), use special converter programs that can translate the extension in a matter of minutes. Here is a list for PC:

• WinScan2PDF - converts all text files to PDF format.
• Total PDF Converter - converts PDF documents to Doc, Excel, Text, HTML or CSV.
• ABC Amber Text Converter is a program that processes a huge number of formats: WK4, RTF, PDF, HTML, TXT (Unicode and ANSI), RFT, DOC, SAM, XLS and others.
• BookReader is suitable for avid readers, especially when you really want to study a new work on your way to work or study, but you cannot take an e-book. The program makes the DOC, FB2, HTML, RTF, WRI, TXT, CHM formats readable on the phone.

If you don't want to download utilities to your PC, no problem! You can choose online converters that do the file conversion in a few minutes. Often, there you just need to register and upload a text, audio, video file. Here are some examples of services for converting e-books: ebook.online-convert.com, convertfileonline.com, popprograms.com, lamerkomp.ru.

Programs for changing the formats of audio and video files

While you have not yet downloaded the program for converting, you can change the display of music files, as in text documents (uncheck the box so that the extension is highlighted). The only caveat that stops is quality can be lost. It is very disappointing if you downloaded a song for a fee in excellent resolution, and your PC detects the format as unknown or invalid. Use the Format Factory program. It is universal in application and the question of how to change the format of a video file, audio, DVD, Mp4, will be solved instantly.

Converting graphic file formats

You have several options. The easiest one is to click "Save As" and set the required format for a new document. If you have graphic editors on your PC, for example, Photoshop, Corel Draw, Adobe Illustrator, then the conversion can be done as follows:

• Open the program, upload your photo there.
• Click "Save As", install the desired extension.
• Don't forget to set the appropriate image size.

Corel Draw program is designed for vector graphics, logos in excellent quality, it is better not to load usual photo formats there. If this option does not suit you, use special converter programs (Format Factory, Paint, Microsoft office) or online services: photoconverter.ru, online-convert.com, pcfreetime.com, image.online-convert.com.

file, you should start Windows Explorer. This can be done by double-clicking on the "My Computer" icon or simply by pressing the Win key and, without releasing it, the "U" key (this is the Latin "E"). Navigate the folder tree in the left pane of the explorer to the folder you are interested in the file. With the default settings the file extension explorer, but to change the extension file you need to see it first. Therefore, now you should activate the option responsible for this in the folder settings. To do this, in the Explorer menu, click the "Tools" section and select "Folder Options ..." in it. In the window that opens, go to the "View" tab and at the bottom of the "Additional parameters" list uncheck the item "Hide extensions for registered file types". If the file, the type of which you need to change, is a system file, then you should also uncheck the "Hide protected system files" item and check the "Show hidden files and folders" item. After all this, click the "OK" button to commit the changes.

By making these changes to the settings, you can edit the extension you are interested in file... To do this, right-click it, select "Rename" and change the extension to the type you want. The explorer will ask you to confirm this operation - click "Yes".

If at this moment, for any reason, it is impossible to change the name filethen the corresponding message will be shown by the explorer. This can happen for several reasons. One of them is that the file is protected from editing. To remove one you need to change the corresponding one: again right-click the file and in the menu that appears, select the lowest item - "Properties". Properties window will open file, where on the General tab uncheck the Read-only attribute. By pressing the "OK" button commit the change and try again to change the type file.

Another reason for not being able to edit the title file it may be that at this moment any of the application or system programs with this file. In the case of an application, simply close it. And if the file is any of the operating system components, then you can change its extension by restarting Windows in protected mode and repeating the renaming procedure file there. In protected mode, the operating system uses a limited number of components, so there is a high probability that the file you need to change the extension will not be available.

Each Windows user may be faced with the need to change the type of a particular file. We invite you to familiarize yourself with the main ways to accomplish this simple task.

Interesting! It is customary to designate the extension or type of file that part of its name that is contained after the dot. For example, the "All About Everything. Docx" file has the ".docx" extension or the Microsoft Word file extension.

Please note that initially all file extensions are hidden from users. In order to change the file type, we first need to make all extensions visible to us. This can be done through the "Folder Options" window, and you can access it in the following ways:

Method 1. Using the base explorer of your operating system

Step 1. Open "My Computer" or "Computer".

Step 2.Depending on the language of your OS, in the upper left corner, click "Organize" or "Organize" and select "Folder and search options" or "Folder and search options".

