Opening an XL File

The XL file type is primarily associated with Microsoft Excel.

XL	File extension: XL
	File type:	spreadsheet file

What is an XL file?

XL files mostly belong to Microsoft Excel. XL files are primarily Excel spreadsheet files. They store table data, formulas, and other structured information.
Some XL files use a ZIP container that holds XML documents, common in modern Excel versions. Others use the Microsoft Compound binary format for legacy spreadsheets.

Primary use: They manage data and perform calculations.

Alternate use: A subset of these files are used in game localization (e.g., Cyberpunk 2077) or as mod files (e.g., SnowRunner mods).

Opening and viewing: Microsoft Excel is the recommended application. More details are available at Microsoft Excel.

FilExt.com note: These files leverage specialized internal structures, a fact not widely known outside technical circles.

How to open an XL file

You need a suitable software like Microsoft Excel to open an XL file. Without proper 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. If you cannot open your XL file correctly, try to right-click or long-press the file. Then click "Open with" and choose an application. You can also display a XL file directly in the browser:. Just drag the file onto this browser window and drop it.

Online XL Text Viewer

Choose your .xl file to analyze

or drag and drop it here

Online File Viewer

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XL file format:

A file format defines how the data in the file is structured. A file format is determined by the file extension and signature, so JPEG images have the extension .jpg and the first bytes in the file are ÿØÿ. Nonetheless, different programs can utilize the same file extension to represent distinct file formats. Double-clicking on the file often results in an error when opening. Knowledge is power - this also applies when dealing with unknown or faulty files. Our evaluation of the XL files is as follows:

XL is not a commonly used file extension and covers different formats for different programs. However, the following two file formats are common:

• 35% of all XL files use the ZIP algorithm, so several files are combined and compressed into one XL file. Such a ZIP file contains 10 to 60 files. Common included file names are [Content_Types].xml, \_rels\.rels, \docProps\app.xml, \docProps\core.xml, \xl\_rels\workbook.xml.rels, \xl\calcChain.xml, \xl\drawings\drawing1.xml, \xl\sharedStrings.xml, \xl\styles.xml, \xl\theme\theme1.xml, \xl\workbook.xml and \xl\worksheets\sheet1.xml. You can see the included files and images by renaming the file extension to .zip and then double-clicking it. Most of these files are 11 KB to 300 KB in size. The following keywords are characteristic: [Content_Types].xml. Files like these are about quotation, taxonomy, channel, report, abund, group, match, line and xlsx, and have often person-related content.
• 15% of all XL files have the same signature 02 00 00 00. They consist of unreadable binary data. The files are often between 28 KB and 21 MB in size. An example of a file name is DL.XL or DV.XL.

All other XL files (50%) have no uniform format, often e.g. DOC, localization, factories, Intensity and journal. Sometimes used for archive, translation, jrme or worldspawn. If you want to find out which format your XL file belongs to, just click on the button "Choose your .xl file to analyze".