Comparison of file archivers

This is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by adding missing items with reliable sources.

The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of file archivers. Please see the individual products' articles for further information. They are neither all-inclusive nor are some entries necessarily up to date. Unless otherwise specified in the footnotes section, comparisons are based on the stable versions—without add-ons, extensions or external programs.

Archivers

Note: Archivers names in purple are no longer in development.

General information

Basic general information about the archivers: creator/company, license/price etc.

File archivers	Creator(s)	First public release date	Latest stable version	Cost (USD)	Software license
7-Zip	Igor Pavlov	January 2, 1999 (1999-01-02)	19.00 February 21, 2019 (2019-02-21)	Free	LGPL (RAR plugin is proprietary)
ALZip	ESTsoft	1999 (1999) (as a WinZip translation)	Template:Latest stable software release/ALZip	A free general serial number was published on developer's website altools.com in August 2012	Proprietary
ALZip for Mac	ESTsoft	1999 (1999) (as a WinZip translation)	Template:Latest stable software release/ALZip for Mac	A free general serial number was published on developer's website altools.com in August 2012	Proprietary
Archive Manager	Paolo Bacchilega	May 12, 2001 (2001-05-12)	3.36.2 May 4, 2020 (2020-05-04)	Free	GPL
Archive Utility	Apple Inc.	October 24, 2003 (2003-10-24)	Template:Latest stable software release/Archive Utility	Included with Mac OS X Core Services	Proprietary
Ark	KDE team	1997	19.4.3 July 9, 2019 (2019-07-09)	Free	GPL
B1 Free Archiver	Adam Buyer	August 2011 (2011-08)	1.5.86 November 25, 2013 (2013-11-25)	Free	Proprietary
BetterZip	MacItBetter	May 2006 (2006-05)	Template:Latest stable software release/BetterZip	$29.95 USD	Proprietary
Commander One	Eltima Software	August 4, 2015 (2015-08-04)	1.1 September 29, 2015 (2015-09-29)	Standard Free; $29.95 Pro Pack	Proprietary
Compressed Folders	Microsoft Inc.	June 25, 1998 (1998-06-25)	Windows 8.1 August 27, 2013 (2013-08-27)	Included in Microsoft Windows Windows Explorer shell since Windows Me.	Proprietary
CRAX Commander	Soft4U2	September 1, 2013 (2013-09-01)	1.10.9 March 2, 2016 (2016-03-02)	$19.99 USD	Proprietary
Disk ARchiver	Denis Corbin	2002 (2002)	2.5.14 December 20, 2017 (2017-12-20)	Free	GPL
Expander	Haiku, Inc.	2002 (2002)	Template:Latest preview software release/Haiku (operating system)	Free	MIT
Filzip	Philipp Engel	Un­known	Template:Latest stable software release/Filzip	Free	Proprietary
FreeArc	Bulat Ziganshin	November 1, 2007 (2007-11-01) v0.36	0.666 (May 20, 2010 (2010-05-20))	Free	GPL
iArchiver	Dare to be Creative Ltd.	October 21, 2007 (2007-10-21)	1.4.1 October 30, 2008 (2008-10-30)	$26	Proprietary
Info-ZIP (Wzip)	Samuel Smith	March 1989 (1989-03)	6.0 April 29, 2009 (2009-04-29)	Free	BSD-like
KGB Archiver	Tomasz Pawlak	April 1, 2006 (2006-04-01)	1.2.1.24 November 1, 2006 (2006-11-01)	Free	GPL
PeaZip	Giorgio Tani	September 16, 2006 (2006-09-16)	7.7.0 January 8, 2021 (2021-01-08)	Free	LGPL
PKZIP	Phil Katz	1989 (1989)	12.4 (ca. September 2009 (2009-09))	$29.00	Proprietary
PowerArchiver	ConexWare	March 1999 (1999-03)	17.01.04 October 5, 2017 (2017-10-05)	$22.95	Proprietary
StuffIt	Smith Micro Software	1987 (1987)	15.0.7 December 1, 2011 (2011-12-01)	Free expander; $49.99 Deluxe, $79.99 French Deluxe; Windows: $14.99 Standard, $29.99 Deluxe, $49.99 French (or German) Deluxe	Proprietary
TAR	AT&T	1979 (1979)	GNU tar: Template:Latest stable software release/Tar; star: 1.5.3; BSD tar: 2.6.0	Free	Various
The Unarchiver	Circlesoft	July 1, 2006 (2006-07-01)	3.11.3 September 16, 2017 (2017-09-16)	Free	Proprietary
Terse	IBM	July 1, 1984 (1984-07-01)		Free	Proprietary
TUGZip	Christian Kindahl	August 18, 2002 (2002-08-18)	3.5.0.0 April 2, 2008 (2008-04-02)	Free	Proprietary
WinAce	e-merge GmbH	Un­known	2.69 November 23, 2007 (2007-11-23)	Free expander (GNU/Linux & Mac only); $29.00 Standard; $39.00 Plus	Proprietary
WinRAR	Eugene Roshal / Alexander Roshal	1993 (1993)	Template:Latest stable software release/WinRAR	Free expander; $29	Proprietary
WinZip	WinZip Computing, Inc	1991 (1991)	Template:Latest stable software release/WinZip	$29.95 Standard; $49.95 Pro	Proprietary
XAD a.k.a. XADMaster.library	Dirk Stoecker	1998 (1998)	13.1	Shareware, Free for non commercial use	Proprietary
Xarchiver	Giuseppe Torelli	Un­known	0.5.4 September 14, 2014 (2014-09-14)	Free	GPL
ZipGenius	Matteo Riso of M.Dev Software	May 2003 (2003-05)	6.3.2.3112 August 8, 2014 (2014-08-08)	Free	Proprietary
ZPAQ	Matt Mahoney	March 2009 (2009-03)	7.15 August 17, 2016 (2016-08-17)	Free	Mixed public domain and MIT

Operating system support

The operating systems the archivers can run on without emulation or compatibility layer. Linux Ubuntu's own GUI Archive manager, for example, can open and create many archive formats (including Rar archives) even to the extent of splitting into parts and encryption and ability to be read by the native program. This is presumably a "compatibility layer."

File archivers	Windows	DOS	Mac OS X	Linux	BSD	Other Unix	AmigaOS	Android	Windows Mobile	Windows Phone
7-Zip	Yes[1]	Command-line interface[2]	Yes[2]	Command-line interface[2]	Command-line interface[2]	Command-line interface[2]	Command-line interface	No	Yes	No
ALZip	Yes	Command-line interface	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
ALZip for Mac	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Archive Manager	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No
Archive Utility	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Ark	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No
B1 Free Archiver	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No
BetterZip	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
bsdtar/libarchive	Yes, bundled[9]	No	Yes, bundled	Yes	Yes, bundled	Yes	Partial	Un­known	Un­known	No
Commander One	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
CRAX Commander	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Disk ARchiver	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No
Filzip	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
FreeArc	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No
GNU tar	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
iArchiver	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	?
Info-ZIP	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[9]	Yes	No	Yes[8]	No
KGB Archiver	Yes[7]	Partial	Command-line interface	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Un­known	?
PeaZip	Yes[1]	Un­known	Under Development	Yes	Yes	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	?
PKZIP	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	?
PowerArchiver	Yes	Un­known	Command-line interface	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	?
Star	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	?
StuffIt	Yes	Un­known	Yes	X86 only, older version (5.2.0?)	No	older version (5.2.0?)	No	Un­known	Un­known	?
The Unarchiver	Command-line interface	No	Yes	Command-line interface	No	No	No	Un­known	No	?
TUGZip	Yes	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	?
WinAce	Yes	Command-line interface[5]	Command-line interface expander only[5]	X86, Command-line interface expander only[5]	No	No	Command-line interface expander only	Un­known	Un­known	?
WinRAR and RAR	Yes[1]	Yes	Command-line interface[6]	X86 and x86-64, Command-line interface[6]	Command-line interface[6]	Command-line interface[6]	Command-line interface expander only	Yes	Yes	?
WinZip	Yes[1]	Command-line interface	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known	?
XAD	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	?
Xarchiver	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	?
ZipGenius	Yes	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	?
ZPAQ	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	?
	Windows	DOS	Mac OS X	Linux	BSD	Unix	AmigaOS	Android	Windows Mobile	Windows Phone

Notes:

1. ^ A separate 64-bit Windows x64 Edition version is also available.
2. ^ The Unix-like system port is known as p7zip. p7zip also is provided by FreeDOS.
3. ^ A Windows Mobile release (version 9.05-alpha onward) is available.
4. ^ The programs for other platforms are called Unace, do not have the same GUI, and can only perform decompression.
5. ^ WinRAR is for Windows, RAR for other platforms.
6. ^ This program also has a POSIX version available.
7. ^ General Windows CE version.
8. ^ Also Acorn RISC OS, Atari, MVS, OS/2, VM/CMS, VMS and others.
9. ^ Bundled with Windows 10 since insider build 17063

Archiver features

Information about what common archiver features are implemented natively (without third-party add-ons).

File archivers	Data compression	Shell integration	Password protection	Multiple volumes	Self extraction	File repairing	Batch conversion	Unicode file / directory names[5]	Encryption	Filename Encryption
7-Zip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
ALZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[8]	No	Un­known	Un­known
Archive Manager	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Archive Utility	Yes	Yes	No	Un­known	No	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Un­known
ARJ	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known
Ark	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
B1 Free Archiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
BetterZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
bsdtar/libarchive	non-tar formats[2]	Yes	zip	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	7z, zip, rar	7z, zip, rar
Commander One	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes for 7z
CRAX Commander	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	No
Disk ARchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Filzip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known
FreeArc	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
GNU tar	No[2]	Yes	No	Yes	No	Separate	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Un­known
iArchiver	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Un­known	Un­known
Info-ZIP	Yes	No[11]	Yes	Yes[12]	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[12]	ZipCrypto (weak) and AES[12]	No
KGB Archiver	Yes	Not enabled by default	Yes	Un­known	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known
PeaZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[9]	Yes[10]	Yes
PKZIP	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Separate	Separate	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known
PowerArchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[7]	Yes	Yes	Yes
StuffIt	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known
The Unarchiver	No[1]	some formats	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[1]	Yes	Un­known
TUGZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Un­known
WinAce	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Un­known
WinRAR and RAR	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[3]	Yes	Yes[6]	Yes	Yes
WinZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[10]	Yes	Yes	Yes
XAD	No[1]	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known
Xarchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known
ZipGenius	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Un­known	Yes	No	Un­known	Un­known
ZPAQ	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	No	Un­known	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Un­known
	Data compression	Shell integration	Password protection	Multiple volumes	Self extraction	File repairing	Batch conversion	Unicode file / directory names[5]	Encryption	Filename Encryption

Notes:

1. ^ Application is only for decompression.
2. ^ Traditionally, tar, cpio, or pax calls the external programs gzip and bzip2 to perform compression; these external programs usually come with systems that contain the archiver. This is the case for GNU tar. BSD tar uses its own implementation, since it also has to deal with archive formats that do their own compression.
3. ^ Allows adding a variable amount of redundancy for much better error recovery. See also RAR (file format).
4. ^ Extracting/adding file and/or directory names into archive in either UTF-7, UTF-8 or UTF-16/UCS-2 encoding to support single file/directory name which contains characters from different languages. More recent versions of the zip file format have support for Unicode filenames.
5. ^ In WinRAR 3.60, when opening 7-Zip archives which contains Unicode file/directory names, they will not be displayed correctly. There will be no problem extracting them, however.
6. ^ Does support Unicode names, but not under the default (initial) option settings: the user must tick "Use OEM conversion for filenames" under "General" on the "Miscellaneous" tab in the Configuration dialog to enable Unicode name support. Full support for Unicode files names by default is supported only for 7-Zip and RAR archive formats.
7. ^ Commandline batch compression is available only for ZIP and ALZ formats.
8. ^ UTF-8 file/path-names support was completed in release 3.0.1 on Unix systems, and in release 5.8.0 on Windows systems. GUI UTF-8 support for full internationalization of the application was completed in release 2.2.0. Optionally, extended characters can be set to be replaced by jolly "?" character for exporting scripts to legacy systems; scripts creation screen informs if commands are ANSI-safe, OEM-codepage-safe (on Windows), or requires UTF-8 compliant environment to run (system, command interpreter, etc).
9. ^ Commandline batch compression and expansion requires free add-on software downloaded from the WinZip website.^[1]
10. ^ Peazip supports file encryption and file name encryption, although only in certain types of archives, including its own Pea format, 7-zip, zip and Arc.
11. ^ Many shells have built-in zip file support. Windows Explorer has "Send To"->"ZIP-compressed folder".
12. ^ Unicode and volumes since version 3.0 (2008). AES since 3.1 (in beta).

