How to open old Microsoft Publisher .pub files
When proprietary software like Microsoft Publisher reaches its end-of-life, the file format becomes orphaned and unsupported. This leaves your archive unreadable and stops you from accessing or editing legacy documents once future security updates and application support disappear.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
- 1Converting legacy files to PDF
- 2Buying a perpetually licensed version of the software
- 3Switching to alternative design software like InDesign
- 4Isolating or virtualizing systems running offline software
In their words
Unedited, most upvoted first, each linked to the thread it came from.
“I say this as someone who's been using Publisher for ~30 years and is rather saddened to see it go.”source ↗
“The kicker is going to be no future security updates for perpetual editions of Publisher, and that the .pub file format becomes orphaned and unsupported. Your .pub archive eventually will become unreadable.”source ↗
Where this came up
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