Comparison of 7-Zip, WinZip, and WinRAR

Although 7-Zip is Free, WinRAR and WinZip Provide Many Good Features

Nov 17, 2009 John Wu

Although many choose 7-Zip because it's a free zip program, WinRAR's ability to create RAR format and WinZip's speed and features appeal to many looking beyond price.

7-Zip, WinZip, and WinRAR are all excellent zip compression programs available in Microsoft Windows. WinRAR and 7-Zip also have versions in Mac OS X command line, Unix command line, and Windows Mobile. All three have the capability of extracting compressed files in many other file formats as well.

All three of these zip utilities have their own advantages and disadvantages. Because of this, the ideal zip program depends on the user's needs.

7-Zip Advantages with Free Zip Compression

Many people use 7-Zip just to create new ZIP archives. However, 7-Zip does much more than that.

One of the interesting features of 7-Zip is the 7z file format, which stands for the 7-Zip file format. Although 7z is not compatible with many zip programs (WinRAR and WinZip can extract 7-Zip), the compression in 7z format is much better than that of the original ZIP format. The 7z format, just like RAR, allows users to split one archive into multiple files. The 7-Zip file format has compression ratios that are usually within 2% of RAR file format. In short, both 7z and RAR compress similarly well.

However, the biggest advantage of 7-Zip is that it's free. Those who simply want a free zip or free unzip utility should choose 7-Zip. WinRAR are and WinZip are shareware. WinRAR costs $29 while WinZip costs $29.95. All of 7-zip's capabilities are free including the packing and unpacking of the popular ZIP format as well as its own 7z file format.

WinRAR Advantages with the RAR format

The RAR file format was in wide use long before the ubiquity of high speed internet. During the days of dialup modems, disconnects and file corruption were a frequent concern. Unlike the ZIP file format, RAR allowed users to split a large archive into multiple pieces. Furthermore, RAR could reconstruct the archive even if there were some errors introduced during file transmission.

The RAR format became very popular for transferring large files. Even today, email providers limit the size of attachments to just 10MB or even less so the file splitting available in RAR is still needed.

One would think that the freely available 7z file format with its free compression program would make significant inroads versus RAR. However, it has not happened yet because 7z compression times are sometimes significantly slower. Even on the fastest computers available, a file archive that takes 2 minutes on WinRAR using RAR format could take as much as 10 minutes on 7-Zip with the 7z format.

WinZip Speed Advantages

WinZip is the fastest at compressing files. In a January 2006 Softpedia test, WinRAR compressed a movie file to 456KB in 14 seconds while WinZip compressed the same file to 2.05MB in just 3 seconds. For those who care about speed a lot more than compression ratios, WinZip is the best zip/unzip tool to use.

WinZip is known for adding many features such as FTP, automated backups, email of ZIP archives, direct write of ZIP files to CD or DVD, image thumbnail viewer, and encryption policies. Depending on one's needs, these features alone may be worth choosing WinZip over 7-Zip or WinRAR.

Users who need a free zip program or want to use the 7z file format despite its slowness should choose 7-zip. Those who need to create RAR archives along with unzip and zip should choose WinRAR. Those who want fast compressing times along with a full featured zip utility should choose WinZip. Because WinZip and WinRAR both have a free, no obligation trial period of 40 days, it's possible to try all three programs to find out which one is best.

The copyright of the article Comparison of 7-Zip, WinZip, and WinRAR in Computer Software is owned by John Wu. Permission to republish Comparison of 7-Zip, WinZip, and WinRAR in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

User Running a Zip Utility Program