What Is GZ File Type or Extension? How To Create, Extract and Open Gz File?

gz or GZ files are compressed files using gzip algorithm or a related application. gz is natively created for Linux and Unix but currently supports all major operating systems like Windows, MacOS, BSD etc.

Programs Those Can Open GZ Files

In this part we will provide the applications or programs those can be open, create, extract GZ files.

Windows

• File Viewer Plus
• Corel WinZip
• WinRAR
• 7-Zip
• PeaZip

Linux

• gzip
• 7zip
• Ark
• PeaZip
• Xarchive

MacOS

• Smith Micro Stuffit Deluxe 16
• Incredible Bee Archiver
• Apple Archive Utility

List GZ Files Attributes

Linux

We can use command line native gzip command in order to list gz for the following attributes.

• File Contents
• Compressed File Size
• Uncompressed File Size
• Compression Ratio

We will use gzip command with the -l option like below.

$ gzip -l exec.c.gz

Windows

Windows operating system provides a lot of files to list gz file attributes. Some applications which can be used are WinZip, RAR, 7zip, etc. In this example, we will use 7zip. We will right-click to the gz file and then hover over 7z and then click Open archive.

We will click to the Info which will open Properties screen.

In properties screen, we will get the following information.

• Uncompressed File Size
• Compressed File Size
• Folder Count
• File Count
• CRC info
• Path
• Compression Type
• Header Size

Create GZ File

Creating gz file is very easy for both Linux and Windows operating systems.

Linux

We will use gz command and provide the file name. After compression is completed a gz extension file will be created.

Windows

In Windows, we will use 7zip tool like below.Rigth Click->7-Zip->Add to archive

We will create the gz file by selecting gzip as Archive format.

Extract GZ File

Linux

We can open existing gz file with the gunzip command like below.

$ gunzip exe.c.gz

Windows

In Windows Right Click->7-Zip->Extract Here

Tar.gz Files

Especially in Linux and Unix environments tar.gz is a very popular file extension. Tar is used to make a list of files a single file where gzip can easily compress the single file.