Click the "Select File" button above, and choose your HTML file.
You'll see a preview.
Click the "Convert file to..." button and download the OPML file.
High Quality Conversion
Our advanced conversion technology delivers accurate HTML conversions while preserving quality and integrity of your pages.
Secure and Private
Your data is protected by strict privacy policies and access controls. Uploaded HTML pages and converted OPMLs are deleted immediately after conversion.
Easy to Use
Upload your HTML file to preview it in your browser and download it as a OPML. No registration, watermarks, or software installation required.
HTML to OPML Conversion Explained
Converting .HTML to .OPML transforms a visual web page into a strict, hierarchical text outline. People convert html to opml to extract structured data, such as heading hierarchies or lists of RSS feeds, from standard web documents. You gain a clean, machine-readable XML tree that imports easily into outliners and feed readers. You lose all styling, images, scripts, and non-hierarchical text. This conversion is a bad idea if you want to preserve the visual appearance or the full readable content of a web page.
Typical Tasks and Users
RSS Users and Podcasters: Extracting feed URLs embedded in HTML <head> tags or blogroll lists to import into feed readers.
Researchers and Writers: Pulling the <h1> to <h6> heading structure of a long article to create a document outline.
Data Scrapers: Converting nested HTML lists (<ul>, <ol>, <li>) into structured XML nodes for database import.
Mind Mappers: Turning web-based text hierarchies into nodes for mind mapping software.
For programmatic conversion, developers use parsing libraries like Beautiful Soup (Python) or Cheerio (Node.js) to read the .HTML DOM and generate XML output.
Command-line document converters like Pandoc can convert HTML to OPML by mapping HTML headings directly to OPML nodes.
Pros and Cons of the Conversion
Pros:
Structure: Forces flat or messy web content into a strict, predictable hierarchy.
Compatibility: Creates a file that feed readers and mind mapping tools can import natively.
File Size: Drastically reduces file size by stripping CSS, JavaScript, and media assets.
Cons:
Severe Data Loss: Discards images, tables, formatting, and interactive elements entirely.
Context Loss: Standard paragraph text (<p>) does not map well to .OPML nodes, which expect short outline titles.
Parsing Errors: Poorly structured .HTML (such as missing closing tags or skipped heading levels) results in broken or illogical .OPML hierarchies.
Conversion Difficulties & Why Convert.Guru
The technical pipeline to convert html to opml requires parsing the Document Object Model (DOM) and mapping specific elements to OPML <outline> tags. The main difficulty is handling unstructured or semantic-free .HTML. If a web page uses bold text (<b> or <span>) instead of proper heading tags (<h2>), standard converters fail to recognize the hierarchy. Additionally, extracting RSS feeds requires scanning both <link> tags and anchor (<a>) tags for specific attributes.
Convert.Guru handles this conversion accurately by using robust DOM parsing algorithms. It intelligently identifies headings, lists, and feed URLs, mapping them to clean .OPML nodes while safely discarding irrelevant web code and layout wrappers.
HTML vs. OPML: What is the better choice?
Feature
.HTML
.OPML
Primary Purpose
Web page display and layout
Outlines and feed lists
Structure
Flexible Document Object Model (DOM)
Strict XML hierarchy
Media Support
Images, video, audio, scripts
Text and URLs only
Styling
Full CSS support
None
Software
Web browsers, text editors
Outliners, RSS readers, mind maps
Which format should you choose?
Choose .HTML when you need to display a document with formatting, images, and readable paragraphs. It is the standard for human-readable web content. Choose .OPML when you need to transfer a list of subscriptions between RSS readers or import a document's structural outline into a mind map. Avoid converting to .OPML if you want to archive a web page for offline reading; use .PDF or .MHTML instead to preserve the visual layout and text.
Conclusion
Converting .HTML to .OPML makes sense only when you need to extract hierarchical data, such as headings or feed links, from a web page. The biggest limitation is the total loss of visual styling, media, and standard paragraph text. For users who need to extract outlines or blogrolls without writing custom parsing scripts, Convert.Guru provides a reliable, fast, and technically accurate tool for this exact conversion.
FAQ
The converter also works in reverse, allowing you to convert your OPML file into HTML file type.
Convert.Guru also easily converts HTML pages (Markup Language Document) to various formats - free and online. No Word or extra software needed.
Convert the HTML locally and export to OPML using Word software or a reliable desktop converter — no internet needed. The easiest way is to open the HTML file in the software on your computer and then save it as a OPML file in the File menu under Save as...
About the HTML to OPML Converter
Convert.Guru makes it fast and easy to convert web pages to OPML online. The HTML to OPML converter runs entirely in your browser, so there’s no software to install and no account required. Powered by one of the industry’s largest and most trusted file format databases—maintained for more than 25 years—our technology reliably identifies HTML pages even when they are damaged or incorrectly named. Uploaded files are automatically deleted after conversion to protect your privacy.