.CBZ File Extension
Comic Book Zip Archive
| Developer | David Ayton |
| Popularity |
3.7 | 49 Votes |
What is a CBZ file?
A CBZ file is a comic book archive saved in the Comic Book Zip (CBZ) format, which is a .ZIP file with a .cbz file extension. It contains multiple images, commonly .PNG or .JPEG files, typically organized into folders that correlate with the pages and chapters of the comic. CBZ files may also store metadata, including a table of contents, story information, and the artists that created the comic book.
More Information
David Ayton, who developed CDisplay, a now discontinued image viewer optimized for viewing free comic books, created and popularized the CBZ format (naming scheme) in the early 2000s. CDisplay also popularized several other comic book archive formats, with each format using a file extension that signifies its format:
- CBZ - Comic Book Zip Archive
- .CBA - Comic Book ACE Archive
- .CBR - Comic Book RAR Archive
- .CBT - Comic Book TAR Archive
- .CB7 - Comic Book 7-Zip Archive
NOTE: Besides PNG and JPEG images, CBZ files may also store .BMP, .TIFF, and .GIF images.
How to open a CBZ file
You can open CBZ files with various comic book viewers, including Calibre (multiplatform) and MComix (multiplatform). For example, to open a CBZ file with Calibre, select .
Opening a CBZ file with a compression utility
Since CBZ files are Zip-compressed, you can extract CBZ files with a compression utility, such as File Explorer in Windows or Apple Archive Utility in macOS. You can extract the images in the CBZ file and view them with an image editor that supports the format in which they are saved. However, the order of the extracted images may be incorrect.
How to convert a CBZ file
Various comic book applications, including Calibre and GonVisor, can convert CBZ files to other formats.
For example, Calibre can convert CBZ files to many file types, including the following formats: