Archiving and Compression
| File extension(s) | MIME type | Official name | Creation platform | Restoration platform | Restoring with free software | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| .7z | application/x-7z-compressed | 7z | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | Open source file format. Used by 7-Zip. |
| .s7z | application/x-7z-compressed | 7zX | Mac OS X | Mac OS X, restoration on different platforms is possible although not immediate | Yes | Based on 7z. Preserves Spotlight metadata, resource forks, owner/group information, dates and other data which would be otherwise lost with compression.
Made obsolete by the introduction of AppleDouble-encoded 7z archives (Macintosh only). |
| .ace | application/x-ace-compressed | ACE | Windows | UNIX-like | Old archive versions only | Proprietary format |
| .afa | application/x-astrotite-afa | AFA | UNIX-like | UNIX-like | No | A format that compresses and doubly encrypt the data (AES256 and CAS256) avoiding brute force attacks, also hide files in an AFA file. It has two ways to safeguard data integrity and subsequent repair of the file if has an error (repair with AstroA2P (online) or Astrotite (offline)). |
| .alz | application/x-alz-compressed | ALZip | Windows | Multiple | Yes | A mainly Korean format designed for very large archives. |
| .apk | application/vnd.android.package-archive | APK | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | Android application package (variant of JAR file format). |
| .arc | ARC | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | ||
| .arj | application/x-arj | ARJ | Originally DOS, now multiple | Multiple | Yes | |
| .ba | Scifer | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | Binary Archive with external header | |
| .bh | BlakHole | No | Proprietary format from the ZipTV Compression Components | |||
| .cab | application/vnd.ms-cab-compressed | Cabinet | Windows | Multiple | Yes | The Microsoft Windows native archive format, which is also used by many commercial installers such as InstallShield and WISE. |
| .cfs | application/x-cfs-compressed | Compact File Set | Windows, Unix-like, Mac OS X | Multiple | Yes | Open source file format. |
| .cpt | Compact Pro | Mac OS | Multiple | Yes | Compact Pro archive, a common archiver used on Mac platforms until about Mac OS 7.5.x. Competed with StuffIt; now obsolete. | |
| .dar | application/x-dar | Disk Archiver | Windows, Unix-like, Mac OS X | Windows, Unix-like, Mac OS X | Yes | Open source file format. Files are compressed individually with either gzip, bzip2 or lzo. |
| .dd | DiskDoubler | Mac OS | obsolete | |||
| .dgc | application/x-dgc-compressed | DGCA | Windows | Windows | ||
| .dmg | application/x-apple-diskimage | Apple Disk Image | Mac OS X | Mac OS X, Windows, Linux | Yes | Supports "Internet-enabled" disk images, which, once downloaded, are automatically decompressed, mounted, have the contents extracted, and thrown away. Currently, Safari is the only browser that supports this form of extraction; however, the images can be manually extracted as well. This format can also be password-protected or encrypted with 128-bit or 256-bit AES encryption. |
| .gca | application/x-gca-compressed | GCA | The predecessor of DGCA. | |||
| .ha | Originally DOS | Originally DOS | Yes, but may be covered by patents | DOS era format; uses arithmetic/Markov coding | ||
| .hki | WinHKI | MS Windows | MS Windows | No | HKI | |
| .ice | ICE | Windows | Windows | Yes | Produced by ICEOWS program. Excels at text file compression. | |
| .j | Jar | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | Jar archive, the successor to ARJ | |
| .kgb | KGB Archiver | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | Open sourced archiver with compression using the PAQ family of algorithms and optional encryption. | |
| .lzh, .lha | application/x-lzh | LHA | Originally DOS, now multiple | Multiple | Yes | The standard format on Amiga. |
| .lzx | application/x-lzx | LZX | Amiga | Archiver originally used on The Amiga. Now copied by Microsoft to use in their .cab and .chm files. | ||
| .pak | PAK | file format from NoGate Consultings, a rival from ARC-Compressor. | ||||
| .partimg | PartImage | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | A disk image archive format that supports several compression methods as well as splitting the archive into smaller pieces. | |
| .paq6, .paq7, .paq8 and variants | PAQ | Unix-like and Windows | Unix-like and Windows | Yes | An experimental open source packager (http://mattmahoney.net/dc) | |
| .pea | PeaZip | Linux and Windows | Linux and Windows | Yes | Open source archiver supporting authenticated encryption, volume spanning, customizable object level and volume level integrity checks (form CRCs to SHA-512 and Whirlpool hashes), fast deflate based compression | |
| .pim | PIM | Windows | Windows | Yes | The format from the PIM - a freeware compression tool by Ilia Muraviev. It uses an LZP-based compression algorithm with set of filters for executable, image and audio files. | |
| .pit | PackIt | Mac OS | obsolete | |||
| .qda | Quadruple D | Windows | Windows | Used for data in games written using the Quadruple D library for Delphi. Uses byte pair compression. | ||
| .rar | application/x-rar-compressed | RAR | Originally DOS, now multiple | Multiple | Yes | A proprietary archive format, second in popularity to .zip files. |
