Open a Publisher file without Publisher

If somebody has sent you a file whose name ends in .pub and double-clicking it does nothing useful, the file is a Microsoft Publisher document. Publisher is a Windows program most people do not have, and nothing else on an ordinary computer opens one.

This page opens it. Choose the file, and it appears on this page — on your own device, without being sent anywhere. You can then read it, print it, or save it as a PDF that opens on anything.

What a .pub file actually is

Publisher is a page-layout program. It is what a great many parish newsletters, school notices, orders of service, flyers and raffle tickets were made in, because it came free with some versions of Office and it let people put a text box exactly where they wanted one.

A .pub file is not a Word document with a different ending. It stores the page size, every text box and picture frame and its exact position, the colours, and the names of the fonts used — but not the fonts themselves. That last detail matters, and it comes up again below.

Microsoft has retired Publisher. It is no longer included with Microsoft 365, and the files people already have do not stop existing because the program did. That is why this page exists.

What comes through, and what does not

This was measured, not guessed. Seventeen real Publisher documents — a school travel flyer, an Italian parish booklet, a Portuguese wedding order of service, greeting cards, a pedigree certificate — were opened and compared against the originals. All seventeen opened. Here is what survived the journey:

What is in the file		What happens
Photographs	Kept	Stored as ordinary pictures, which any browser can show.
Clip art and drawings	Not shown	Kept as Windows drawing instructions rather than as pictures. You get an empty frame where each one was.
The lettering	Substituted	The file names its fonts but does not carry them. The closest available lettering is used, so a line may break in a different place.
Text, colours, arrangement	Kept	Boxes stay where the author put them, at the size they were.
Tables, lines, borders	Kept	Drawn again from the measurements in the file.

Those seventeen files came from people who were having trouble with them, so they are harder than an average document rather than easier.

If some of the pictures are missing

This is the one imperfection you are likely to meet, so it is worth knowing why it happens. When somebody drops a photograph into Publisher, the photograph itself goes into the file. When they use a piece of clip art, draw an arrow, or pick one of the decorative borders, Publisher does not store a picture at all — it stores a list of drawing instructions written for Windows. Nothing outside Windows can follow that list.

So photographs always arrive and drawings do not. Where one is missing you see an empty frame in its place, the same size and in the same position, rather than the page quietly closing up around a hole. Everything else on that page — the words, the colours, the arrangement — is as it was. The page will tell you how many pictures it could not show.

If the drawings are the point, and you can still reach whoever made the file, ask them to open it in Publisher and save a PDF. That keeps every one of them.

Nothing is uploaded

Most sites that open or convert a file ask you to upload it first. Your file goes to a computer you have never seen, in a country you did not choose, and you are asked to believe a sentence about it being deleted afterwards.

This page does not do that, because it does not have to. A browser can open a file, read it and write a new one without sending anything anywhere. So the file you choose stays on your machine, the page does the work, and there is nothing on our side to leak, to sell, or to be asked for by anybody.

You do not have to take that on trust. Load this page, turn your internet off, and then open your file. It still works.

Other ways to open one

Ask whoever sent it for a PDF

Much the best answer if they are still reachable. In Publisher it is File, then Save As, then PDF — about a minute of their time, and the result opens anywhere, on anything, for ever, with every drawing intact.

If your workplace has a Microsoft 365 subscription

Some business plans still include Publisher for Windows. It is worth asking whoever looks after the computers before you install anything yourself.

LibreOffice Draw

Free, and it opens many .pub files. Older files and heavily designed ones come out further from the original than you would like, and it is a large download for one file — but if you need the drawings and cannot get a PDF, it is the next thing to try.

Questions people ask

Is my file uploaded to your server?

No, and not in the "we delete it afterwards" sense — it never goes. The code that reads the file is part of this page and runs on your machine. If you want to be sure rather than reassured, load this page, turn off your Wi-Fi, and open a file. It works.

Some of the pictures are missing

Clip art and drawings are stored as Windows instructions rather than as pictures, and no browser can follow them. Photographs are unaffected. If you need the drawings, ask the sender for a PDF.

It opened but there is nothing on the page

A few older Publisher files hold their text in a way the reader cannot get at — two of the seventeen tested documents were like this. Anything drawn on the page still shows. There is nothing you can do from this end; the sender's copy of Publisher can still save a PDF.

The words are right but the lettering looks wrong

The file names its fonts but does not carry them, so the nearest available lettering is used. Widths are matched as closely as possible, but a line may break in a different place than it did on the author's screen.

Can I edit the newsletter here?

No. This page reads Publisher files; it does not write them. If you need to change the date on next year's notice, you need Publisher itself, or you rebuild the page in something else.

Does it work on a phone?

Yes, and that is where most people use it. On the first visit there is a second or two while the part of the page that reads Publisher files arrives; after that it is immediate. You can send the PDF straight on to somebody from the same screen.