Convert rtf to txt using this free simple utility. This tool takes your rich text files and saves them as Unicode text files. It can do batch rtf to txt conversion for multiple files. No installation is necessary, it is a stand alone utility. This is a very simple rich text to txt converter, nothing fancy.
Download RTF to TXT converter – RTFtoUTXT.exe
The resulting txt file will be saved in Unicode encoding so scripts in languages other than English (non windows-1252 character sets) will be handled correctly. You should not have character corruption or garbage characters. If you do, please drop a note and I will check.
How does rtf to txt converter look?
Like this:
How do I use rtf to txt file converter to batch convert?
- Download rtf to txt converter utility using the link above (if you get a browser security warning, select to continue downloading)
- Launch the utility by double clicking on RTFtoUTXT.exe
- Either drag or drop your rtf file(s) or click “Select Files” and point to the files that you want to batch convert rtf to txt. Hold CTRL down while selecting a file to select multiple rtf files
- Click “Convert” to start the rtf to txt conversion process
- Wait until the rtf to txt conversion is completed. Conversion time will depend on the number of files you selected and the size of each file.
That’s it. Converted Unicode txt files will be saved in the same folder as the source files that you selected.
Update – The converter initially used an Office method. Thanks to the great suggestion of, Etienne Kroger, the converter is now using a different method which does the RTF to TXT conversion much faster.
Hi Mr Emre !
Fantastic tool for converting rtf to txt.
I have a question, is it possible to change the code for saving converted files to UTF-8 txt, maybe it is not complicated make toolbox with choosing output format ANSI, UNICODE, UTF-8 …Thank you for this tool
I am glad you found it useful, Artek. That could be done but I chose to set it to Unicode as that should address most needs. Is there a particular reason why you need your files to be UTF-8?
I try to connect txt file to access database. When I use sql to connect txt unicode i see nothing, if i change output with save as to utf-8 everything is ok.
I cant find better tool for me but it is small problem with this encoding. Sometimes I have a lot of txt to connect and I must manualy click save as for all this files. I foun MS tool http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc488002.aspx but it makes only 1 file and this proces sometimes takes a long time. RTFtoUTXT i faster than it.
Artek, you can use iconv to batch convert your files to UTF8 after using RTFtoTXT. See this link – http://sharealike.org/index.php/2008/12/12/script-to-convert-windows-1252-files-to-utf-8/
There is an iconv port to Windows as well if you dont have access to a Linux box. Se this link – http://superuser.com/questions/69091/batch-change-encoding-ascii-files-from-utf-8-to-iso-8859-1
Thanks a lot. I’ll check it tomorrow and tell you if it works. Thank You very much for your interesting. Bye.
Hi Emre, i’ve trie this methods but without positive efects. I use Windows and iconv works bad with my template. Please more sugesstions if you have.
Thank you. I recently switched from a Mac to PC. I used RTFtoTXT to batch convert the rtf files in Notational Velocticy to txt files in the equivalent program Resophnotes for PC (both free and highly recommended).
Hello, Great tool
thanks 
Have you got a possibility to add a command line mode – then it could be even more useful for some scripts.
Does it need any particular software installed on PC (MSOffice?)
That’s a good idea tomsh, if I get some free time in my hands, I will look in to that. No, it does not require Office as it uses a .NET library for conversion.
Have you had a chance to make this work from command line yet. How about building a tcl package you could call from a tcl proc.
Thanks,
thank you. that’s a great and easy to use tool. have a nice day!
Thanks, nice and simple tool. Would it be possible to log some data about lost information? i.e. display how much formatting got lost in the conversion.
Thanks Jan, that is beyond the purpose of the tool at this point.
Absolutely fantastic! I search web for about 30 min and found this utility. I was able to successfully convert 1929 rtf files in about 30 sec! Great job and thanks for providing this tool.
Just incredible! Converted 100 RTF in a few seconds! (After googling around for hours…)
Thank you very much for this fantastic tool!
Did you know, that your Unicode-TXT-Files doesn’t have the BOM (Byte Order Mark) set?
Some programs need this BOM to read the content properly from TXT-files.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byte_order_mark
Thank You, thank You, thank You ! Amazing tool. And for free. You make something good.
Great tool, but may I second the request for a command line interface – in its simplest form, just 2 parameters would be needed: input file path and output file path [or perhaps even only one if output file defaulted to same name/location as input file, but with .txt extension.
Thanks,
William
Hello Emre,
would it be possible to add command line processing, too? I.e. no GUI.
E.g. “RFTtoUTXT.exe My.rtf My.txt”?
TIA.
Lyricus
lovely i like it
Fantastic! Now I can convert .rtf files to .txt! I use Mobipocket reader, which converts most documents into it’s own proprietary format. Unfortunately, it doesn’t convert .rtf, but now with one extra step, I can read all my .rtf’s with Mobipocket!
Thanks a bunch, Emre, and good luck in all your future endeavors.
I love you.