Archive Explorer
Open ZIP, TAR, TAR.GZ and Zstandard or Brotli archives in the browser, list their contents, extract selected files safely and create new ZIP or TAR archives.
Your inputs and files stay in your browser
Archive
Archive file
ZIP, TAR, TAR.GZ, TGZ, TAR.ZST, TAR.BR, GZ, ZST or BR. It stays on this device.
The archive is read in a Web Worker in 1 MiB blocks and unpacked in WASM. Nothing is uploaded, and names, contents and selections are not saved.
Choose an archive to list its files and folders.
Click a row or press Space to select it. Selecting a folder selects everything inside.
Extract
Paths are checked before anything is written: absolute paths, “..”, drive letters and control characters are skipped, links are never created, and a file that already exists in the folder is kept while the new one gets a “ (2)” name. Each entry must match its declared size and CRC-32.
Up to 1,000,000 entries and a 256 MiB central directory. Extraction stops when data expands more than 1000 times past 64 MiB or the output passes 64 GiB. ZIP methods: Stored, Deflate and Zstandard; encrypted entries are not opened. Without a save dialog (Firefox, Safari) a download is limited to 512 MiB.
Create archive
Files to pack
Dropped files are added to the list. Add folder keeps a folder's structure.
No files added yet.
ZIP uses Deflate with UTF-8 names and switches to ZIP64 for files of 4 GiB and more. TAR uses ustar headers with pax for long or non-ASCII names; TAR.GZ and TAR.ZST compress the whole stream.
On this page
Archive Explorer opens ZIP, TAR and compressed TAR archives (gzip, Zstandard, Brotli) directly in the browser. It lists every entry with its size, compressed size, date and method, extracts the files you select into a folder or a new ZIP, and packs your own files into ZIP, TAR, TAR.GZ or TAR.ZST. Nothing is uploaded.
Detailed Functionality
A ZIP is read from its central directory, including ZIP64 archives, self-extracting stubs and Info-ZIP Unicode names, so even an archive with a million entries opens without unpacking it. TAR archives are read header by header with GNU long names and pax records; a compressed TAR is unpacked in one streaming pass in a Web Worker. Deflate, gzip, Zstandard and Brotli run in WASM with a bounded output window, so a compression bomb never inflates more than 1 MiB at a time.
Extraction is guarded against path traversal (Zip Slip): absolute paths, drive letters, “..” segments and control characters are never written, symlinks and hard links are never created, and characters or device names Windows refuses are replaced. Each entry must match its declared size and CRC-32; overlapping entries, ratios above 1000:1 past 64 MiB and output beyond 64 GiB stop the extraction. In Chromium-based browsers files go straight into a folder you pick, keeping existing files; elsewhere the selection downloads as one ZIP.
Creating an archive streams each file through the compressor to the file you save, with UTF-8 names, ZIP64 for files of 4 GiB and more, and pax headers for long TAR names.
Practical Examples
Look inside a download: open a 2 GB release.zip to see its 40,000 files and their sizes in a second, without unpacking it.
Pull one log out of a backup: filter a logs.tar.gz by “2026-10”, select the matching files and extract only them to a folder.
Check a suspicious archive: a ZIP whose entries contain “../../etc/passwd” is listed with those entries marked as unsafe, and they are never written.
Pack a project folder: add a folder, choose TAR.ZST at level 3, and save a compressed archive that keeps the folder structure.
How to Use This Tool
Open an archive
Drop or choose a ZIP, TAR, TAR.GZ, TAR.ZST, TAR.BR, GZ, ZST or BR file. The list of entries appears when reading finishes.
Find and select files
Type part of a name in Filter, then click rows or use Select matching. Selecting a folder selects everything inside it.
Extract
Choose Extract to folder… in Chromium-based browsers, Download as ZIP anywhere, or Save the file when one file is selected.
Create an archive
Add files or a folder under Create archive, choose a format and level, and save the new archive.
Tips and Best Practices
- A single .gz, .zst or .br file without TAR inside appears as one entry; its size is known only after extraction.
- Encrypted ZIP entries and methods such as BZIP2, LZMA or Deflate64 are listed but not extracted.
- Cancel stops the worker at once; a partially written file is discarded.
- To compare how gzip, Brotli and Zstandard handle your data, try Compression Benchmark.