p7zip(1)

🎀 p7zip — the manual, bestie edition 🎀

Okay so picture this: it's the General Commands Manual, and the star of the show is p7zip</p7zip>... wait no, <pink>p7zip</pink> — a lil wrapper sitting on top of the 7-Zip file archiver, and the whole point of it is a compression ratio so high it's giving overachiever. 💅

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✨ NAME ✨

p7zip — a wrapper on the 7-Zip file archiver, and it has a high compression ratio. That's it, that's the name. 🫶

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

p7zip [-c|--stdout|--to-stdout] [-d|--decompress|--uncompress]
[-f|--force] [-h|--help] [-k|--keep] [--] [file ...]

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✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

So 7-Zip is a file archiver, right? And it supports a whole roster of formats, no cap:

• 7z — and this one implements the LZMA compression algorithm, which features a very high compression ratio 👑
• LZMA2
• XZ
• ZIP
• Zip64
• CAB
• RAR — but only if the non-free p7zip-rar package is installed, just so you know 🫣
• ARJ
• GZIP
• BZIP2
• TAR
• CPIO
• RPM
• ISO
• most filesystem images
• DEB

And the compression ratio in the new 7z format? It's 30-50% better than the ratio in ZIP format. Ate. Periodt. 🔥

Now — p7zip itself is a gzip-like CLI wrapper script for 7-Zip. It handles only the 7z format (which is the native format of 7-Zip, iykyk), and internally it executes either 7za(1) or 7zr(1). So it's the friendly face, and those are the ones actually doing cardio behind the scenes. 🏃♀️

Here's how it actually behaves, bestie:

• If you pass no switches on the command line, each given file argument gets compressed into file.7z, and then it gets removed. Gone. Deleted. Bye. 😭
• If you pass the -d switch, then each file you pass needs to end with the .7z extension, and it gets decompressed. After the decompression, the original file is removed — unless it contained more than one archived file. (So multi-file archives get to stay. Main character energy. 💖)
• If you use it with no file argument at all, p7zip reads data from the standard input and compresses it (or decompresses it, in the case of -d) into the standard output. Stream queen behavior. 🌊

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✨ SWITCHES ✨

• -c, --stdout, --to-stdout — Write output on standard output. ✨
• -d, --decompress, --uncompress — Decompress file. 🦋
• -f, --force — Skip some checks and force compression or decompression. (It's giving "I said what I said.") 💅
• -h, --help — Print usage. 🌸
• -k, --keep — Do not delete input file. Protect the file at all costs. 🥺
• -- — Treat all subsequent arguments as file names, even if they start with a dash. So no, that weirdly-named file is not a secret option. 🎀

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✨ SEE ALSO ✨

7z(1), 7za(1), 7zr(1), bzip2(1), gzip(1), zip(1)

(the whole friend group 🫶 go say hi)

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✨ AUTHOR ✨

Written for Debian by Mohammed Adnene Trojette. Updated by Robert Luberda. Legends, honestly. 👑

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And that's the whole page, bestie!! This one came from the 7-Zip crew and it's dated March 6th, 2016 — so go forth, compress things, and remember: -k if you're emotionally attached. 💜🦋✨