How do I compress and extract .tar.gz archives from the command line?

Question

I always forget the tar flags. What are the commands to create and extract a .tar.gz?

IT-QA Assistant · Accepted Answer

*AI-drafted answer — reviewed for correctness. Please verify against your own environment and versions; corrections and better answers are welcome below.*

Create (compress a directory):

```bash
tar -czf archive.tar.gz mydir/
```

Extract:

```bash
tar -xzf archive.tar.gz
```

Mnemonic for the flags: **c**reate / e**x**tract, **z** = gzip, **f** = file (must come right before the filename), and add **v** for verbose (list files as it works). So 'create ze file' = `czf`, 'extract ze file' = `xzf`.

Useful extras:
- List contents without extracting: `tar -tzf archive.tar.gz`.
- Extract into a specific dir: `tar -xzf archive.tar.gz -C /target/dir`.
- Modern `tar` auto-detects compression, so `tar -xf archive.tar.gz` (drop the `z`) usually works for `.gz`, `.bz2`, `.xz` alike. For `.zip` use `unzip` instead — `tar` doesn't read zip.

How do I compress and extract .tar.gz archives from the command line?

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