Overview
7-Zip does one job with no ceremony attached. It compresses better than the alternatives on its own format, it opens practically every archive anyone will send you, it adds a handful of entries to the right click menu, and it takes up less disk space than a single photograph. There is no updater nagging, no bundled toolbar and no account.
Compression on the 7z format is the reason it earned its position. The dictionary size goes up to a gigabyte, solid archiving compresses many small files as one continuous stream, and multi-threading uses every core. On a folder of source code or documents the difference against a standard zip is not marginal, files routinely come out at half the size or better.
Reading support is the other half. 7z, zip, rar, tar, gzip, bzip2, xz, iso, cab, wim, dmg, msi, deb, rpm and a long tail of others open in the same window. Split archives reassemble automatically, archives can be tested for integrity without extracting, and an archive can be created as a self extracting executable for a recipient who has nothing installed. Encryption is available on the 7z and zip formats with filename hiding, though nothing posted here uses it.
What it does well
Strong compression
Dictionary sizes up to a gigabyte, solid mode, multi-threaded compression and per-format tuning that consistently beats the standard zip tools.
Opens almost anything
Reads 7z, zip, rar, tar, gzip, bzip2, xz, iso, cab, wim, dmg, msi, deb, rpm and a long list of less common formats.
Shell integration
Context menu entries for extract here, extract to folder, add to archive and test, with configurable entries and cascading submenus.
Split and self extracting
Split archives across volumes of any size, and build self extracting executables for recipients with no archiver installed.
Command line included
A full command line binary for scripting backups and batch compression, with the same engine as the graphical shell.
Changes in this build
- Improved compression ratio on the 7z format for large mixed content sets.
- Faster extraction on multi-core machines through better thread scheduling.
- Support added for further archive variants encountered in the wild.
- File manager gained a proper dark theme.
- Fixed handling of archives with very long path names on deep folder structures.
What is in the package
- 7-Zip installer, 32-bit, 64-bit and ARM64
- Shell integration module
- Command line binary
- Self extracting archive stubs
- Multilingual interface files, 87 languages
System requirements
| Processor | Any x86, x64 or ARM64 processor |
| Memory | 256 MB, more for very large dictionary sizes |
| Graphics | Not applicable |
| Storage | 10 MB free plus room for the archives themselves |
| Display | 1024 x 768 minimum |
| System | Windows 7 through Windows 11 |
Installation
- Extract the package and remove any older archiver you no longer want handling files.
- Run the installer matching your architecture.
- Open the options panel and tick the file types you want associated.
- Configure the context menu entries, the default set is longer than most people need.
- Set the default compression level and dictionary size for your usual work.
Before you start
Large dictionary sizes need a lot of memory to compress and roughly a tenth of that to extract.
Solid archives compress better but a single damaged block can affect everything after it.
Associating every archive type is optional, it coexists fine with another archiver holding some of them.
Questions about this title
Does it open rar files?
Yes, it reads them. It does not create them, that format is not open for writing.
Is there a command line version?
Yes, and it uses the same compression engine as the graphical application.
Can I send an archive to someone without an archiver?
Yes, build it as a self extracting executable.
Which format should I use?
7z for the best ratio, zip when the recipient's tooling is unknown.
About this listing
This entry was checked on a clean install of Windows 7 / 8 / 10 / 11 (32-bit, 64-bit and ARM64) before it was published, and it is rechecked whenever the package is rebuilt. The figures on this page come from the site index rather than from the publisher, so the download count is what people here have actually pulled.
If a mirror stops answering, use the contact form and it gets replaced. Reports about a specific title are handled faster than general messages because they name the file, the mirror and the point at which the transfer stopped.
Requests for a different version, a different language build or an older release go on the requests page. Older versions of a title are usually still held even when only the current one is listed.