Method 2. Through the search in the "START" menu

Step 1.Press the "Win" key / the corresponding icon at the bottom left of the screen.

Step 2.In the search box, start entering "Folder and search options" or "Folder and search options", click on the result.

Method 3. Through the "Control Panel"Windows

Step 1.Press the "Win" key or the corresponding icon at the bottom left of the screen.

Step 2.In the menu that opens, select "Control Panel" or "Control Panel".

Step 3.In the upper right corner, change the view type to "Large Icons" or "Large Icons".

Step 4.Among all the icons that appear, we are looking for one with the name "Folder Options" or "Folder Options" and click it.

As a result of using any of the above methods, the desired window will open in front of you, in which you should uncheck the box "Hide permissions for ..." or "Hide extensions for known file types".

Uncheck the box "Hide permissions for ..." or "Hide extensions for known file types"

After that, you will see the extensions of all files on your system. In order to change one file type to another, you must select it and:

1. Right-click on it, then click on the "Rename" or "Rename" option, then change the text following the dot.
2. Press the F2 key and also change the text after the point.

Important! The extension is the text after the period in the file name. To change the file type, you need to LEAVE the point and change the text after it. See the picture below.

Method 4. We use the command line Windows 7

First, you need to open a command line:

Step 1. Press the Win + R keys at the same time.

Step 2. A window will open in front of you, in the empty field of which you must enter "CMD" and press "Enter" or "Ok".

Now you need to use the "Rename" command. For this you need:

• type "rename" and press space;
• print the full path to the file and the file name itself along with its current extension;
• put a space, put an asterisk and immediately after it write a new extension.

A simple example of a complete command along with an accompanying screenshot:

"Rename C: \\ Users \\ temnikov.s \\ Desktop \\ Personal \\ 121.rtf * .docx".

As a result of using this command, we will change the file format called "121" from plain text to Microsoft Word 2010.

Interesting! Please note that by changing the file type you will not in any way change / damage its contents. All you do is tell your WINDOWS that this or that file is in a format that should be opened through a specific program.

We use third-party programs

The file extension can also be changed using additional software. We suggest using one of the most popular programs "Total Commander":

Step 1.We open the program and reach the file we need.

Step 2.Press the F2 key, then change the file name after the dot and press the Enter key. We remind you that it is the text after the dot that contains information about the file extension. Now in the "Type" column you can see the file with its new extension.

In this example, we have changed the file extension "Error codes" from ".doc" to ".txt"

Video - How to change the file type to Windows 7

Today we will analyze such a moment,. Each element of the operating system has its own name and extension, which is separated from the name by a period and consists of three characters. Each character set identifies the type of file. There is a huge variety of types of files, executable (exe) text (txt, doc), music (mp3) and many others.

In windows 7, users face such a problem that they do not know how to change the file type. By default, this option is disabled and you can only set a new name. Do not be upset, there are several simple and unspoiled ways.

Note: change the extension of those files that you can work with after renaming. It makes no sense to assign the executable type (exe) to the place of the music type (mp3).

Windows 7 standard tools

First you need to find a window that is responsible for the properties, settings of folders and files. You can do this action in the following ways:

1. In Explorer (my computer), click "arrange" and select "".
2. In the "start" menu in the search form, we type the query "folder parameters".
3. In the "start" menu, select "control panel", look for the desired tab.

Go to the "View" tab. Find and uncheck the "Hide extension for registered file types" option. Then apply the changes and click "ok".

After that, the extensions will be visible in the explorer. Now we can change file type in windows 7using several recommendations. Select the file and do one of the following:

1. Click on the right mouse button. From the drop-down menu select the "rename" command.
2. Press the F2 key.
3. From the Organize menu at the top of File Explorer, choose Rename.
4. Click on the modified object with the left mouse button, then after a couple of seconds click again. If you press too quickly, a file or folder will open.

Set your extension and click enter.

Total commander program

The most powerful tool for working with files. Many functions, and most importantly, ease of use. After installing the program, you can easily. Use the recommendations above (points 1, 4).

Another important difference from the conductor, batch file type change... To do this, select several elements (hold down CTRL and click with the left mouse button). Right click and select "rename".

In the window that opens, you will see the standard renaming pattern *. *, Where an asterisk denotes any sequence of characters. We change the template, for example, * .php so that all selected files will have the php extension. You can customize this filter as you like, even by partial occurrence.

Command line (CMD)

We will change it using the rename command. Below we will consider how to use it.

