What is the WEB file format?
.web is a proprietary project file format used by Xara Web Designer, a vector-based website design application developed by Xara Group Limited and distributed by MAGIX Software GmbH. The .web file stores the entire working design for a website: vector objects, text, layout grids, embedded images, page structure, navigation elements and hyperlinks.
The .web format is a variant of Xara's native .xar binary format, which uses a compressed tagged-record structure internally. It is a design source file - to publish a finished site, the designer exports via File > Export Website, which generates HTML, CSS and image assets. The .web file itself is not a webpage and cannot be opened in a browser.
Xara Web Designer is a Windows-only application. The .web format is version-specific: files created in newer versions of Xara Web Designer may not open correctly in older releases. Xara Cloud also supports import and export of .web files. No other application reads or writes this format.
Security & safety
RISK: LOW.web files are design project files with no active code execution outside Xara. The risk noted by Xara itself is editorial: anyone with the .web file can modify and republish your website if they have Xara Web Designer installed.
Format details
in a nutshell- PHP Web Page (rare) - Some early web servers used .web as an alias for PHP or SSI server-side pages; extremely rare in modern contexts.
- Various browser cache / web download artifacts - Some download managers or browsers have historically used .web as a partial download extension; non-standard.
Programs that open WEB files
Windows3 apps
Xara Designer Pro
Paid File > Open, select the .web file. Xara Designer Pro is the full-featured version that also opens .web files. 
Xara Xtreme
Open-source Legacy open-source version of Xara; may open older .web files but not recommended for modern files.
Xara Web Designer
Paid File > Open, select the .web file. The application is the native creator/editor of this format.
Xara Cloud
Freemium Upload the .web file to Xara Cloud - it supports importing Xara Web Designer format for online editing. Technical details
deep spec| Container | Xara proprietary XAR binary format (compressed tagged records) |
| Encoding | Binary, little-endian |
| Internal compression | LZW or DEFLATE (internal Xara compression) |
| Stores | Vector objects, text, embedded images, page layout, navigation structure and hyperlinks |
| Output | Exported to HTML, CSS and image assets via File > Export Website; not directly browser-readable |
| Typical size | 500 KB - 50 MB (varies with embedded images and page count) |
| Color support | 24-bit RGB with alpha channel (vector and raster elements) |
| Canvas type | Vector-based; no fixed pixel canvas dimensions |
| Platform | Windows only (Xara Web Designer and Xara Designer Pro) |
| MIME type | application/octet-stream |
| Version compatibility | Files from newer Xara releases may not open correctly in older versions |
| Shared structure | .web is a variant of Xara's .xar format; both use the same XAR binary container |
| Released | ~2006 (Xara Web Designer product line) |
| Latest version | Xara Web Designer 19 (2023+) |
| Specification | site.xara.com |
WEB conversions
Community Q&A
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