Save an email file as PDF

Why PDF

Email files are awkward to keep. A .msg needs Outlook, a winmail.dat needs unpacking, and even .eml files show up as code in the wrong program. A PDF opens on every computer and phone, can be filed with a case or a claim, and shows the sender, date and message exactly as they were.

One email, free: print it to PDF

1. Open the email file on this page.
2. Press Print above the email.
3. In the print dialog, choose Save as PDF as the printer or destination (on a Mac, use the PDF button at the bottom of the dialog).

The printout contains the subject, sender, recipients and date, followed by the message. The page’s own buttons and menus are left out. Attachments aren’t part of the printout; save them separately with their Save buttons.

Many emails: one ZIP of PDFs (unlock)

If you have a folder of .msg or .eml files, for example for a dispute, an audit or a hand-over, the one-time unlock converts them all in one go. Choose the files and you get a single ZIP with a folder for each email holding:

• a PDF of the email, with its headers, message text and list of attachments,
• every attachment, with winmail.dat packages unpacked and attached emails turned into PDFs of their own,
• and a summary spreadsheet (summary.csv) listing every file, its subject, sender and date, and any file that couldn’t be read and why.

The unlock also adds a direct Save as PDF button that skips the print dialog. Those PDFs use the standard PDF fonts, which cover English and other Western European languages; characters outside them, such as Chinese or emoji, show as question marks, and the PDF says so. For emails in other scripts, print to PDF instead, which uses your computer’s fonts.

Is it private?

Yes. Both ways run in your browser. The emails and the PDFs are made on your own device and never uploaded, which is why this is suitable for confidential or legal material.