From the beginning. To do this, press the key combination, the windows + R icon and enter CMD in the line.

Below is an example of modifying one file. Enter the rename command followed by the path and parameters of the change.

Rename c: \\ computer \\ document.txt * .php

In this example, the type will be renamed from txt to php, and the name will remain the same. Replace * enter any sequence of characters to change the name.

If there are two or more words separated by spaces in the file name or path, you need to enclose them in quotes.

It is possible to change several files at once. Type the following command:

Rename c: \\ computer \\ *. Zip * .rar

In the current directory, all items with a zip extension will be renamed to rar, but the names will remain the same. In case of incorrect input construction, you will see a warning “error in command syntax”.

So you know how to change file type in windows 7, this also applies to 8, XP. Do not forget that changing the extension facilitates the opening of the file by another program, but not changing its structure. Of the methods considered, the most practical is the use of a total commander.

Everyone uses the Explorer, but due to the limitation of working with a group of files, it makes it not very practical. And not everyone wants to deal with the command line.

Before moving on to the topic of how to change the file format, I propose to define the file terminology. Instead of the word "format" you can also come across the word "extension".

These are two words, equal in meaning, between which you can put a mathematical equal sign, although this is not entirely correct from the point of view of mathematics:

file extension \u003d file format

Sooner or later, any user is faced with the need to change, and some of them find it difficult to perform this action.

You can find many special programs with which you can change the file format. Such programs are called converters. They can be freely downloaded from the Internet, or you can simply not go through the procedure for installing programs on your computer or on a device that replaces your PC.

Before we start changing the format, let's clarify what, in fact, we are going to change.

What is the file extension (format) and why is it needed

The extension or file format refers to the part of the file name that comes after the period. It is this part, which is spelled out in the name (in the name) of the file, which indicates what type (format) the file belongs to.

Why do you need a file format?

The file format is needed by the Windows operating system so that it can quickly determine with which program to open a particular file for the user. And if there is no such program, then the system can inform the user that it does not understand how to deal with the "strange" file.

And why would a common user need to know a little about the file extension (format)? First of all, in order to easily open files taken from the Internet or from other sources. Or just to understand that you need a suitable program to open each file format.

For example, a file named Hope.txt has the extension .txt, which means it is a text file. Therefore, this file can be opened, for example, with, and, if necessary, make changes to it, save it with a different name, etc.

For the file hope.mp4, the extension is .mp4, which means that we are dealing with a video file, which means that you can open, edit and, in general, deal with such a format using the appropriate video programs. But the Notepad program, designed for working with text, is not at all suitable for opening the video file hope.mp4.

How to determine the file type by format

Here are some examples:

• "At sea.jpg" - we read what is written after the point (jpg) and understand that this is an image, since jpg is an image format.
• "Report protection.pptx" - we read what is written after the dot (pptx) and understand that this is a presentation.
• "Watch me.avi2" is a video file, since avi is a video file format.

Now let's look at what formats the various file types have, so that you can also easily determine the file type by extension yourself or use it by entering a query like "bmp what format".

The following extensions have

• archivers: rar, zip, arj;
• executable programs: exe, com;
• web pages: htm, html;
• texts: txt, rtf, doc, docx, pdf;
• graphics: bmp, gif, png, jpg, jpeg;
• audio: wav, mp3, midi;
• video: avi, mpeg, mp4.

Among Microsoft Office files, there are such formats as:

• documents: doc, docx;
• tables: xls, xlsx;
• presentations: pptx, ppt, pps;
• publications: pub.

How to open a file without knowing its format

You can simply click on the file 2 times with the mouse and it is likely that it will open. But this is not always the case, so we switch from the automatic method to the manual option in order to eventually open the file.

This can be done using the context menu. Sometimes it is also called the RMB menu (menu). The context menu offers a set of specific actions that the system is able to do in the place where the user calls this menu.

Calling up the menu is simple - just right-click on the file name. On touch screens, in particular, the context menu opens if you hold your finger (or pen) in the right place, for example, on the file name.

In fig. 1 shows:

1 - Right-clicked on the file name.
2 - A context menu opens for the file whose name was clicked. The "Play" option offers to open the view with.
3 in Fig. 1 - If the default program does not suit us, click "Open with".
4 - A list of programs that can be used to open the file will appear if the default program is not suitable.
5 - The "Select program" option will offer to search for a suitable version of the program on the Internet.

