A ZIP around a score
MXL is the compressed form of MusicXML: a ZIP archive holding the notation document plus a META-INF/container.xml manifest that names it. Notation programs write it because it is a fraction of the size on disk.
Browser tool
MXL to MusicXML converter, online and local to your browser.
Drop a compressed .mxl score in and take away the plain .musicxml document inside it. The container is unpacked by this page, so your file never leaves your browser.
Step 1
Drop an .mxl file here, or pick one.
The container is unpacked by your own browser. Nothing is sent to a server, and your file never leaves your machine.
About the format
What an .mxl file actually is, and why you might want the XML.
Plain XML is what tools read
Diff tools, scripts, validators, text editors, and version control all work on the uncompressed document. Extracting the score is the step that makes a container inspectable and editable.
Nothing is transmitted
The decompression happens in the page with the browser's own APIs. No account, no queue, no server round trip — which also means an unpublished arrangement stays on your machine.
Questions
MXL conversion questions.
These answers match the structured data search engines receive for this page.
Do I need to install any software?
No. The converter runs entirely in this page. Any current browser with the built-in decompression API can unpack an .mxl container without additional software.
Is my file uploaded?
No. The .mxl is read and decompressed locally in your browser, so the score never leaves your machine and no copy reaches a server.
What is the difference between .mxl and .musicxml?
An .mxl file is a ZIP container holding the same notation as a .musicxml document, plus a META-INF/container.xml manifest naming the score inside it. Unpacking the container gives you the plain XML text.
Which file does the converter pull out of the container?
It reads META-INF/container.xml and extracts the score named there. When a container carries no manifest, the first MusicXML document at the root of the archive is used instead.
Working from paper instead?