What Is WEBLOC File? How to Open It on Windows 10/11?

What Is WEBLOC File

WEBLOC files are shortcuts to websites generated by web browsers in macOS, such as Apple Safari or Google Chrome. It contains the URL of a web page and is created by dragging the website URL from the address bar of a web browser to another folder on the desktop or hard drive. WEBLOC files are similar to .URL files created by other programs.

WEBLOC files are not supported in the Windows version of Safari, which was discontinued in 2012. However, you can open WEBLOC files in Windows with WeblocOpener. When copying a WEBLOC file to a Windows computer, it may show two files: [filename].webloc and [filename]._webloc. Both files can be opened in a text editor, which will display the URLs contained in the files.

How to Open the WEBLOC File on Windows 11/10

How to open WEBLOC file on Windows 11/10? You need the right software like Finder to open a WEBLOC file. Without the appropriate software, you will receive a Windows message “How do you want to open this file?” or “Windows cannot open this file” or a similar Mac/iPhone/Android alert.

Way 1: Via Notepad

Mac OS X users can open WEBLOC in Chrome or Firefox, much like opening a regular URL shortcut in Windows. However, on other platforms, you need to first open the WEBLOC file with a text editor. You can then copy the URL string from webloc into your browser’s URL bar. Here’s how to open WEBLOC with notepad on Windows 11/10.

First, right-click on the WEBLOC and select the Open with option.

If Notepad is not in the “Open With” menu, click “Choose another application” to open the window below. You can then click “Choose another app on this PC” to choose Notepad if you want.

Alternatively, you can convert WEBLOC to a txt file in File Explorer by removing the WEBLOC extension at the end of the file header and replacing it with txt. You need to select the “File extensions” checkbox on the View tab of File Explorer to edit the extension.

With the WEBLOC file open in Notepad, use the Ctrl + C hotkey to copy the website URL between the <string> and </string> tags.

Start a browser to open the WEBLOC URL.

Paste WEBLOC’s URL into your browser’s URL bar using the Ctrl + V hotkey.

Way 2: Via WeblocOpener

WeblocOpener is software that allows you to open WEBLOC shortcuts in Windows just like in Mac OS X. So you can open the page in your browser without copying and pasting the URL from Notepad. Press the “Download Installer” button on this website page and open WeblocOpener’s installation wizard to add it to Windows.

Run the WebBloc Opener Update application. You can then click the WEBLOC file shortcut on your desktop to open it in your browser.

WeblocOpener also enables you to add new WEBLOC page shortcuts to your desktop. Right-click on the desktop, click New and select WEBLOC Link. This will add a WEBLOC shortcut to your desktop that you can click to open the WeblocOpener window where you can enter the URL of the shortcut you want to open. Thereafter, you can click the WEBLOC shortcut to open a web page.

Final Words

Here is all information about the WEBLOC file. You can know the definition of the WEBLOC file. Besides, you can know how to open the WEBLOC file.