Figure: 1. The file can be "Played" using the default program, or through the "Open with" option, select another program

• video to video (e.g. video format .avi to video.mpeg),
• picture to picture (for example, expanding a picture.png to a picture.jpg)
• etc.

How to change the file format to Windows 7

By default, file extensions are hidden from users. Windows developers did this on purpose, so that users would not break the woods by changing extensions, deleting "extra" files and rendering the system inoperative.

• Hover your mouse over ",
• then go to the "Control Panel" menu,
• there click on "Small icons",
• then stop at the item "Folder Options".
• Next, the "Folder Options" window will be highlighted, where you need to select the "View" tab (1 in Fig. 2).

Figure: 2. How to allow Windows 7 to show file extensions

• Go down below by moving the slider (2 in Fig. 2).
• Stop at the phrase "Hide extensions for registered file types" (3 in Fig. 2).
• There should not be a checkbox, it must be unchecked, if there is one, and then confirm the action with the "OK" button (4 in Fig. 2) for the changes to be saved.

We make a copy of the file for safety reasons

Let's say you have a video file in avi format (title.avi), and you want to convert it to mpeg format (title.mpeg will be). Since after changing the file format, theoretically it may become inaccessible (it will stop opening), in this regard, I recommend making a copy of the file as a safety net.

• To do this, right-click on the file, after which a menu will appear, in which we click on "Copy".
• Then, in the free space, right-click again, and in the menu that appears, select "Paste".
• The same file will appear with a prefix to the name of the word "copy", more precisely, "title - copy.avi" (1 in Fig. 3).
• Below is an example based on Windows 7, for other versions of Windows (8, 10, XP) the steps are exactly the same.

Figure: 3. Make a copy of the file, then click "Rename"

For this new copied file, we will make the extension change.

• Click on the name "title - copy.avi" (1 in Fig. 3) with the right mouse button,
• then click "Rename" (2 in Fig. 3).
• And now, without changing the file name, we only change its extension, that is, after the dot, write down the format that you need, in my case it is "title - copy.mpeg".
• After this operation, press "Enter", as a result we get (Fig. 4) a duplicate-twin of the file, or rather, its copy:

Figure: 4. Changed the "title - copy.avi" file format to "title - copy.mpeg" format

Figure: 5. Warning about the consequences of changing the file extension

If you are sure, then you just have to click "Yes". After completing these steps, it remains to check that the file with the new extension is being opened. Then you can delete the extra file that was saved under the old name, in this example, this is the title.avi file.

How to change the file format to Windows 10

To have Windows 10 show extensions instead of hiding them, you can enable this option by following the steps below.

Click "Start" (1 in Fig. 6), then - "Control Panel". The "Configure computer settings" window will open, in which we click the "Explorer Settings" command (2 in Fig. 6):

Figure: 6. Open the Windows 10 Control Panel

The "Explorer Options" window will open (Fig. 7), in which:

• open the "View" tab (1 in Fig. 7),
• using the slider (2 in Fig. 7) we look for the option "Hide extensions for registered file types",
• remove the checkbox or make sure that it is not there (3 in Fig. 7) opposite the line "Hide extensions ...",
• click "OK" (4 in Fig. 7):

Figure: 7. Opening Windows 10 file extensions

Changing the file format to Windows 8

The process of changing the file format in Windows 8 is exactly the same as in 7 (seventh).

• Through "Start" go to "",
• where you need to click on "Small icons" (1 in Fig. 8).
• After that, go to the item "Folder options" (2 in Fig. 8), where you need to click on the "View" tab (3 in Fig. 8) and go to "Additional options".

Figure: 8. Open file extensions in Windows 8

Then we check if the extensions are hidden: there should be no checkboxes opposite the option "Hide extensions for registered file types" (4 in Fig. 8). Then accept the changes if they were made (5 in Fig. 8).

Algorithm for changing file extension in Windows XP

• Hover your mouse over,
• then you need to go to the "Settings" menu,
• there select "Control Panel" and
• click on "Folder Options".

In the window that appears on the screen, select the "View" tab. Then you need to click on the item "Advanced options", and then go down and move the mouse over the phrase "Hide extensions for registered file types." If there is a check mark here, then it must be unchecked. If you unchecked the box, be sure to confirm the action by clicking "Apply" so that the changes are saved.

The same can be done using the "My Computer" window, more details.

Now you can start changing the format of the desired file. To start changing the format, hover the mouse over your file, click on it to bring up a window. Then select the "Rename" item below.

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