This article compares several notable file archiver utilities. Unless otherwise noted, comparisons are for full release versions (not prerelease) and for installations without extra aspects such as add-ons, extensions or external programs.
General information Legend:
File archivers Developer Initial release Platform Latest release version Latest release date Status License Cost (USD) 7-Zip Igor Pavlov 1999-01-02 Cross-platform Active ALZip ESTsoft 1999 Cross-platform Active Archive Manager(File Roller) Paolo Bacchilega 2001-05-12 Cross-platform Active Archive Utility Apple 2003-10-24 macOS Active Ark KDE team 1997 Cross-platform Active B1 Free Archiver Adam Buyer 2011-08 Cross-platform (Android), (Linux), (macOS), (Windows) (Android), (Linux), (macOS), (Windows) Inactive BetterZip MacItBetter 2006-05 macOS Active Commander One Eltima Software 2015-08-04 macOS Active Compressed Folders Microsoft 1998-06-25 Windows Windows 8.1 2013-08-27 Active Disk ARchiver Denis Corbin 2002 Cross-platform Active Expander Haiku 2002 Haiku Active Filzip Philipp Engel Windows Inactive FreeArc Bulat Ziganshin 2007-11-01 Cross-platform Inactive iArchiver Dare to be Creative Ltd. 2007-10-21 macOS 1.4.1 2008-10-30 Inactive Info-ZIP(Wzip) Samuel Smith 1989-03 Cross-platform 6.0 2009-04-29 Inactive KGB Archiver Tomasz Pawlak 2006-04-01 Cross-platform Inactive PeaZip Giorgio Tani 2006-04-19 Cross-platform Active PKZIP Phil Katz 1989 Cross-platform 12.4 2009-09 Active PowerArchiver ConexWare 1999-03 macOS (macOS), (Windows) (macOS), (Windows) Active StuffIt Smith Micro Software 1987 Cross-platform 15.0.7 2011-12-01 Inactive TAR AT&T 1979, 1987 (pdtar), 1997 (star) Cross-platform 3.5.2 (BSD tar), (GNU tar), 1.6.0 (star) 2021-08-23 (BSD tar), (GNU tar), 2019-04-15 (star) Active The Unarchiver Circlesoft 2006-07-01 Cross-platform Active Terse IBM 1984-07-01 Active TUGZip Christian Kindahl 2002-08-18 Windows Inactive WinAce e-merge GmbH Windows Inactive WinRAR Eugene RoshalAlexander Roshal 1993 Cross-platform Active WinZip WinZip Computing, Inc 1991 Cross-platform (Android), (iOS), (macOS), (Windows) (Android), (iOS), (macOS), (Windows) Active XAD(XADMaster.library) Dirk Stoecker 1998 Cross-platform 13.1 Inactive Xarchiver Giuseppe Torelli Cross-platform Active ZipGenius Matteo Riso of M.Dev Software 2003-05 Windows Active ZPAQ Matt Mahoney 2009-03 Cross-platform Active File archivers Developer Initial release Platform Latest release version Latest release date Status License Cost (USD)
Notes:
Operating system support The following table identifies the operating systems that archivers can run on directly without emulation or a compatibility layer. File archivers Windows DOS macOS Linux BSD Other Unix AmigaOS Android Windows Mobile Windows Phone 7-Zip ALZip ALZip for Mac Archive Manager Archive Utility Ark B1 Free Archiver BetterZip bsdtar/libarchive , bundled , bundled , bundled Commander One Disk ARchiver Filzip FreeArc GNU tar iArchiver Info-ZIP KGB Archiver PeaZip PKZIP PowerArchiver Star StuffIt The Unarchiver TUGZip WinAce WinRAR and RAR WinZip XAD Xarchiver ZipGenius ZPAQ Windows DOS macOS Linux BSD Unix AmigaOS Android Windows Mobile Windows Phone
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Archiver features The following table indicates which archivers implement various archiver features natively without third-party add-ons.
File archivers Data compression Shellintegration Password protection Multiple volumes Self extraction File repairing Batch conversion Unicode file /directory names Encryption Filename Encryption 7-Zip ALZip Archive Manager Archive Utility ARJ Ark B1 Free Archiver BetterZip bsdtar/libarchive Commander One for 7z Disk ARchiver Filzip FreeArc GNU tar Separate iArchiver Info-ZIP ZipCrypto (weak) and AES KGB Archiver Not enabled by default PeaZip PKZIP Separate Separate PowerArchiver StuffIt The Unarchiver some formats TUGZip WinAce WinRAR and RAR WinZip XAD Xarchiver ZipGenius ZPAQ Data compression Shellintegration Password protection Multiple volumes Self extraction File repairing Batch conversion Unicode file /directory names Encryption Filename Encryption
Notes:
Archive format support Reading The following table identifies the archive formats that each archiver can read. Note that gzip, bzip2 and xz are compression formats rather than archive formats.
File archivers ZIP TAR GZ BZ/BZ2 7z XZ RAR LHA/LZH ACE SIT SITX ARJ KGB DAR ARC CAB ALZ ISO/CD Image ZPAQ 7-Zip ALZip TAR Archive Utility Ark B1 Free Archiver BetterZip bsdtar/libarchive cpio Commander One Disk ARchiver Filzip FreeArc GNU tar iArchiver Info-ZIP KGB Archiver PeaZip PKZIP PowerArchiver Star StuffIt The Unarchiver TUGZip WinAce WinRAR WinZip XAD Xarchiver ZipGenius ZIP TAR GZ BZ/BZ2 7z XZ RAR LHA/LZH ACE SIT SITX ARJ KGB DAR ARC CAB ALZ ISO/CD Image ZPAQ
Notes:
Writing The following table identifies the archive formats that each archiver can write and create. Note that gzip, bzip2 and xz are compression formats rather than archive formats. File archivers ZIP TAR GZ BZ2 7z XZ RAR LHA/LZH ACE SIT SITX ARJ KGB DAR ARC CAB ALZ ISO/CD Image ZPAQ Special 7-Zip ALZip Archive Manager Archive Utility Ark B1 Free Archiver BetterZip bsdtar/libarchive Commander One Disk ARchiver Filzip FreeArc GNU tar iArchiver Info-ZIP KGB Archiver PeaZip PKZIP PowerArchiver.bh (BlakHole) by ZipTV Star StuffIt TUGZip WinAce WinRAR WinZipZIPx Xarchiver ZipGenius ZIP TAR GZ BZ2 7z XZ RAR LHA/LZH ACE SIT SITX ARJ KGB DAR ARC CAB ALZ ISO/CD Image ZPAQ Special
Notes:
Uncommon archive format support PeaZip has full support for Brotli, Zstandard, various LPAQ and PAQ formats, QUAD / BALZ / BCM (highly efficient ROLZ based compressors), FreeArc format, and for its native PEA format.
7-Zip includes read support for .msi, cpio and xar, plus Apple's dmg/HFS disk images and the deb/.rpm package distribution formats; beta versions (9.07 onwards) have full support for the LZMA2-compressed .xz format.
See also Comparison of archive formats Lossless compression benchmarks Comparison of file systems List of archive formats List of file systems
References
Further reading Maximum Compression (last archive of site with test data available), site benchmarking compressors for several filetypes (text, executable, jpeg etc.). Kingsley G. Morse Jr., "Compression Tools Compared", Linux Journal, issue 137, September 2005 Patrick Schmid, Achim Roos, (March 10, 2010) "Four Compression And Archiving Solutions Compared", Tom's Hardware