Formats 7-Zip Can Unpack Without Plugins

7-Zip is a popular open-source file archiver known for its high compression ratios and broad format support out of the box. Without installing any third-party add-ons, DLLs, or external plugins, 7-Zip can natively unpack dozens of compressed archive formats, system installation packages, and virtual disk images. This guide details every file format that 7-Zip can decompress and extract natively.

Core Dual-Support Formats (Pack and Unpack)

7-Zip can both create and extract the following formats natively:

  • 7z: 7-Zip's native high-compression format.
  • ZIP: The standard compression format widely used across Windows and macOS.
  • TAR: Tape archive format commonly used in Unix/Linux environments.
  • GZIP (.gz): Standard GNU compression format.
  • BZIP2 (.bz2): Block-sorting data compression format.
  • XZ (.xz): Modern container using LZMA/LZMA2 compression.
  • WIM: Windows Imaging Format used for deployment and recovery images.

Standard Archive Formats (Unpack Only)

7-Zip includes built-in extraction code for numerous standalone archives created by legacy or alternative compression utilities:

  • RAR (.rar): Supports unpacking both RAR4 and RAR5 archives natively.
  • ARJ (.arj): Legacy DOS-era archive format.
  • CAB (.cab): Microsoft Cabinet archive format.
  • LZH / LHA (.lzh, .lha): Traditional algorithmic compression formats originally popular in Japan.
  • Z (.z): Unix compress file format.
  • CPIO (.cpio): General Unix archive format.
  • AR (.a, .ar): Unix archiver format commonly used for static libraries.

Package and Installer Formats (Unpack Only)

7-Zip can inspect and extract files contained within various software installers and package distributions:

  • MSI (.msi, .msp): Microsoft Windows Installer packages and patches.
  • NSIS: Nullsoft Scriptable Install System executable packages.
  • RPM (.rpm): Red Hat Package Manager format used in Linux distributions.
  • DEB (.deb): Debian software package format (handled via nested AR/TAR/GZ extraction).
  • CHM (.chm): Microsoft Compiled HTML Help files.

Disk Images and Filesystem Containers (Unpack Only)

A standout native feature of 7-Zip is its ability to browse and extract contents from filesystem dumps and optical/virtual drive images without mounting them:

  • ISO (.iso): Standard CD/DVD optical disc images.
  • UDF (.udf): Universal Disk Format used on DVDs and Blu-ray discs.
  • DMG (.dmg): Apple disk image files.
  • HFS / HFS+: Apple Macintosh hierarchical file systems.
  • APFS: Apple File System containers.
  • FAT / FAT32 / NTFS: Standard Windows filesystems.
  • EXT / EXT2 / EXT3 / EXT4: Linux filesystem images.
  • VHD / VHDX: Microsoft Virtual Hard Disk formats.
  • VMDK: VMware virtual disk files.
  • VDI: VirtualBox disk image files.
  • QCOW2: QEMU copy-on-write disk images.
  • SquashFS / CramFS: Compressed read-only Linux filesystems.
  • MBR / GPT: Master Boot Record and GUID Partition Table disk layouts.
  • XAR (.xar): Extensible Archive format used in macOS package setups.
  • UEFI / IHEX: BIOS/UEFI firmware images and Intel HEX files.