Comparison

MacPacker vs 7-Zip

Which archive, package and disk-image formats each app can open on macOS, and which ones it can create.

10 August 202649 formats · 9 capabilities

The apps

MacPacker

0.19.0

Price: Free
Licence: GPL-3.0, open source
Needs: macOS 14.6+
Shape: Archive browser

39read

1write

7-Zip

26.02 · macOS console build

Price: Free
Licence: LGPL + BSD, open source
Needs: 64-bit macOS
Shape: Command line only

43read

9write

The read and write totals count the rows of the table below, where one row can stand for a family of formats. Every app counts its own formats differently, so the totals are for orientation and the table is the comparison.

Format matrix

Read means the app can list an archive's contents and extract from it. Write means the app can produce that format — creating it, and where noted updating it. Formats neither app handles are left out.

Format	MacPacker		7-Zip
Format	Read	Write	Read	Write
Everyday archives	MacPacker		7-Zip
ZIP.zip .jar .war .apk .ipa .appx .xpi .epub .cbz	Yes¹	Yes²	Yes	Yes²
ZIPX.zipx	Yes	No	Partial³	No
7z.7z	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
RAR / RAR5.rar .cbr .r00	Yes	No	Yes	No
TAR.tar	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
ARJ.arj	Yes	No	Yes	No
LHA / LZH.lha .lzh	Yes	No	Yes	No
CAB.cab	Yes	No	Yes	No
CHM.chm	Yes	No	Yes	No
CPIO.cpio .cpgz	Yes	No	Yes	No
Platform & package formats	MacPacker		7-Zip
AR.ar .a .lib	Yes	No	Yes	No
Debian package.deb	Yes	No	Yes	No
RPM package.rpm	Yes	No	Yes	No
XAR.xar	Yes	No	Yes	No
Apple installer package.pkg	Yes	No	Yes	No
Apple signed archive.xip	Yes⁴	No	Yes	No
MSI / OLE compound.msi .doc .xls	Yes	No	Yes	No
Self-extracting EXE / NSIS.exe .nsis	Yes	No	Yes	No
Windows imaging.wim .swm .esd	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Legacy, Mac-classic and long tail	MacPacker		7-Zip
StuffIt.sit	Yes	No	No	No
StuffIt X.sitx	Yes	No	No	No
StuffIt self-extracting.sea	Yes	No	No	No
LZX.lzx	Yes	No	No	No
SWF media extraction.swf	No	No	Yes	No
Single-stream compression	MacPacker		7-Zip
GZIP.gz	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
BZIP2.bz2	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
XZ.xz	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
LZMA (raw).lzma	No	No	Yes	No
Unix compress.Z	Yes	No	Yes	No
LZ4.lz4	Yes	No	No	No
Zstandard.zst	No	No	Yes	No
Compound tar streams	MacPacker		7-Zip
tar.gz / tar.bz2 / tar.xz / tar.Z.tgz .tbz2 .txz .taz	Yes	No	Yes	Partial⁵
tar.lz4.tlz4	Yes	No	No	No
tar.zst / tar.br.tzst .tbr	No	No	Partial⁵	Partial⁵
Disk images and filesystems	MacPacker		7-Zip
Apple Disk Image.dmg .smi	Yes	No	Yes	No
ISO 9660.iso	Yes	No	Yes	No
UDF.udf .iso	No	No	Yes	No
SquashFS.squashfs .sfs	Yes	No	Yes	No
FAT.fat .img	Yes	No	Yes	No
NTFS.ntfs .img	Yes	No	Yes	No
HFS / HFS+.hfs .hfsx	No	No	Yes	No
ext2 / ext3 / ext4.ext .img	No	No	Yes	No
APFS.apfs .img	No	No	Yes	No
CramFS.cramfs	No	No	Yes	No
VirtualBox VDI.vdi	Yes	No	Yes	No
Hyper-V VHD / VHDX.vhd .vhdx	Yes	No	Yes	No
VMware VMDK.vmdk	Yes	No	Yes	No
QEMU QCOW2.qcow2	Yes	No	Yes	No
MBR / GPT partition maps.mbr .gpt	No	No	Yes	No

YesPartialNoReadWrite

Beyond the format list

Format coverage is half the picture. These rows cover what you can do with an archive once it opens.

Capability	MacPacker	7-Zip
Open split / multi-volume setsJoining archives that arrive as .001, .z01 or .r00 parts.	Partial⁶	Yes
Create split volumesWriting an archive across several sized parts.	No	Yes
Open password-protected archivesPrompting for a password and decrypting on read.	Yes	Yes
Write encrypted archivesAES-256 on output. MacPacker's save panel exposes format and compression level only.	No	Yes
Modify an archive in placeAdding, deleting or renaming entries without a full unpack-and-repack.	Partial⁷	Yes
Archive browserA window that lists an archive's contents before you extract anything.	Yes	Partial⁸
Browse nested archivesOpening an archive that sits inside another, without extracting the outer one first.	Yes	No
Finder / Quick Look extensionsSystem integration beyond the app window.	Yes	No
Command-line interfaceScriptable from a shell.	No	Yes

YesPartialNo

Notes

1MacPacker identifies formats by content rather than extension, so any ZIP-based container opens as ZIP whatever it is called.
2Writing a JAR, APK, IPA or similar means writing a ZIP container: none of these apps produce the signing or manifests that make a valid platform package.
37-Zip's ZIP handler registers the .zipx extension and decodes the LZMA, PPMd and BZip2 methods WinZip uses, but 7-Zip does not advertise ZIPX as an output format.
4.xip is a XAR container, so MacPacker opens it as one.
5Two passes: the tar is built first, then compressed. There is no single command for it.
6MacPacker joins split ZIP sets only — spanned (.z01…) and numeric (.zip.001…). Split RAR or 7z sets are not recognised.
7ZIP only.
8The macOS build of 7-Zip is a console binary: 7zz l lists an archive, but there is no window.

More comparisons

Compiled 10 August 2026, against the versions listed above.

Get MacPacker

v0.20.0 · macOS 14+

$ brew install --cask macpacker

.dmg .zip App Store Releases

App Store updates may lag a few days behind direct downloads due to Apple review.