File extensions – definition and basic information


File extensions are the integral parts of the files that are on each computer. Often, when working on a computer, we encounter a wide range of files, such as docx, ppt, part, mp3 or rmvb. We realize that they are there – but we often do not know what they are for on our computer.

File extension, also known as the filename extension is a suffix added to the name of a computer file, usually consisting of a number of characters placed after the last dot in the filename, which gives us information about its coding. In other words a file extension is a file format. It allows the operating system (e.g. Windows) to recognize what program it should try to open the file.

In the table below you will find a random selection of popular file extensions.


File extension The full name of the file Category

AIF file extension

Audio Interchange File Format

Audio Files

DDS file extension

DirectDraw Surface

Raster Image Files

DMP file extension

Windows Memory Dump

System Files

KEY file extension

Keynote Presentation

Data Files

LOG file extension

Log File

Text Files

PHP file extension

PHP Source Code File

Web Files

PL file extension

Perl Script

Developer Files

SLN file extension

Visual Studio Solution File

Developer Files

SRT file extension

SubRip Subtitle File

Video Files

TARGZ file extension

Compressed Tarball File

Compressed Files

WAV file extension

WAVE Audio File

Audio Files

WSF file extension

Windows Script File

Executable Files

XLS file extension

Excel Spreadsheet

Spreadsheet Files

3DS file extension

3D Studio Scene

3D Image Files

3GP file extension

3GPP Multimedia File

Video Files