| .rk | RK and WinRK | Multiple | Multiple | No | The format from a commercial archiving package. Odd among commercial packages in that they focus on incorporating experimental algorithms with the highest possible compression (at the expense of speed and memory), such as PAQ, PPMD and PPMZ (PPMD with unlimited-length strings), as well as a proprietary algorithms. | |
| .sda | Self Dissolving ARChive | Commodore 64, Commodore 128 | Commodore 64, Commodore 128 | N/A | SDAs refer to Self Dissolving ARC files, and are based on the Commodore 64 and Commodore 128 versions of ARC, originally written by Chris Smeets. While the files share the same extension, they are not compatible between platforms. That is, an SDA created on a Commodore 64 but run on a Commodore 128 in Commodore 128 mode will crash the machine, and vice-versa. The intended successor to SDA is SFX. | |
| .sea | Self Extracting Archive | Mac OS | Mac OS (implicitly) | A pre-Mac OS X Self-Extracting Archive format. StuffIt, Compact Pro, Disk Doubler and others could create .sea files, though the StuffIt versions were the most common. | ||
| .sen | Scifer | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | Scifer Archive with internal header | |
| .sfx | Self Extracting Archive | Commodore 64, Commodore 128 | Commodore 64, Commodore 128 | N/A | SFX is a Self Extracting Archive which uses the LHArc compression algorithm. It was originally developed by Chris Smeets on the Commodore platform, and runs primarily using the CS-DOS extension for the Commodore 128. Unlike its predecessor SDA, SFX files will run on both the Commodore 64 and Commodore 128 regardless of which machine they were created on. | |
| .sit | application/x-stuffit | StuffIt | Originally Mac OS, now multiple | Originally Mac OS, now multiple | Yes | A compression format common on Apple Macintosh computers. Can be extracted with nulib command tool. The free StuffIt Expander is available for Windows and OS X. |
| .sitx | application/x-stuffitx | StuffIt X | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | The replacement for the .sit format that supports more compression methods, UNIX file permissions, long file names, very large files, more encryption options, data specific compressors (JPEG, Zip, PDF, 24-bit image, MP3). The free StuffIt Expander is available for Windows and OS X. |
| .sqx | SQX | Windows | Windows | A royalty-free compressing format | ||
| .tar.gz, .tgz, .tar.Z, .tar.bz2, .tbz2, .tar.lzma, .tlz |
application/x-gtar | tar with gzip, compress, bzip2, or lzma | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | The "tarball" format combines tar archives with a file-based compression scheme (usually gzip). Commonly used for source and binary distribution on Unix-like platforms, widely available elsewhere. |
| .uc .uc0 .uc2 .ucn .ur2 .ue2 | UltraCompressor II | DOS | DOS | UltraCompressor 2.3 was developed to act as an alternative to the then popular PKZIP application. The main feature of the application is its ability to create large archives. This means that compressed archives with the UC2 file extension can hold almost 1 million files. | ||
| .uca | PerfectCompress | Windows | Windows | No | Based on PAQ, RZM, CSC, CCM, and 7zip. The format consists of a PAQ, RZM, CSC, or CCM compressed file and an manifest with compression settings stored in a 7z archive. | |
| .uha | UHarc | DOS/Windows | DOS/Windows | Yes | A high compression rate archive format originally for DOS. | |
| .wim | Windows Image | Windows | Windows | Yes | File-based disk image format developed to deploy Microsoft Windows. | |
| .xar | XAR | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | ||
| .xp3 | KiriKiri | Windows | Windows | Yes | Native format of the Open Source KiriKiri Visual Novel engine. Uses combination of block splitting and zlib compression. The filenames and pathes are stored in UTF-16 format. For integrity check, the Adler-32 hashsum is used. For many commercial games, the files are encrypted (and decoded on runtime) via so-called "cxdec" module, which implements xor-based encryption. | |
| .yz1 | YZ1 | Windows, DOS, Linux | Windows, DOS, Linux | Yes | Yamazaki zipper archive. Compression format used in DeepFreezer archiver utility created by Yamazaki Satoshi. Read and write support exists in TUGZip, IZArc and ZipZag | |
| .zip, .zipx | application/zip | ZIP | Originally DOS, now multiple | Multiple | Yes | The most widely used compression format on Microsoft Windows. Commonly used on Macintosh and Unix systems as well. |
| .zoo | application/x-zoo | zoo | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | |
| .zz | Zzip | Multiple | Multiple | Yes | Archiver with a compression algorithm based on the Burrows-Wheeler transform method. |
Read more about this topic: List Of Archive Formats
Famous quotes containing the word compression:
“The triumphs of peace have been in some proximity to war. Whilst the hand was still familiar with the sword-hilt, whilst the habits of the camp were still visible in the port and complexion of the gentleman, his intellectual power culminated; the compression and tension of these stern conditions is a training for the finest and softest arts, and can rarely be compensated in tranquil times, except by some analogous vigor drawn from occupations as hardy as war.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)