What is a .eot file?
Embedded OpenType Font · Font · Microsoft · 1997
An .eot file is Embedded OpenType, a compact web-font format Microsoft made for old Internet Explorer. It wraps a TrueType or OpenType font with light protection so it can be embedded on a web page.
What is a .eot file used for?
EOT was the only web-font format Internet Explorer understood for years, so sites once shipped it alongside other formats. It is a repackaged sfnt font with a header giving the allowed sites.
Modern browsers use WOFF2, and EOT is effectively obsolete. You only meet it in legacy sites; convert the underlying font to WOFF2 for anything current.
What opens a .eot file?
The .eot format opens in the following apps, grouped by operating system. If one app does not work, try another from the same list.
Windows
- Convert to TTF/WOFF2
- font tools
macOS
- Convert to TTF/WOFF2
Linux
- FontForge (via conversion)
Web
- Legacy Internet Explorer only
Open a .eot file step by step
- Confirm the file really is a .eot. Drop it into the WhatFileType identifier, which reads its signature in your browser without uploading anything.
- On Windows, open it with Convert to TTF/WOFF2 or font tools.
- On Mac, use Convert to TTF/WOFF2.
- On Linux, try FontForge (via conversion).
- Still stuck? Convert the .eot to woff2, which opens more widely.
Why can't I open my .eot file?
Almost always because no installed app understands EOT. Install one of the apps above, or convert the file to a format your existing software already reads. If double-clicking opens the wrong program instead of nothing at all, the file association is set to the wrong app rather than the file being broken.
The other possibility is that the file is not really a .eot at all. Drop it into the file identifier to check it by its bytes instead of its name. Nothing is uploaded.
How to convert a .eot file
You can convert a .eot file to woff2, ttf, otf using a conversion tool or the export menu of an app that opens it.
EOT has no fixed magic number, so there is no signature table on this page. Its bytes alone do not prove the format: identification relies on the extension, the structure of the content and the program that created it. The magic-numbers reference lists the formats that do carry one.
Frequently asked questions
What is a .eot file?
An .eot file is Embedded OpenType, a compact web-font format Microsoft made for old Internet Explorer. It wraps a TrueType or OpenType font with light protection so it can be embedded on a web page.
What is an .eot file?
Embedded OpenType, an old Microsoft web-font format made for Internet Explorer. It wraps a TrueType/OpenType font for embedding on web pages.
Do I still need EOT fonts?
Almost never. Only very old Internet Explorer required them. Modern sites use WOFF2, which every current browser supports.
How do I convert an EOT font?
Use an online font converter or FontForge to turn the embedded font into WOFF2, TTF or OTF.
Related formats
Sources
Details on this page were checked against authoritative references. How sources are ranked and what is deliberately left out is set out in the methodology.