A native macOS version of the 7-Zip File Manager: the real 7-Zip 26.04 engine with a new AppKit interface that follows the Windows app item for item — the same two panels, menus, dialogs, keyboard map, settings and 93 languages — plus Finder integration.
Unofficial. This project is not affiliated with or endorsed by Igor Pavlov or the 7-Zip project. 7-Zip is Igor Pavlov's work (7-zip.org); this repository is a fork of ip7z/7zip that adds a macOS app. Please report problems with the Mac app here, not to 7-Zip.
Current version: 7-Zip 26.04 for macOS 1.2.1.
- Browse and edit archives like folders — 7z, ZIP, RAR, TAR, GZip, BZip2, XZ, Zstandard, CAB, ISO, DMG, WIM, MSI, RPM, DEB, APFS, VHD and the rest of 7-Zip's formats, including archives inside archives.
- Two panels, four view modes, sortable columns, flat view, folder history, favorites and 7-Zip's keyboard map.
- Extract with every path and overwrite mode; Add to archive with the full set of compression options, AES-256 encryption (including file names), multi-volume and self-extracting archives.
- Exclude Mac resource forks — a checkbox in Add to archive (off by default) that leaves
._*AppleDouble files,.DS_Storeand__MACOSXfolders out of the archive, so archives shared with Windows and Linux users contain only your files. - Test, checksums (CRC32, CRC64, SHA-1, SHA-256, SHA-512, BLAKE2sp, XXH64 and more), Benchmark, Split, Combine, Link, Properties and comments.
- Finder integration — a 7-Zip submenu on Finder's right-click menu, Quick Actions, Services, and document icons for 40 archive types.
- Quick Look preview — select an archive in Finder (or press Space) to see its summary and its contents as 7-Zip lists them, without opening the app; Quick Look's Open with 7-Zip is one click away. Options ▸ macOS turns it off.
- 93 languages — the official 7-Zip translations, switchable while the app runs.
- Light and Dark themes: Light by default, Dark or following the system in Options ▸ macOS.
- Native: Swift and AppKit on top of the unchanged C/C++ engine. No emulation, no third-party code, no network access except the optional update check.
Add to archive
Extract
Benchmark
Properties of an item inside an archive
Options ▸ macOS
Finder's right-click menu with the 7-Zip submenu
Archive icons in Finder (the original 7-Zip icons, for every type associated with 7-Zip)
Requires macOS 14 (Sonoma) or newer, on Apple Silicon or Intel (the release is a universal app).
Download 7-Zip-26.04-macOS-1.2.1.dmg (the version in the name changes with each release) from
Releases, open it and drag 7-Zip onto
Applications. The app is universal: one download for Apple Silicon and Intel Macs.
brew install --cask yrambler2001/tap/7zip-macos
brew trust yrambler2001/tap # once, so that a plain `brew upgrade` includes the cask (Homebrew 7)Update with brew upgrade --cask 7zip-macos. The tap is a personal one
(yrambler2001/homebrew-tap), updated automatically
with each release. The cask removes the quarantine flag from /Applications/7-Zip.app after
every install and upgrade (xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine), because the app is not notarized:
a Homebrew install opens directly, with no Open Anyway step. Installing the cask is the consent
to that; the disk image below still needs Open Anyway.
See docs/building.md. In short, with Xcode 26 and brew install xcodegen:
Mac/scripts/build.sh --release # or Mac/scripts/run.sh to build and launch a Debug buildThe app is ad-hoc signed, not notarized — there is no paid Apple Developer ID behind this project. A copy installed from the disk image is therefore blocked the first time ("Apple could not verify "7-Zip" is free of malware"). To allow it:
- Open 7-Zip once and dismiss the warning.
- Open System Settings ▸ Privacy & Security, scroll to Security, and click Open Anyway next to the message about 7-Zip.
- Confirm with Touch ID or your password. Later launches open normally.
