WinRAR is a popular alternative to WinZip for file and folder extraction on the Windows operating system.  WinRAR is a shareware program, so after its trial runs out, you have to purchase the full version to continue using the software.  WinZip, which you may have probably heard of or used in the past, is a similar type of archiver and compression utility.  Basically, WinRAR does the same exact thing except its focus is on creating .RAR compression-based archives as opposed to .ZIP-based archives.

The nice thing about WinRAR is that it lets you interact with both types of archives. You can create and uncompress both archive types in various formats, as well as unpack other less common types of archives, such as .ACE, .EXE, .GZ and .ISO archives. You can either manually extract files, self-extract files or split archives into various volumes depending on your needs and how you want to work within the confines of archives on your system.

Using WinRAR is relatively simple once unlocked. It is easy to learn how to use the program, too. You can create and uncompress files and folders right from an archive's context menu by right-clicking on it. Once the menu pops open, you will have the various options for either creating an archive or uncompressing one. From there, you walk through the steps and do what you need to do. You can also open the WinRAR program to get into more advanced ways of dealing with or creating archives.

WinRAR is the alternative to WinZip.  If you are unhappy with WinZip, giving WinRAR a chance might be just what you need.  Give WinRAR a chance to see if it works for you, if not, there are other alternatives out there for you to use.  Otherwise, you will not be able to take advantage of what a extraction utilities can do for you and your files, folders and more.