Archive format support

Reading

Information about what archive formats the archivers can read. External links lead to information about support in future versions of the archiver or extensions that provide such functionality. Note that gzip, bzip2 and xz are rather compression formats 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	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No[1]	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No
ALZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
TAR	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Archive Utility	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No[7]	No
Ark	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
B1 Free Archiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No[11]	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
BetterZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No
bsdtar/libarchive	Yes	Yes	Yes[10]	Yes[10]	Yes	Yes[10]	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No
cpio	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Commander One	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
CRAX Commander	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	No
Disk ARchiver	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Filzip	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
FreeArc	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	No[1]	No	No	Yes	No	No	No[12]	Yes	No	Yes	No
GNU tar[2]	No[2]	Yes	Yes[2]	Yes[2]	No[3]	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
iArchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No
Info-ZIP	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
KGB Archiver	Yes	No	No	No	No	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No
PeaZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
PKZIP	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
PowerArchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Star[2]	No[2]	Yes	Yes[2]	Yes[2]	Yes[2]	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
StuffIt	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
The Unarchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Partial	Yes	Partial[11]	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
TUGZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No
WinAce	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	No
WinRAR	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No
WinZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes[4]	Yes	No	No	No	Yes[5]	No	No	Yes[5]	Yes	No	Yes	No
XAD	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Un­known	Yes	Yes	Partial	Yes	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Xarchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No
ZipGenius	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	Yes	Yes[10]	Yes	No	No	Yes[10]	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No
	ZIP	TAR	GZ	BZ/BZ2	7z	xz	RAR	LHA/LZH	ACE	SIT	SITX	ARJ	KGB	DAR	ARC	CAB	ALZ	ISO/CD Image	ZPAQ

Notes:

1. ^ Used to, but no longer does, due to technical and legal issues.
2. ^ Tar implementations call external programs (like compress, gzip or bzip2 or any other programs working with abstract streams and supporting the "-d" option) to perform (de)compression, and allowing you to implement your own filters^[2]. These external programs may be shipped with your Operating System.
3. ^ GNU tar lets you implement your own filters [3], allowing you to use other compression programs (p7zip, ...) and filters (GPG, ...).
4. ^ Starting from version 11.
5. ^ Requires external program. More info
6. ^ Archive Utility itself is unable to open ISO files, but Disk Utility, which also comes with Mac OS X, is able to mount them as virtual disks.
7. ^ Requires external program.[4]
8. ^ Only partial support for reading proprietary SITX format. [5]
9. ^ FreeARC uses .arc as its filename extension, but this format is not the same as the traditional ARC file.
10. ^ Supports these formats as compression stream of other archive formats like tar.bz2 or iso.xz but does not support the format as an archive itself, as they are not archive formats. See the above explanation for tar.
11. ^ B1 Free Archiver for Android and B1 Online Archiver support ARJ format.

Writing

Information about what archive formats the archivers^[5] can write and create. External links lead to information about support in future versions of the archiver or extensions that provide such functionality. Note that gzip, bzip2 and xz are rather compression formats than archive formats.

