| 7Z | RAR | |
|---|---|---|
| Compression | Lossless | Lossless |
| Metadata | - | - |
| Open / royalty-free | ✓ | - |
| Defined by | - | RARLAB |
| Since | - | - |
| Best for | shrinking large archives | nothing new, so convert it to ZIP |
7Z
Better compression than ZIP. Needs 7-Zip or similar to open.
RAR
Proprietary archive, common on download sites. Free to read, not to create.
Questions
7Z or RAR: which is smaller?
It depends on the content; see our measured benchmarks on the conversion pages.
Can I convert 7Z to RAR?
Not on this site yet.
And RAR to 7Z?
Yes, as well.