unzip Archives • Linux Tips

Today’s article might seem like a strange one, but it’s all about how to unzip all the files in a directory. It’s something only a few folks will need to know and something you may not need all that often. However, those folks who need to know this, and those folks who need this often, will be grateful to learn this little tip.

I would think that this will be a short article, as I don’t see it taking up that many words. I’m not sure of the appeal, but I want to write it anyhow. So, if you want to know how to unzip all the files in a directory, this is the article for you!

For me, this is another article based on necessity. See, it’s I who frequently has to unzip a bunch of files all at once. They’re fortunately all in the same directory, making this just a pair of easy commands. Sometimes I have to unzip nested files, so I’ll include the command to do that along with the more simple command that I usually run.

Every month, I get a whole lot of documents from my accountant. For bandwidth’s sake, these get organized and compressed before they’re emailed to me. In theory, I’m supposed to go over them and verify them individually. At best, I open them all up and look at a few of them. I do a sanity check every few months. My accountant is an old lady and I’m pretty confident in her integrity. So, I’m pretty lax…

However, see, I’m supposed to check them… So, I kinda go through the motions and at least look at a few of the documents. That’s where this command comes in…

Unzip All The Files In A Directory:

For those following along, it has been a minute since you needed to open a terminal to follow one of these articles! Well, that wait is over! You know what to do. Otherwise, just press CTRL + ALT + T, and your default terminal should open.

With your terminal open, use the cd command to navigate to the directory that contains multiple .zip files. You should know how to do this, but it’s just:

cd <path/to/directory>

1	cd <path/to/directory>

Once you have reached the directory you’ve chosen, you can just run this command to unzip all the files in a directory:

unzip "*.zip"

1	unzip "*.zip"

Now, sometimes there will be folders inside that directory and those folders will also contain .zip files. To unzip the files recursively you’d just want to use the following find command first, like so:

find . -name "*.zip" -exec unzip {} \;

1	find . -name "*.zip" -exec unzip {} \;

That lovely command will scour the directory you’re in for sub-directories, enter those directories, and then unzip any files it finds in those sub-directories. It’s not all that complicated, you’re just finding files with .zip in their name and then executing the unzip command on them.

As I said at the start, it’s not one of those things you’ll need often – but when you do need it, you need it. Well, your life is significantly improved by it. I suppose it’s not technically a necessity. You could unzip all the files one by one or even unzip them using a GUI. Still, it’s handy to have.

Closure:

And there you have it. Today’s article is back to a shorter format article, largely because this is what I was thinking about today. Because of that, you got an article explaining how to unzip all the files in a directory – and how to do so recursively – unzipping files nested in sub-directories. You’ll eventually need it! Maybe…

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Today’s article is going to tell you how to unzip a .zip file in the Linux terminal. It shouldn’t be too complex, nor will it take a great deal of time to learn how to unzip a file.

In the Linux world, we don’t really see the .zip files all that often. We have other ways to compress files, but .zip is still there and you’ll sometimes come across them in your travels.

If you’re unaware, the .zip form of data-compression is actually a ratified standard. The format has been around since the late 80s and is one of the compression methods that supports loss-less compression. There are all sorts of compression formats and methods, but .zip has been around since forever and will probably exist long into the future.

If you want to unzip a .zip in a GUI, I’d say that you need look no further than PeaZip. It’s easy enough to compile from source, or you can find pre-built PeaZip packages for most distros. This article, on the other hand, is how to unzip a zip in the Linux terminal.

It’s not all that daunting and should be a pretty easy article for even a beginner to follow. Though, I suppose, any well-written article should be easy enough for a beginner to follow. Were I something other than a basic keyboard smasher, I’d probably be able to do that!

Read: Decompress a .tar.gz in the terminal

Unzip A .zip:

The headline clearly mentions doing this in the terminal, so you’re going to need an open terminal to continue. That’s relatively simple. Just press CTRL + ALT + T and your default terminal should open.

With your now-open terminal, let’s first make sure you have the ability to unzip a .zip file. To do that, let’s use:

which unzip

1	which unzip

That should return something akin to:

which unzip
/usr/bin/unzip

1 2	which unzip /usr/bin/unzip

If you do not get a result, you’ll need to install unzip from your system’s repositories. Trust me, it’s in there – unless you’re using a really, really basic distro.

Assuming you get results indicating that you have unzip, it’s actually easy to unzip a .zip in the Linux terminal. You just navigate to the correct directory and run:

unzip <file_name>

1	unzip <file_name>

Which, I suppose, is mostly all you’re going to need. I should also mention that when you’re attempting to run this command, you can generally type the first few letters of the file name, and then press TAB to auto-complete the file name, saving you some typing time and just generally making the whole thing easier.

Obviously, there’s more to the unzip command. You can check the man unzip page, but the more useful flags will get covered here. Seriously, check the man page. The command is absurdly complex, with tons of options for obscure uses.

For example, to unzip a .zip to a different directory, you just use the -d flag, like so:

unzip <file_name> -d /desired/path

1	unzip <file_name> -d /desired/path

If you need to enter the password, you can just use:

unzip -P <password> <file_name>

1	unzip -P <password> <file_name>

When you want to list the files without decompressing them, you just use the -l flag, like this:

unzip -l <file_name>

1	unzip -l <file_name>

If you want to test the ,zip file to see if it’s corrupted, you can use the -t flag.

unzip -t <file_name>

1	unzip -t <file_name>

Normally, it’ll extract the files and overwrite the existing files (if any). You can avoid that with -n flag:

unzip -n <file_name>

1	unzip -n <file_name>

When you unzip a .zip, you will find out that it happily creates new directories. You can avoid that with the -j flag, like this:

unzip -j <file_name>

1	unzip -j <file_name>

Do read the man page! There’s a zillion options.

Closure:

Seriously, read the man page. Learn how to unzip a .zip file – and then all the many, many options included. Of all the man pages out there, this one is one of the most complex ’cause this one little application has a ton of options. Even if you don’t intend to learn it all, read the man page!

Thanks for reading! If you want to help, or if the site has helped you, you can donate, register to help, write an article, or buy inexpensive hosting to start your own site. If you scroll down, you can sign up for the newsletter, vote for the article, and comment.

Tag: unzip

How To: Unzip All The Files In A Directory

Unzip All The Files In A Directory:

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Unzip A .zip File In the Linux Terminal

Unzip A .zip:

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