272

I would like to be able to run 7zip from the command line on Mac. Does anyone have instructions on how to set this up?

Paul Sheldrake
  • 5,224

5 Answers5

456

To install p7zip using Homebrew, first update your brew formulae to be sure you are getting the latest p7zip.

$ brew update

Use Homebrew to install p7zip:

$ brew install p7zip

Add all files in the sputnik directory to the compressed file heed.7z:

$ 7z a heed.7z sputnik

Unzip heed.7z:

$ 7z x heed.7z
Troy Harvey
  • 4,678
44

On the download page of 7-zip, there are several options for OS X. Unfortunately, they seem to be with a GUI, or not available at the moment.

You can download p7zip though.

p7zip is the command line version of 7-Zip for Unix/Linux, made by an independent developer

It is distributed as Linux binaries and in source code form on Sourceforge.

Download the source code, and run make in the folder you extract the archive to. It will automatically build 7za for your OS. You might need Xcode and its command line tools for this to work.

$ cd Downloads/p7zip_9.20.1
$ make
[...]
$ cd bin
$ ls
7za
$ ./7za 

7-Zip (A) [64] 9.20  Copyright (c) 1999-2010 Igor Pavlov  2010-11-18
p7zip Version 9.20 (locale=de_DE.UTF-8,Utf16=on,HugeFiles=on,4 CPUs)

Usage: 7za <command> [<switches>...] <archive_name> [<file_names>...]
       [<@listfiles...>]

<Commands>
  a: Add files to archive
  b: Benchmark
  d: Delete files from archive
  e: Extract files from archive (without using directory names)
  l: List contents of archive
  t: Test integrity of archive
  u: Update files to archive
  x: eXtract files with full paths
<Switches>
  -ai[r[-|0]]{@listfile|!wildcard}: Include archives
  -ax[r[-|0]]{@listfile|!wildcard}: eXclude archives
  -bd: Disable percentage indicator
  -i[r[-|0]]{@listfile|!wildcard}: Include filenames
  -m{Parameters}: set compression Method
  -o{Directory}: set Output directory
  -p{Password}: set Password
  -r[-|0]: Recurse subdirectories
  -scs{UTF-8 | WIN | DOS}: set charset for list files
  -sfx[{name}]: Create SFX archive
  -si[{name}]: read data from stdin
  -slt: show technical information for l (List) command
  -so: write data to stdout
  -ssc[-]: set sensitive case mode
  -t{Type}: Set type of archive
  -u[-][p#][q#][r#][x#][y#][z#][!newArchiveName]: Update options
  -v{Size}[b|k|m|g]: Create volumes
  -w[{path}]: assign Work directory. Empty path means a temporary directory
  -x[r[-|0]]]{@listfile|!wildcard}: eXclude filenames
  -y: assume Yes on all queries

$ ./7za a 7za.7z 7za 

7-Zip (A) [64] 9.20  Copyright (c) 1999-2010 Igor Pavlov  2010-11-18
p7zip Version 9.20 (locale=de_DE.UTF-8,Utf16=on,HugeFiles=on,4 CPUs)
Scanning

Creating archive 7za.7z

Compressing  7za      

Everything is Ok

$ ls
7za    7za.7z
Daniel Beck
  • 111,893
32

p7zip is not maintained anymore. It's been at 17.xx for years. 7zip is at 24.11 as of Jan 2025. p7zip is missing important features like multi-core parallel compression and extraction

brew install sevenzip will install the package still maintained by the original developers (https://7-zip.org).

To use, 7zz --help

Ariel Lubonja
  • 463
19

If you only need to extract archives, unar (a command line version of The Unarchiver) also supports 7zip.

Lri
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0

In 2024 peazip looks like a good choice for MacOS. Cross platform with both console & GUI modes & supporting 200 archive types. File splitting also very useful:

Stuart Cardall
  • 414