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Archive Content Inspector

Inspect a ZIP, TAR or GZIP archive without extracting: file list, sizes, compression, suspicious paths — and a refusal note for every violation.

Choose an archive

The tool reads the archive’s own metadata. It does not extract anything, and suspicious paths are flagged, not executed.

Report

The entry list and its verdicts appear here.

Your file is never sent to a server. It is read and processed by your own browser, and the results are not stored.

How to use it

  1. Choose a .zip, .tar or .gz file.
  2. Read the entry list: sizes, compression, suspicious flags.
  3. Download the CSV report, then extract only if you decide it is safe.

Limits worth knowing

  • ZIP sizes are read from the central directory (no inflation); TAR members are listed from headers; .gz payloads are verified against the trailer when single-member.
  • Archives above 512 MB are refused before parsing; encrypted ZIPs are reported as encrypted, not opened.
  • This is inspection only — the tool does not extract or rewrite anything.
  • Suspicious entries are listed with their reason; you decide whether to proceed.

Trust, but verify — or refuse

An archive is a guest you have not met. The rest of a ZIP file is structurally fine right up until an extractor you trust unwraps “../../.ssh” — and the .gz that decompresses from 20 KB to 40 GB is not a file, it is a denial of service. Inspection is how you look before you let it in.

The verdicts use the same rules as the extractors: absolute paths, traversal, drive letters, and anything over budget. An archive that has any of those is refused there, not sanitised.

The central directory is the metadata

A ZIP lists everything in its central directory at the end of the file — sizes, offsets, CRC-32s. This inspector reads that and stops there, which is why it is fast and why it never has to inflate a decompression bomb to tell you something is wrong.

Frequently asked questions

Does Archive Content Inspector upload my files to any server?

No. Archive Content Inspector runs in your browser, and the file is read there rather than sent to a server for processing. Our host still sees ordinary page-request metadata, which is described on the privacy page.

Is Archive Content Inspector free to use?

Yes, Archive Content Inspector is free, with no paid tier, no account, and no watermark added to your output. The limits are technical rather than commercial: file size, page count and supported formats are listed on this page.

What file formats and sizes are supported?

Archive Content Inspector supports .zip, .tar, .gz files up to 512MB directly in your browser.

Does it extract the archive?

No — it inspects. You get the file list, sizes, and a verdict for every entry. If you decide the archive is honest, extract it with the matching tool below.

What is “suspicious”?

Traversal (“../”), absolute paths, drive letters, or entries above the size budget — the same rules the extractors enforce, shown per entry instead of hidden behind an error.

Why GZIP shows “verified” only for one member?

Single-member .gz files carry a trailer with CRC-32 and size, which this tool checks. Multi-member archives decompress fine but skip the footer check — reported as such.

Is anything uploaded?

No. The archive bytes never leave this tab. Inspecting an archive is reading it — there is no reason for a network round trip.