How to open a Publisher (.pub) file on a Chromebook

What works on a Chromebook, at a glance

Why Publisher won’t run on ChromeOS

Publisher was a Windows desktop program. Microsoft’s own help page says it was available for the PC only, and there was never a web version you could open in Chrome. Microsoft retired Publisher in October 2026, so that won’t change.

Google Drive doesn’t help either. Drive will store any file, but its list of files it can preview covers Word, Excel, PowerPoint and XPS from Microsoft, not Publisher. A .pub file in Drive shows no preview; all you can do is download it.

This has been a sore spot for a while. When schools moved to Chromebooks, IT staff on the EduGeek forum found no direct way to open .pub files, and suggested converting old files to PDF and making new ones in Google Slides or Canva.

Option 1: LibreOffice through Linux (free)

Many Chromebooks can run Linux apps, and LibreOffice is one of them. Its Draw app opens .pub files, lets you edit them, and exports PDFs. The steps are above.

What to know first:

• School and work Chromebooks. Google says that if your Chromebook is managed by a work or school, you might not be able to use Linux. If you don’t see the Developers section, that’s usually why. Ask your IT team, or skip to Option 2.
• Setup takes a while. Turning on Linux takes 10 minutes or more, and LibreOffice is a large download. Do it on good Wi-Fi.
• The version may be older. The LibreOffice you get with apt comes from Debian and may not be the newest release. It still opens .pub files.
• Linux can only see shared folders. Put the .pub file in Linux files, or right-click a folder in the Files app and share it with Linux.

Once it’s open, LibreOffice behaves just as it does on Windows or Mac, rough edges included. Our LibreOffice guide covers the common problems and how to fix them.

Option 2: Convert it in Chrome (no install)

If Linux is blocked or you’d rather not set it up, a web converter is the simplest route. Our converter works from Chrome (the conversion itself runs on our servers) and turns each .pub file into:

• a PDF that opens in Chrome, the Files app or Google Drive, ready to print or share;
• PNG and JPG images of every page, which drop straight into Google Slides, Canva or a class website;
• a text-only Word file, which opens in Google Docs when you only need the words;
• an ODG file for LibreOffice Draw, if you or a colleague can edit it later.

To convert a .pub file to PDF, upload the files or a ZIP. You see a free, watermarked preview of every page for the first 10 files in a batch, so you know what you’re getting. One clean file is free per email address. After that it’s a one-time $5 for up to 10 files, $15 for up to 60, $29 for up to 300 or $59 for up to 2,000, and only files that convert count (pricing). There’s no account to make, and files are deleted after 24 hours.

Option 3: Ask someone with Publisher on Windows

If a colleague still has a one-time-purchase copy of Publisher (2016, 2019 or 2021), they can open the file and choose File > Save As > PDF. For one or two important files, that’s the most faithful copy you can get, and it costs nothing.

After it’s open: making new versions on a Chromebook

Once you can see the file, decide what you need next:

• Just reading or printing: keep the PDF and you’re done.
• Making the next issue: rebuild it in Google Slides (set a custom page size) or Canva. Canva can import a PDF and keep the layout as closely as it can, so the converted PDF is a good starting point.
• Reusing the words: open the text-only Word file in Google Docs and copy what you need.

Related guides

• How to open a .pub file without Publisher
• How to open a Publisher file in LibreOffice
• Converting Publisher pages to PNG or JPG