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I want to make a BAT file that will ZIP or UNZIP a file. For zipping a file, I have found this question: Can you zip a file from the command prompt using ONLY Windows' built-in capability to zip files?

The answers given there are great and working for me, but I couldn't find any information about how to unzip the files. Like in the link, I can't assume any third-party tools (except winRAR).

Thanks ahead and sorry for English mistakes

Chen Tasker
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7 Answers7

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On Windows 10 build 17063 or later you can use tar.exe (similar to the *nix one). This is also available in the nanoserver docker container

C:\> tar -xf archive.zip

Note: zip support is not well documented

ref: https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=bsdtar&sektion=1&manpath=FreeBSD+5.3-stable

venimus
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    Luckily, it’s bsdtar. Because .zip is not GZip (-z). – Daniel B Aug 20 '19 at 13:27
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    It does work well with .gz and .zip – venimus Aug 21 '19 at 10:03
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    Yes. Because it ignores the incorrect -z argument and always uses autodetection. – Daniel B Aug 21 '19 at 10:50
  • Thanks, I removed it. I thought that with -z is to call the gzip submodule, which in turn does the autodetect. – venimus Aug 23 '19 at 07:26
  • It works perfectly for me on Windows 10. FYI: I am using the tar command from GNU CoreUtils for Windows http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/coreutils.htm – Happy Jan 12 '21 at 18:34
  • After reading tar --help, the support for .zip files seems totally undocumented and also unexpected to me. Maybe it's worth mentioning this in the answer text.. – Daniel Alder May 21 '21 at 08:38
  • since it claims to be a bsdtar it is documented here https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=bsdtar&sektion=1&manpath=FreeBSD+5.3-stable however many options are missing though – venimus May 21 '21 at 12:20
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    be careful with this as it will overwrite existing files with no indication at all. -k can apparently be used to not overwrite, but haven't tried it. (also note that tar --help has more detailed help than tar /?) – Dave Cousineau Jun 20 '21 at 18:46
  • the -C switch can be added to send the extracted files to some location e.g. C:\> tar -xf archive.zip -C some\directory although this may not work with Windows drive letters or UNC paths. – Richard Greenwood Feb 06 '24 at 21:05
50

If you have Windows 10, you can use the much shorter Powershell equivalent

Expand-Archive -Force C:\path\to\archive.zip C:\where\to\extract\to
MegaBatchGames
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18

This batch file code will help you to unzip a file.

@echo off
setlocal
cd /d %~dp0
Call :UnZipFile "C:\Temp\" "c:\FolderName\batch.zip"
exit /b

:UnZipFile <ExtractTo> <newzipfile>
set vbs="%temp%\_.vbs"
if exist %vbs% del /f /q %vbs%
>%vbs%  echo Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
>>%vbs% echo If NOT fso.FolderExists(%1) Then
>>%vbs% echo fso.CreateFolder(%1)
>>%vbs% echo End If
>>%vbs% echo set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
>>%vbs% echo set FilesInZip=objShell.NameSpace(%2).items
>>%vbs% echo objShell.NameSpace(%1).CopyHere(FilesInZip)
>>%vbs% echo Set fso = Nothing
>>%vbs% echo Set objShell = Nothing
cscript //nologo %vbs%
if exist %vbs% del /f /q %vbs%

N.B. C:\Temp is folder where it stores the Extracted (UnZip) File.

And, c:\FolderName\batch.zip is source path, (where Zip files are stored).

Please, Change the Full File Path ( Drive, Folder & Zip file name), according to your need.

Rajesh Sinha
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    Seems like he just copied it from here https://stackoverflow.com/questions/21704041/creating-batch-script-to-unzip-a-file-without-additional-zip-tools . Shouldn't this answer be reported for plagarism, because he is not referencing the original source. – samarendra chandan bindu Dash Oct 09 '22 at 17:08
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If you have Windows 10 (and powershell), but still want to unzip from within .bat/.cmd-file (cmd.exe), you can use

powershell -command "Expand-Archive -Force '%~dp0my_zip_file.zip' '%~dp0'"

where my_zip_file.zip is the file to be unzipped and %~dp0 points to the same folder are where the .bat/.cmd-file is (Change the folder, if needed).

Niko Fohr
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  • I have two problems with this. spawning a powershell takes prohibitively long (about 20 seconds in my test), and it can't even extract a zip file with another extension. – Mark Jeronimus Jan 04 '21 at 16:00
  • There is no powershell in some nano containers for example. Not a valuable answer ... – Ari Nov 18 '21 at 08:26
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    Nothing in the question mentions that it needs to run in a nano container. Very useful answer for me – janv8000 Apr 03 '23 at 08:45
2
ZipFile="C:\Users\spvaidya\Music\folder.zip"
ExtractTo="C:\Users\spvaidya\Music\"




'If the extraction location does not exist create it.

Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")

If NOT fso.FolderExists(ExtractTo) Then



 fso.CreateFolder(ExtractTo)

End If

'Extract the contants of the zip file.

set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")

set FilesInZip=objShell.NameSpace(ZipFile).items

objShell.NameSpace(ExtractTo).CopyHere(FilesInZip)

Set fso = Nothing
Set objShell = Nothing

The following vbscript can be saved as file.vbs and then run using batch script like:

file.vbs

save this in .bat file and run it.

spoorthi vaidya
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2

I use this one-liner to extract all zip files in the current path to their own subdirectory based on their file name:

gci -Recurse -Filter *.zip |ForEach-Object {Expand-Archive -Path $_.Fullname -DestinationPath $_.BaseName -Force}
Aaron Hudon
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1

To unzip all files in the current directory in one command, using Powershell:

Get-ChildItem *.zip | Expand-Archive -DestinationPath .\Extracted -Force
Karobwe
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