Convert 7Z to TAR
Free online converter for 7Z files. Uncompressed Unix archive stream. Nothing to install, no watermark, and every file is deleted automatically.
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Upload a 7Z file to convert it to TAR. Up to 3 files at once, 100 MB each.
Free · up to 3 files · 100 MB each · files deleted automatically after 1 hour.
About 7Z and TAR
7Z .7z
The high-compression archive format, using LZMA. It routinely produces the smallest file of anything here, at the cost of time and memory.
Good for
- The best compression ratios available here
- Strong AES-256 encryption
- Solid mode compresses similar files together very effectively
Trade-offs
- Needs software installed on Windows and macOS
- Slow to compress, and memory-hungry
- Less universal than ZIP for sending to other people
application/x-7z-compressed
TAR .tar
Not a compressor at all — a way of concatenating many files into one while preserving Unix permissions, ownership and symbolic links. Compression is applied afterwards, if at all.
Good for
- Preserves Unix permissions, ownership and links exactly
- The standard for backups and software distribution
- Streams, so it works down a pipe
Trade-offs
- No compression by itself — a tar is as big as its contents
- No random access without reading through the file
- Awkward on Windows without extra software
application/x-tar
7Z and TAR side by side
| 7Z | TAR | |
|---|---|---|
| Compression | Solid (LZMA) | None — container only |
| Typically used for | Maximum compression, long-term storage | Unix backups, software packaging |
What changes when you convert 7Z to TAR
The archive is rebuilt, not renamed
Your 7Z is unpacked in full and its contents are written into a new TAR. Nothing is passed through untouched, so the compression is done again from scratch at the level you choose, and the resulting size depends on that setting rather than on how the 7Z was originally made. The folder structure inside is preserved exactly.
These two store files differently
7Z compresses with LZMA, usually the tightest of these formats, so supports random access, though at a higher cost to decompress. TAR applies no compression whatsoever — it only concatenates, so reading one file means reading through everything before it. That difference is the real reason to pick one over the other: per-file compression lets a tool pull out a single entry cheaply, while compressing everything as one stream finds patterns across files and usually ends up smaller.
Unix file modes have somewhere to go
TAR records Unix permissions and symbolic links as a matter of course, which is why it is the format of choice for anything destined for a server. Note that it can only record what it is given: metadata the 7Z never stored cannot be recovered by converting.
Why 7Z is read-only here
7z compresses tightly, but writing it well requires the reference implementation. We read it and repackage the contents into formats every operating system can open without extra software.
You choose how hard it compresses
Because the archive is built again from scratch, the compression level is yours to set rather than inherited from the 7Z. It defaults to 6 — the setting that has been the sensible middle ground for deflate for thirty years. Raising it buys a few percent for a disproportionate amount of time; lowering it is worth doing for large archives of already-compressed material such as photographs or video, where there is nothing left to squeeze.
TAR does not compress at all
A tar file only concatenates — it makes one file out of many and applies no compression whatsoever, so the result will be roughly the combined size of everything inside it. That is deliberate: tar handles the bundling and a separate compressor handles the squeezing. If you want the file smaller, TGZ is the same tar with gzip applied over it.