Best Free Alternatives to WinZip and Winrar

Winzip and Winrar are the most popular file compression software for handling archive formats like zip, iso, rar, tar and others. Both of these are paid software. But there are many free alternatives available that can easily zip files, and unzip them that does the same thing as WinRar and WinZip and some do it even better.

Here are the best of free Alternatives to Winzip and Winrar :

1. 7 Zip

7 Zip is a free and open source file archiver. 7-Zip operates with the 7z archive format, but can read and write several other archive formats. It's my favorite tool to zip and unzip file.

7 -Zip supported formats:

• Packing / unpacking: 7z, XZ, BZIP2, GZIP, TAR, ZIP and WIM
• Unpacking only: ARJ, CAB, CHM, CPIO, CramFS, DEB, DMG, FAT, HFS, ISO, LZH, LZMA, MBR, MSI, NSIS, NTFS, RAR, RPM, SquashFS, UDF, VHD, WIM, XAR and Z.

Visit 7-Zip Website here

2. PeaZip

PeaZip is a free file and archive manager, based on solid and proven Open Source technology of 7-Zipextract 7z files for handling mainstream archive formats, and other great Open Source tools (like FreeARC, PAQ, UPX...) for supporting additional file formats and features, in order to provide an all purpose zip utility featuring a powerful unified GUI that, unlike most of other classic file archivers like i.e. WinZip and WinRar, is natively portable and cross-platform.

PeaZip supported formats (150+ archive formats supported):

• Create: 7Z, ARC, BZ2, GZ, *PAQ, PEA, QUAD/BALZ, TAR, UPX, WIM, XZ, ZIP
• Extract: ACE, ARJ, CAB, DMG, ISO, LHA, RAR, UDF, ZIPX and more...

Visit PeaZip Website here

3. IZArc

IZArc is a freeware archive utility supporting many archive formats like: 7-ZIP, A, ACE, ARC, ARJ, B64, BH, BIN, BZ2, BZA, C2D, CAB, CDI, CPIO, DEB, ENC, GCA, GZ, GZA, HA, IMG, ISO, JAR, LHA, LIB, LZH, MDF, MBF, MIM, NRG, PAK, PDI, PK3, RAR, RPM, TAR, TAZ, TBZ, TGZ, TZ, UUE, WAR, XXE, YZ1, Z, ZIP, ZOO. With IZArc you can drag and drop files from and to Windows Explorer, create and extract archives directly in Windows Explorer, create multiple archives spanning disks, creating self-extracting archives, repair damaged zip archives, converting from one archive type to another, view and write comments and many more.

Visit IZArc Website here

5. jZip

jZip is based on proven 7-Zip technology, it is an easy to use and fast archiving software that can create, open and extract Zip, TAR, GZip and 7-Zip. Open and extract from RAR and ISO.

Visit jZip website here

6. Universal Extractor

Universal Extractor is a program to extract files from any type of archive, whether it's a simple zip file, an installation program, or even a Windows Installer (.msi) package.

Download Universal Extractor here

7. ArcThemAll

ArcThemALL is a completely free open source software. It supports files and folders multi-compression (UPX, ZIP, 7Z) and archives extraction (33 archives formats. There is also portable version of ArcThemAll that can be stored on an external device (like a USB flash drive) and run on any computer.

Visit ArcThemAll website here

8. TugZip

TUGZip is a powerful freeware archiving utility for Windows that provides support for a wide range of compressed, encoded and disc-image files, as well as very powerful features; all through an easy to use application interface and Windows Explorer integration, for example drag & drop, shell context menu and drop handlers.

Visit TugZip Website here