Extract text from PuTTY private keys (PPK)
To convert PPK private keys to another format, you need PuTTY or other Developer software.
To convert other file formats to the "Private Key File" file type, you need software like PuTTY or a similar tool.
The .PPK file extension is primarily a PuTTY Private Key file. PuTTY is a widely used SSH and Telnet client for Windows. These files store both the public and private cryptographic keys required for secure, passwordless authentication to remote servers.
The main disadvantage of the .PPK format is that it is strictly proprietary to the PuTTY ecosystem. Standard operating systems like Linux and macOS, as well as cloud infrastructure providers like AWS, rely on standard OpenSSH key formats, commonly saved as PEM files. If you generate a standard key on a Linux server, PuTTY cannot read it directly. Conversely, standard OpenSSH clients reject .PPK files. This fragmentation forces developers to constantly convert keys.
To resolve compatibility issues, you must usually convert .PPK files to PEM to authenticate via standard terminal tools, or convert PEM to .PPK to use Windows GUI clients like WinSCP or FileZilla.
This file format is difficult to handle online because cryptographic keys require exact mathematical formatting, and standard converters often corrupt the key structure. Additionally, some .PPK files are completely unrelated - they can be ZIP-compressed resource packages for games or XML data files for Polish employee pension plans. We will inspect the headers locally and show you its internal text or XML structure. If our analysis detects a supported underlying or embedded format, viewing or conversion may still be possible.
Convert.Guru analyzes your PPK file, detects the exact format, and lets you read the text inside.
Users also converted ID_RSA, PEM, PPTX, PEPK, PKK, PVK, SSH, KEY, PUB, TXT, JPG, PKPASS and PDF files.
If you want to convert PPK file to PEM, KEY, PPM, TMP, TEMP, CACHE, LOG, BAK, OLD, NEW, PART or DOWNLOAD, you can use PuTTY or similar software from the "SSH Authentication Private Key" category. In the File menu, look for Save As… or Export….
To convert DEVICE, CACHE, SOCK, SYMLINK, PID, MOUNT, FIFO, LOG, PIPE, TMP, JUNCTION or TEMP files to PPK, try PuTTY or another comparable tool in the "SSH Authentication Private Key" category.
The history of Convert.Guru began over 25 years ago in California with Tom Simondi’s file-format database. A former contributor to Space Shuttle development and a software pioneer of the 1980s, Simondi established a trusted resource for file type analysis that was even referenced by Microsoft Windows XP. Today, we use modern technology to process and convert thousands of file formats while continually improving our PPK converter.