What is the IWB file format?
An .iwb file is an interoperability lesson package for interactive whiteboards, defined by the IMS Global Learning Consortium (now 1EdTech). It was created to let teachers exchange lesson content between competing platforms - SMART Board, Promethean ActivBoard, Mimio, BenQ EZWrite - without recreating slides from scratch.
Internally the file is a ZIP archive containing an imsmanifest.xml resource list and a content.xml that encodes page structure using an IWB XML schema with SVG-profile vector objects. Embedded media (images, audio, video) are bundled as files within the archive. You can rename a .iwb file to .zip to inspect its contents directly.
The format captures a common subset of whiteboard features: shapes, text, hyperlinks, grouping, and embedded media. Vendor-specific interactive elements - SMART activities, Promethean containers, Flash widgets - are stripped on export to .iwb. Legacy files created before 2021 may reference embedded Flash .swf resources that no longer play, as Flash reached end-of-life in December 2020.
The specification was initiated by Becta (UK) in 2009 and finalized by IMS Global as v1.0 in 2013. No revision has been published since. Competing native formats include .notebook (SMART Technologies) and .flipchart (Promethean ActivInspire).
Security & safety
RISK: LOWXML and media content only; no executable code. Could theoretically contain malicious hyperlinks or embedded media - treat files from unknown sources with normal caution.
Format details
in a nutshell- Industrial Winding Body / other 'IWB' acronyms - Rare: some proprietary data files from unrelated industrial or software contexts use .iwb with no relation to whiteboards.
Programs that open IWB files
Windows4 apps
macOS1 app
Technical details
deep spec| Encoding | Binary ZIP container with UTF-8 XML entries |
| Container format | ZIP (RFC 1951 DEFLATE compression) |
| Magic bytes | 50 4B 03 04 ("PK" - standard ZIP local file header) |
| Key manifest file | imsmanifest.xml - IMS metadata and embedded resource list |
| Key content file | content.xml - page/slide structure in IWB XML schema with SVG-profile vector objects |
| Compression | DEFLATE (per-entry ZIP) |
| Per-entry integrity | ZIP CRC-32 per file entry |
| Supported content types | Shapes, text, hyperlinks, groupings, embedded images, audio, and video |
| Flash dependency risk | Legacy files may embed .swf resources (Flash EOL December 2020 - no longer playable) |
| Specification body | 1EdTech (IMS Global); IWB/CFF v1.0 Final published 2013; no revision since |
| Associated OS | Windows, macOS, Linux (via ActivInspire), Android (limited, vendor apps) |
| Typical file size | 100 KB - 50 MB (lesson files with embedded media) |
| Inspection method | Rename to .zip and open with any archive manager |
| Native rival formats | .notebook (SMART Technologies), .flipchart (Promethean ActivInspire) |
| Released | 2009 (Becta-initiated; IMS Global published specification) |
| Latest version | IWB Common File Format v1.0 (IMS specification) |
| Open standard | Yes · royalty-free |
| Specification | www.imsglobal.org |
IWB conversions
Community Q&A
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