unzip: Comprehensive Guide to Extracting Zip Archives in Linux

Unlock the power of the unzip command in Linux with this comprehensive guide. Learn various extraction techniques, including extracting files to standard output, listing files, updating existing files, excluding specific files, extracting into a specific directory, and much more.

Extract files to standard output, no messages

unzip -p foo.zip

List files (short format)

unzip -l foo.zip

Freshen existing files, create none

unzip -f foo.zip

Test compressed archive data

unzip -t foo.zip

Update files, create if necessary

unzip -u foo.zip

Display archive comment only

unzip -z foo.zip

List verbosely/show version info

unzip -v foo.zip

Exclude files that follow (in xlist)

unzip foo.zip -x filename_to_exclude

Extract files into a specific directory

unzip foo.zip -d /path/to/directory

Never overwrite existing files

unzip -n foo.zip

Quiet mode

unzip -q foo.zip

Overwrite files WITHOUT prompting

unzip -o foo.zip

Junk paths (do not make directories)

unzip -j foo.zip

Match filenames case-insensitively

unzip -C foo.zip

Restore UID/GID info

unzip -X foo.zip

Keep setuid/setgid/tacky permissions

unzip -K foo.zip

Examples

Extract all files except 'joe' from zipfile 'data1.zip'

unzip data1 -x joe

Send contents of 'foo.zip' via pipe into program 'more'

unzip -p foo | more

Quietly replace existing 'ReadMe' if archive file newer

unzip -fo foo ReadMe

List files inside a zip archive

unzip -l foo.zip

Extract a specific file from a zip archive

unzip foo.zip filename_to_be_unzipped

Unzip a zip archive

unzip foo.zip

Unzip multiple zip files

for zip_file in ./*.zip; do 
    unzip -o "$zip_file"
done

Extract 25 zip archive files at once

find . -maxdepth 1 -name '*.zip' -print0 | xargs -0 -I {} -P 25 unzip "{}"

Set a password for a zip file

zip -P mypassword archive.zip file1.txt file2.jpg

Extract files from a password-protected zip file

unzip -P mypassword archive.zip