One of the problems with Android smartphones and tablets and with iPad and iPhone is that they do not support the opening of compressed RAR, ZIP or other formats. To open ZIP and RAR or other types of archives, when they are downloaded from the internet or received as attachments of emails, it is therefore necessary to use an external application. Speaking of the most popular smartphones and tablets, then those with Android system (Samsung, HTC, LG, Nexus, Motorola etc.) and iPhone / iPad, we see here the best applications to open RAR and ZIP files, to extract files from archives, also if divided into parts or with password protection.
Open ZIP RAR and archives on Android
1) If it is not very common to deal with ZIP and RAR files and you never meet other archive formats then it may be enough to have an application that we don't already have in the phone or tablet, the time has come to install.
I am talking about X-Plore File Manager, the best file manager for Android, with which you can also open and unzip RAR and ZIP.
It is difficult to find something that this app cannot do, capable of opening the Android system as if you were using Windows Explorer, with important additional features such as access to files saved in the cloud, access to files shared by the PC, Samba file sharing that only allows you to share a folder on your computer, an integrated file viewer, an FTP client, an app manager, ZIP and RAR support and an intuitive and easy-to-use interface.
Touch the ZIP file and then choose to open it with Zip Viewer to extract the files inside it by selecting them, pressing the button below and choosing the destination folder. The Explorer is also great for creating compressed ZIP or 7Z files . To do this, select the files in a folder (by touching and holding them) and then touch the More button at the bottom left to find the Compress option.
If, on the other hand, you often work with archive files, this app may no longer be sufficient, also because it lacks support for other types of files such as ISO and TAR.
2) You can then download the most powerful and best archive manager for Android called ZArchiver, which is free and perfect in every required task. ZArchiver has a very simple interface that shows all the files and folders of the smartphone or tablet.
You can also look at the inside of the SD card via the drop down menu at the top. With this application, you can tap and hold on a folder to compress it in a .zip and .7z type archive. By pressing the options button you can also choose the compression level and you can set a password to the archive, just like you could do on the PC. When it comes to creating archives, the application supports, in addition to 7z (7zip) and zip, also bzip2 (bz2), gzip (gz), XZ, and TAR. You can also select multiple folders to create a single archive file. If instead you want to open and view a received or downloaded file, ZArchiver supports every type of format, including files divided into parts such as 7z.001 or zip.001. Archives can also be edited by adding or removing files from within.
3) RAR is for those who are looking for a simple and free file compression app for Android smartphones. Basically it is a tool to create zip archives and an extractor of compressed files RAR, ZIP, TAR, GZ, BZ2, XZ, 7Z, ISO, ARJ.
4) WinZip is the official app to create and open ZIP files, which also supports ZIP, 7Zip, 7X, RAR and CBZ archives. The most useful thing is that WinZip also has the ability to locate zip files stored on cloud storage such as Google drive and OneDrive.
5) ALZip is another of the best free file management apps that works as a resource explorer and allows you to copy ZIP files and extract zip, RAR, 7Z, TAR, etc.
To open ZIP, RAR and other formats on iPhone and iPad
For Apple devices with iOS system such as the iPhone and iPad there are two free alternative applications to view ZIP and RAR files:- iZIP is a file manager with which it is very easy to extract files from an archive and also to create ZIP files to be sent via email. The application also supports RAR files and is therefore quite complete in its functions.
- Winzip is the iOS version of the famous PC program, which also supports viewing the files contained in the archives without having to extract them to a folder first.
You can therefore view documents, images and PDFs in Winzip, in ZIP and RAR files. However, the free app does not allow you to create archives on iPhone and iPad.
READ ALSO: Programs to compress extract and open ZIP, RAR or other archives
