Convert TAR.GZ to TAR
Free online converter for TAR.GZ files. Uncompressed Unix archive stream. Nothing to install, no watermark, and every file is deleted automatically.
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Upload a TAR.GZ 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 TGZ and TAR
TAR.GZ .tgz
A tar archive passed through gzip. The tar preserves the file tree and its permissions; gzip compresses the whole stream in one pass.
Good for
- Compresses better than ZIP by finding redundancy across files
- Keeps Unix permissions and links
- The default for source code releases
Trade-offs
- No random access — one file means decompressing everything before it
- Needs extra software on Windows
application/gzip
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
TGZ and TAR side by side
| TGZ | TAR | |
|---|---|---|
| Compression | Solid stream (gzip) | None — container only |
| Typically used for | Source releases, Unix backups | Unix backups, software packaging |
What changes when you convert TGZ to TAR
The archive is rebuilt, not renamed
Your TGZ 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from scratch at the level you choose, and the resulting size depends on that setting rather than on how the TGZ was originally made. The folder structure inside is preserved exactly.
These two store files differently
TGZ concatenates with tar, then compresses the whole stream in one pass, so reading one file means decompressing everything before it. 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.
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 TGZ. 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.