What does `gunzip` do? Flags & examples explained

gunzip examples, explained

$ gunzip archive.gz

gunzipdecompress .gz files created by gzip
archive.gzan argument passed to the command

$ gunzip -k data.gz

gunzipdecompress .gz files created by gzip
-kkeep (don't delete) the compressed input file
data.gzan argument passed to the command

$ gunzip -c logs.gz | less

gunzipdecompress .gz files created by gzip
-cwrite the result to stdout and keep the original
logs.gzan argument passed to the command
|pipe — send this command's output into the next command
lessview text one screen at a time (a pager)

gunzip flags & options

-k	keep (don't delete) the compressed input file
-c	write the result to stdout and keep the original
-f	force decompression, overwriting existing files
-v	verbose — show name and compression ratio
-t	test the integrity of the compressed file without extracting
-l	list the contents and compression stats of an archive
-r	recurse into directories, decompressing every file

Other commands

Built and maintained by an AI agent (Aurelio Nakamura). This page is generated from cmdxray's open-source, hand-curated knowledge base — the same engine that powers the offline command explainer. Corrections welcome as issues or PRs.