File archivers	ZIP	TAR	Gzip/Deflate ZIPx	Bzip2/BZ2 ZIPx	7z	XZ ZIPx	RAR	LHA/LZH	ACE	StuffIt	StuffIt X	ARJ	KGB	DAR	ARC	CAB	ALZ	ISO/CD Image	ZPAQ	Special
7-Zip	Yes	Yes	Yes[14]	Yes[14]	Yes	Yes[14]	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
ALZip[6]	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Un­known	No
Archive Manager	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No[12]	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	No	No
Archive Utility	Yes	No	No	No	No	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Ark	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No[10]	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
B1 Free Archiver	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
BetterZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
bsdtar/libarchive	Yes	Yes	Yes[15]	Yes[15]	Yes	Yes[15]	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No
Commander One	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
CRAX Commander	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No
Disk ARchiver	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Filzip	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Un­known	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	No
FreeArc	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No
GNU tar	No	Yes	Yes[1]	Yes[1]	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
iArchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Info-ZIP	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
KGB Archiver	Yes	No	No	No	No	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	No
PeaZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	Yes
PKZIP	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Un­known	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	No
PowerArchiver 2018	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes[17]	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	.bh (BlakHole) by ZipTV
Star	No	Yes	Yes[1]	Yes[1]	Yes[1]	Yes[1]	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
StuffIt[4]	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Un­known	No[9]	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	No
TUGZip	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	No[2]	Yes	No[4]	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	Un­known	No
WinAce	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Un­known	No	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Un­known	Yes	Un­known	Yes	No
WinRAR	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
WinZip	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No[3]	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	ZIPx
Xarchiver	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Un­known	No[11]	Yes	No	Un­known	Un­known	Yes	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	Un­known	No
ZipGenius	Yes	Yes[7]	Yes[7]	Yes[7]	Yes	Un­known	No	Yes[8]	No	No	No	No	No	No	Un­known	Yes[7]	No	No	No
	ZIP	TAR	Gzip/Deflate ZIPx	Bzip2/BZ2 ZIPx	7z	XZ ZIPx	RAR	LHA/LZH	ACE	SIT	SITX	ARJ	KGB	DAR	ARC	CAB	ALZ	ISO/CD Image	ZPAQ	Special

Notes:

1. ^ Tar implementations call the external programs gzip and bzip2, 7z, xz, ... to perform compression; these external programs usually come with systems that contain tar.
2. ^ Requires rar.exe from WinRAR.
3. ^ Requires external program(if you are using WinZip 11.1 or earlier). More info
4. ^ Requires Ace32.exe from WinAce.
5. ^ The Extractor and XAD are not included in this list because they only expand archives.
6. ^ ALZip can also write to the following formats: BH, JAR, and LZH
7. ^ Updating archives is not supported.[6]
8. ^ Requires external program.[7]
9. ^ Stuffit supported file formats [8]
10. ^ Ark is a front-end only and requires appropriate command-line programs be installed. Programs like bzip2, gzip, tar, zip usually come with systems that contain Ark; writing in .rar format requires a commercial program. [9]
11. ^ Xarchiver is a front-end only and requires appropriate command-line programs be installed. Programs like bzip2, gzip, tar, zip usually come with systems that contain Xarchiver; writing in .rar format requires a commercial program. [10][11]
12. ^ Archive Manager is a front-end only and requires appropriate command-line programs be installed. Programs like bzip2, gzip, tar, zip usually come with systems that contain Archive Manager. writing in .rar format requires a commercial program.[12]
13. ^ If there are more than one, files must be grouped in a .tar before being compressed.
14. ^ supports the formats as stream compression of other archive format and can create compressed format like tar.bz2 or iso.xz but cannot create an archive in these formats
15. ^ it is possible to open war and jar files to extract e add/replace file; files war and jar are still valid after that
16. ^ it require console rar.exe, and the path to it -- specified in Options . it can be taken from WinRAR software . PowerArchiever also doesn't support separate definition of the Dictionary Size and Compression Method .

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

Further reading

• Maximum Compression 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