How to open a .msg file on iPhone or Android

Neither iOS nor Android can open Outlook .msg files natively. How to read one on a phone, save the attachments, and why the usual workarounds fail.

Someone forwards you a .msg attachment, you tap it on your phone, and nothing happens — or it downloads and then sits there refusing to open. Neither iOS nor Android ships a handler for Outlook's format, and the Outlook mobile app will not open one either.

Why phones cannot open .msg files

.msg is Outlook's proprietary desktop format — a binary container of MAPI properties rather than a standard email file. iOS and Android both handle .eml natively but have no idea what to do with .msg. Even Microsoft's own Outlook mobile app declines it.

On iPhone and iPad

Tap the attachment in Mail, Messages or wherever you received it.
Tap the Share icon, then Save to Files. Choose somewhere you will find again, such as On My iPhone → Downloads.
Open the viewer in Safari.
Tap the drop zone, choose Browse, and pick the saved file.

The message opens in the browser. Attachments download to the Files app, where you can open them with whatever app normally handles that type.

On Android

Tap Download on the attachment.
Open the viewer in Chrome.
Tap the drop zone, then pick the file from Downloads.

Some Android mail apps hand the file straight to a "choose an app" dialog with nothing suitable listed. Save it first rather than trying to open it from that dialog.

Your file stays on your phone

Parsing runs inside the browser tab, so the message is never uploaded. This matters more on mobile than on a desktop: a phone is often where you read work mail on a personal device, and the alternative tools all require sending the file to a server you know nothing about.

Because there is no upload, it also works on a slow or metered connection — only the page itself is downloaded, once.

Getting the attachments

Every attachment inside the message can be downloaded individually, or all at once as a ZIP. On iPhone they land in Files; on Android in Downloads. Inline images — logos and signature graphics — are shown in the message body rather than listed separately, so the attachment list stays limited to what was really attached.

What does not work on a phone

The Outlook mobile app. It will not open a .msg attachment, even with a Microsoft 365 subscription.
Renaming the file. Mobile file managers often hide extensions, and renaming would not help anyway — the formats are structurally unrelated.
Most "file viewer" apps from the store. Those that do claim .msg support usually upload your file to their own server to convert it.

If you need it on a computer later

Open the file on your phone and use Export → Save as .eml. The resulting file opens natively in Apple Mail, Outlook, Thunderbird and Gmail, so you can forward it to yourself and have something readable at the other end. See the format comparison for what changes in the conversion.