On macOS 15 and later the old right-click ▸ Open shortcut no longer bypasses this; use the steps above. If you prefer the terminal, removing the quarantine attribute does the same:
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/7-Zip.appBuilds you make yourself are not quarantined and open directly, and the Homebrew cask removes the quarantine for you (above).
macOS does not switch extensions on by itself. After the first launch, either tick Options ▸ 7-Zip ▸ Integrate 7-Zip to shell context menu and press OK, or open System Settings ▸ General ▸ Login Items & Extensions and:
- under File Providers (Finder Sync), switch on 7-Zip — the 7-Zip submenu on Finder's right-click menu and a toolbar button;
- under Finder, switch on Extract with 7-Zip and Compress with 7-Zip — the Quick Actions.
The five 7-Zip: … Services need nothing; they are in every app's Services menu. Options ▸ 7-Zip
chooses which of the eleven menu entries Finder shows, as on Windows. If the menu never appears,
pluginkit -m -p com.apple.FinderSync -v shows whether the extension is enabled (+) and which
copy of 7-Zip it belongs to.
The Quick Look preview is on from the first launch: select an archive in Finder and look at the
preview pane, or press Space. Options ▸ macOS ▸ Quick Look preview for archives switches it off
(it is the same switch as System Settings ▸ General ▸ Login Items & Extensions ▸ Quick Look). If
Finder still shows the plain icon right after installing, run qlmanage -r or log out and back in.
The app itself is not sandboxed (it is a file manager), so macOS asks once for access to Desktop, Documents, Downloads, removable and network volumes as you open them. The Finder extensions are sandboxed and only see the files you selected.
macOS keeps Apple's own apps as the default for many archive types (Archive Utility for .zip,
.gz, .tar, .xz, .bz2; DiskImageMounter for .iso and .dmg), so installing 7-Zip does not
change what a double-click opens. To open archives with 7-Zip — and to see 7-Zip's archive icons
in Finder — choose the types in 7-Zip ▸ Options ▸ System: click a type in the column with your user name to associate it (or +
to associate every type), then press OK or Apply. macOS asks you to confirm each change of
default application. A single type can also be switched in Finder with Get Info ▸ Open with ▸
7-Zip ▸ Change All….
When the File Manager starts, at most once a day, the app asks GitHub whether a newer release
exists; Help ▸ Check for Updates… asks at any time. If there is one, a message box shows the
new version and the first lines of its release notes, with Download (opens the release page in
your browser), Later and Skip This Version. Nothing is downloaded or installed by the app.
Homebrew users can also brew upgrade --cask 7zip-macos.
Privacy: the app contacts api.github.com once a day at startup
(GET /repos/yrambler2001/7zip-macos/releases/latest, with nothing but the standard Accept and
User-Agent headers) and makes no other network request. Turn it off in Options ▸ macOS ▸
Check for updates at startup; Finder commands (7-Zip's right-click menu) never check.
The Mac app aims at parity with the Windows File Manager; the differences — Finder instead of Explorer, the Trash, Command shortcuts, the quarantine attribute instead of Zone.Identifier, the macOS additions — are summarised in docs/parity.md. Known limitations: right-to-left languages are not mirrored, and about a quarter of the upstream translations are incomplete.
Bug reports and pull requests are welcome — see CONTRIBUTING.md, and SECURITY.md for vulnerabilities. Developer documentation:
- docs/building.md — requirements, scripts, signing
- docs/architecture.md — engine, bridge, app, extensions
- docs/testing.md — unit, app-hosted and UI tests
- docs/upstream.md — following upstream 7-Zip and the patches to it
- docs/releasing.md — CI, cutting a release, the Homebrew tap, signing secrets
Problems in the archive engine itself (a format, compression, the command-line 7zz) belong
upstream at 7-zip.org.
Most of the port was written by AI agents (Claude Code) directed by the maintainer, one scoped
agent per feature, each checked against the Windows app. The plans, specifications and per-feature
reports are kept in ai/; commits written by an agent carry Co-Authored-By and
Claude-Session trailers.
7-Zip is Copyright (C) 1999-2026 Igor Pavlov; the macOS port is Copyright (C) 2026 Yurii Synyshyn (yrambler2001). Both are under the GNU LGPL 2.1 or later, with parts under the BSD 3-clause and 2-clause licences and the RAR code under the unRAR license restriction — see LICENSE, DOC/License.txt and NOTICE (bundled assets, trademarks, upstream patches). Upstream's own readme is DOC/readme.txt.