Download Sample MSG Files (Microsoft Outlook)

Download free sample MSG files. This is the proprietary binary format used by Microsoft Outlook. Unlike EML, it uses OLE Structured Storage. Use these files to test binary parsing, RTF body extraction, and Outlook Item types. STANDARD Emails & Items File Name Specs Size Action simple_email.msg Email Standard Outlook Email. HTML Body. The most common…

Download free sample MSG files. This is the proprietary binary format used by Microsoft Outlook. Unlike EML, it uses OLE Structured Storage. Use these files to test binary parsing, RTF body extraction, and Outlook Item types.

STANDARD
Emails & Items

File Name Specs Size Action
simple_email.msg
Email		 Standard Outlook Email. HTML Body. The most common file type exported from Outlook. 15 KB Download
outlook_contact.msg
Contact Item		 Contact Item. Stores Name, Phone, Email struct (not vCard). Tests non-email property parsing. 10 KB Download
calendar_appointment.msg
Calendar		 Meeting Item. Contains Start/End times stored as binary properties (FileTime). 12 KB Download

QA / ADVANCED
Binary & RTF

Test Case Description Size Action
Rich Text Body (RTF) Compression. The email body is stored as compressed RTF (LZFe algorithm). Standard text readers will see garbage. 20 KB Download
Embedded MSG (OLE) Recursive. An email containing another email attached. A MSG file inside a MSG file. 50 KB Download
Unicode Headers Uses Unicode (UTF-16) for Subject/Sender. Essential to test non-ASCII character display (e.g., Emoji in Subject). 15 KB Download

Technical Specs: MSG

  • CFBF Format: MSG uses the “Compound File Binary Format” (same as old `.doc` or `.xls`). It acts like a file system with streams and storage directories inside a single file.
  • Property Tags: Data is not stored with keys like “Subject”, but with Hex tags (e.g., 0x0037 for Subject). You need a mapping table (MAPI) to read it.
  • MIME Type: application/vnd.ms-outlook.

Frequently Asked Questions

How to open MSG files on Mac?
macOS does not natively support MSG. You need to use Microsoft Outlook for Mac, or a third-party converter to change it to EML.
Is MSG secure?
Since MSG is a binary OLE format, it can theoretically contain macro viruses or malformed buffer overflow exploits, unlike plain text EML files.

How to analyze MSG structure?

If you are a developer debugging Outlook addons, these tools are mandatory.

  • OutlookSpy: The absolute best tool. It adds a button inside Outlook to inspect the raw MAPI properties of any selected item.
  • MFCMAPI: An open-source, lower-level tool from Microsoft to browse your Exchange store data directly.
  • SSView: A tool to view the “Structured Storage” (OLE) hierarchy of the MSG file without parsing the content.

Developer’s Corner: MSG on Linux

Need to parse Outlook emails on a Python server? Use extract-msg. It handles the binary complexity for you.

# Python: Read MSG properties
import extract_msgwith extract_msg.openMsg(“email.msg”) as msg:
print(f“Subject: {msg.subject}”)
print(f“Sender: {msg.sender}”)
print(f“Body: {msg.body[:100]}…”)

# Save attachments
for att in msg.attachments:
att.save()

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