Some operating systems come with basic support for unzipping files. Windows 7 for instance can unzip zip files without third party tools. Then again, most users will encounter other compression formats such as 7z or rar eventually which means that they do not a third party software to unpack those files on their computer system.

I’d like to share the two programs that I use for the purpose. Wait, two programs? Yes, I’m using two programs to unzip files on my PC.

7-zip

7-zip is a classic unzip software that supports a wide variety of formats. It can pack and unpack formats such as zip, gzip, tar or 7z, and unpack only compression formats such as rar, iso, msi, cab or dmg.

The program integrates into Windows Explorer, so that it becomes possible to quickly unpack compressed files with a right-click on the file. It furthermore comes with a graphical user interface that can be used as well to pack or unpack files in the operating system.

I use 7-Zip to compress files and to unpack single archives on my computer. It’s extensive support of compression formats makes it ideal for those two tasks.

Extract Now

Have you ever downloaded or transferred many compressed files at once? I did, and that’s where I realized that 7-Zip was not the best program for those situations. Say you have a directory full of compressed files, some split into multiple files.

The best tool for this situation is Extract Now which integrates into Windows Explorer as well. Simply right-click the folder containing the compressed files and select Search for archives from the context menu.

Extract Now will locate all archives in the folder. The unzip software can be configured to extract all archives automatically, or after user input only. The program can also be configured to monitor directories to unpack new archives that are stored in the directories automatically.

In short; I use 7-zip to pack and unpack individual files, and Extract Now to mass extract compressed files in a directory.

Which unzip software do you use? Let me know in the comments.

Standard unpackers like WinRar, WinZip or 7-zip are able to handle most of the operations with ease. They usually fail on the other hand when it comes to extracting lots of archives, especially if those are stored in multiple folders.

This article reviews four specialized programs that are capable of extracting multiple archives at once.

Extract Now

Extract Now is the only program of the four that has been reviewed before by Ghacks. That was back in 2007. The developer has continued to develop the software and extended the functionality by a lot. The basic functionality however has remained the same. Archives can be added for extraction by dragging and dropping folders or files into the Extract Now interface or by selecting them in Windows Explorer and using the context menu link to send them to the program.

• Supports most major archive formats
• Drag and drop files or folders from Windows Explorer to extract them
• Simple user interface and sleek design in a small package
• Recursively search through folders for archives (Just drag and drop them)
• Delete files or close program after extraction options
• Windows explorer file associations for all supported archive types
• Extract files into current directory, named folder, or favorite folder of choice
• System tray icon on Minimize and Always on top features
• Integrates with Windows Explorer via special context menu items

Extract Now supports a variety of formats including zip, rar, gzip, tar, iso and dozens of others. All archives that have been found can be extracted automatically or by clicking on the Extract button in the main program interface.

extract now

The software comes with lots of options that make the whole extracting process more comfortable. Extracted archives can for instance be deleted so that they do not have to be deleted manually in the end.

Extract Now is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of most Microsoft Windows operating systems.

UnPacker

Unpacker uses a completely different design but provides almost the same functionality that Extract Now offers. The program does not support drag and drop but selection of files or folders from the file browser in its interface.

Zip-support added!

Possible to add archives in archives directly to the queue

Added option for ignoring the found window and directly extract everything it find

Made the cleanup functions smarter, and fixed a small bug in the renaming feature

Now possible to save unfinished extraction queue to file on exit and reload it on startup (or a crash)

Logfile support added

Also possible to rename the directory you’ve extracted from

Possible to pause/resume on Unpacker & Autocopy

AutoCopy can now operate in quiet mode

Possible to set thread priority

Autoscan directories by given interval

Check autoscanned archives against the SFV file

Automatic adding to queue when archive is equal to SFV, so you don’t have to :)

Recursive scan of harddrive anywhere in Explorer for archives

Archives can be queued for process

Each archive is extracted one by one

Possible (optional) to clean up the archive files after use

Selected folders are scanned for archives which are then automatically displayed with selection boxes to select some or all for extraction.

unpackerext

A major limitation of Unpacker is that it only supports rar and zip archives. These two formats make up the majority of compressed files on the Internet but it may mean the occasional manual extraction of unsupported archives.

Unpacker comes with a folder watcher that can be used to monitor folders for new archives. New compressed files are then automatically unpacked by Unpacker.

Scene Unpacker

Scene Unpacker is limited to the rar format. It has been specifically designed for so called scene releases which are normally distributed as rar archives.

scene unpacker

A folder can be selected in the file browser. The program will automatically scan that folder and subfolders for rar archives. Any rar archive found is then listed in the interface so that they can be extracted easily.

The application seems to have troubles recognizing rar files correctly since it added several jpg images that ended with numbers as archives as well. This alone makes it rather impracticable to use unless it can be ensured that images are not located in the rar archive folders.

Scene Unpacker requires the Microsoft .net Framework. It can be integrated into the Send To menu for extra context menu integration.

The Scene Release Unpacker (SCRU)

SCRU, just like Scene Unpacker, have been specifically designed for P2P downloaders. It is basically a background program that can watch multiple directories for new archives and process them automatically whenever they are discovered.

filters

The app is complex as it provides lots of features that require configuration. It supports all the basic options one would expect like shell integration or logging. Advanced features include configuring different profiles and filters for specific usage scenarios.

The Scene Release Unpacker supports both rar and zip archives. It requires the Microsoft .net Framework 2.0 and can be downloaded from the developer website.

Extract Now was mentioned in the comments. I did write about it earlier actually but forgot completely that it would have that feature. As the name suggests its main purpose is to extract archives and since I do not pack files regularly I decided to make this my main application to handle archives. Extract Now supports many major file types such as zip, rar, 7z, iso and img, all in all 17 file types are supported.

Two ways are provided to communicate with the program. The main interface supports drag and drop which is probably one of the coolest features in an archiver that I have seen for a long time. Just drop a folder into the interface and Extract Now will scan it plus all subfolders for supported file types. The files will then be added and can be extracted automatically.

Several options can be configured that customize the output like retaining the archive folder structure or to extract archives into their own name folder.

Extract Now can also be added to the right-click context menu to extract files this way. This comes in handy if you want to extract just one file and not multiple ones. I have to admit that I’m so impressed by Extract Now that I made the switch from IZarc to it.

The feature that sticks out is that it processes subdirectories automatically as well. If you like your downloads ordered, like Anonymoose who mentioned the software, you could have many rar – or other formats such as zip – files in different folders on your hard drive. Just drag the main folder into Extract Now and it will do all the rest automatically for you.

Besides the obvious drag and drop support it also integrates nicely in your Windows Explorer giving you options to extract files by right-clicking them.

I said earlier that the most used formats like zip, rar and gz are supported as well as image formats such as iso and img. You still need a software that is able to zip software which means this tool is basically for those who work a lot with files that they have to extract.