For example, you may want to encrypt your tax returns or other financial documents before storing them somewhere.

This makes for an easy method of quickly and securely encrypting your files, too. When compressing to a ZIP or 7z file, 7-Zip allows you to set a password that encrypts the file with secure AES-256 encryption. RELATED: How to Create Encrypted Zip or 7z Archives on Any Operating System However, it also integrates with File Explorer or Windows Explorer, allowing you to easily right-click files and use the 7-Zip menu to extract or compress them in various ways. And, when you encounter an archive file online, 7-Zip can probably open it.ħ-Zip includes its own file manager, which you can use to navigate your file system and extract files. This program’s own 7z format offered the highest compression in our benchmarks, but gives you the freedom of choosing the 7z format for maximum compression or creating ZIP archives for maximum compatibility. RELATED: Benchmarked: What's the Best File Compression Format? That’s probably more formats than you’ll need. It can also extract (but not create) AR, ARJ, CAB, CHM, CPIO, CramFS, DMG, EXT, FAT, GPT, HFS, IHEX, ISO, LZH, LZMA, MBR, MSI, NSIS, NTFS, QCOW2, RAR, RPM, SquashFS, UDF, UEFI, VDI, VHD, VMDK, WIM, XAR and Z files. 7-Zip can create and extract 7z, XZ, BZIP2, GZIP, TAR, ZIP, and WIM files. It works on all modern versions of Windows, from Windows XP through Windows 10.ħ-Zip supports a variety of different archive types. Instead, it’s just a completely free to use, open-source application that does its job without complaints. It doesn’t have a big marketing department behind it, so you won’t see advertisements for 7-Zip online. We recommend the open-source 7-Zip tool instead.ħ-Zip isn’t the shinest, most modern looking application. WinZip costs a minimum of $30, while WinRAR costs $29. These tools are commercial software applications that nag you to spend money rather than just doing their job and getting out of the way.

WinZip and WinRAR may be household names, but we recommend against using them.

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