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EntityQ270131· pop 26· linked from 107 articles

Also known as .7z, 7zip, 7-zip archive, 7z format, 7z archive

7z is a compressed archive file format that supports several different data compression, encryption and pre-processing algorithms. The 7z format initially appeared as implemented by the 7-Zip archiver. The 7-Zip program is publicly available under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License. The LZMA SDK 4.62 was placed in the public domain in December 2008. The latest stable version of 7-Zip and LZMA SDK is version 26.00.

Key facts

File format.name
7z file format
File format.icon
7zip archive icon.svg
File format.extension
.7z
File format.mime
application/x-7z-compressed
File format.uniform type
org.7-zip.7-zip-archive
File format.owner
Igor Pavlov
File format.genre
Data compression
File format.magic
'7', 'z', 0xBC, 0xAF, 0x27, 0x1C
File format.max_size
264 bytes (roughly 18 exabytes)
File format.open
Yes: GNU Lesser General Public License / Public domain

via Wikipedia infobox

~7 min read

Encyclopedic overview

9 sections
Contents
  • Features and enhancements
  • Compression methods
  • Pre-processing filters
  • Encryption
  • Limitations
  • See also
  • References
  • Further reading
  • External links

7z is a compressed archive file format that supports several different data compression, encryption and pre-processing algorithms. The 7z format initially appeared as implemented by the 7-Zip archiver. The 7-Zip program is publicly available under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License. The LZMA SDK 4.62 was placed in the public domain in December 2008. The latest stable version of 7-Zip and LZMA SDK is version 26.00.

The 7z file format specification is distributed with 7-Zip's source code since 2015. The specification can be found in plain text format in the "doc" sub-directory of the source code distribution.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “7z” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.