Free online NFO to TXT converter

A program may accept an information file only when its name ends in .txt, or a recipient may need a format that opens in any standard text editor. For an ordinary text NFO, changing the filename extension or saving the same text as TXT is usually sufficient.

What the NFO format is

In the text-file context, NFO is an information file containing release notes, software or media details, instructions, credits, URLs, or ASCII art. Release groups, media cataloging tools, software distributors, and text editors commonly create or distribute these files.

NFO has no universal structure. Many files contain plain character data, while media-management applications such as Kodi can use XML-based NFO metadata. An XML NFO is still text, but changing its extension to .txt does not remove XML tags or convert the metadata into another structure.

What the TXT format is

TXT is a generic plain-text format that stores characters and line breaks without fonts, colors, embedded images, or application-specific layout. Notepad, TextEdit, VS Code, command-line tools, document systems, and many importers can read it.

Use TXT when software filters files by extension, when a recipient needs a broadly supported filename, or when a simple text copy is required. The extension does not determine the character encoding or guarantee a particular internal structure.

How to convert NFO to TXT

Save a new TXT copy in a text editor

1. Open the NFO in Notepad++, VS Code, Notepad, TextEdit in plain-text mode, or another text editor. Notepad++ is useful for checking encodings and preserving ASCII-art layout.
2. Check the displayed characters, box-drawing symbols, and line breaks before saving. If text is corrupted, reopen the original with the encoding that produced it, such as UTF-8, Windows-1252, or CP437/OEM encoding.
3. Choose File → Save As, enter a name ending in .txt, and save. Choose UTF-8 when a portable modern encoding is needed and the source has been read correctly.
4. Keep the original .nfo if another application depends on its extension, original encoding, XML structure, or exact bytes.

On Windows, enable View → Show → File name extensions in File Explorer before renaming or checking the result. Otherwise, an editor or Explorer can leave a misleading name such as filename.txt.nfo.

Rename the file without changing its contents

If the NFO already displays correctly and only the extension prevents an import, renaming is enough. In PowerShell, run Rename-Item -LiteralPath "filename.nfo" -NewName "filename.txt". On macOS or Linux, run mv -- "filename.nfo" "filename.txt".

Renaming preserves every byte, including the original encoding and line endings; it does not convert the file to UTF-8 or alter XML markup. This is the safest option when ASCII art or exact byte comparison matters.

Online conversion

An online converter is normally unnecessary because this operation requires no format transformation. A browser-based service such as Zamzar or Convertio can be considered only if it explicitly accepts .nfo and produces TXT at the time of use; do not upload files containing credentials, private metadata, or restricted release information. Downloaded output should be checked for encoding, line endings, and unchanged content.

Quality and compatibility limits

TXT cannot preserve NFO-specific file associations, XML semantics, or rich formatting. ASCII art depends on fixed character widths, so view it with a monospaced font such as Consolas, DejaVu Sans Mono, or Menlo. A conversion that saves as UTF-8 can also change the byte sequence and may add or remove a byte-order mark.

Encoding errors must be corrected before saving. If the original was opened as the wrong encoding, saving the displayed text preserves the already-corrupted characters rather than recovering the source. Windows CRLF and Unix LF line-ending changes are usually harmless for reading, but scripts and archival checks that compare exact bytes require the original file or a byte-preserving rename.