Unzipping files in Python

In this article we will see how to unzip the files in python we can achieve this functionality by using zipfile module in Python.

What is a zip file

ZIP file is a file format that is used for compressing multiple files together into a single file. It is used in an archive file format that supports lossless data compression and reduces storage requirements it also improves data transfer over standard connections. Zip files make the task of sharing multiple files easy by comprising them into one. The ZipFile class contains extractall() and extract() methods which are used for unzipping the files.

extractall() 

The extractall() method is used to extract all the files present in the zip file to the current working directory. Files can also be extracted to a different location bypassing the path parameter.

Syntax: ZipFile.extractall(file_path , members=None, pwd=None)

Parameters:

• file_path: location where archive file needs to be extracted, if file_path is None then contents of zip file will be extracted to current working directory
• members: It specifies the list of files to be extracted, if not specified, all the files in the zip will be extracted. members must be a subset of the list returned by namelist()
• pwd: the password used for encrypted files, By default pwd is None.

extract()

The extract() method is used to Extract a member from the zip to the current working directory. The file can also be extracted to a different location bypassing the path parameter.

 Syntax: ZipFile.extract(member, file_path=None , pwd=None)

• members: It specifies the name of files to be extracted.
• file_path: location where archive file needs to be extracted, if file_path is None then contents of zip file will be extracted to the current working directory
• pwd: the password used for encrypted files, By default pwd is None.

Example 1: Extracting all the files present in the zip

Import the zipfile module Create a zip file object using ZipFile class. Call the extractall() method on zip file object and pass the path where the files needed to be extracted and Extracting the specific file present in the zip.

Python3

# importing the zipfile module
from zipfile import ZipFile

# loading the temp.zip and creating a zip object
with ZipFile("C:\\Users\\sai mohan pulamolu\\\
            Desktop\\geeks_dir\\temp\\temp.zip", 'r') as zObject:

    # Extracting all the members of the zip
    # into a specific location.
    zObject.extractall(
        path="C:\\Users\\sai mohan pulamolu\\Desktop\\geeks_dir\\temp")

Output

Example 2: Extracting the specific file present in the zip

Import the zipfile module Create a zip file object using ZipFile class. Call the extract() method on the zip file object and pass the name of the file to be extracted and the path where the file needed to be extracted and Extracting the specific file present in the zip.

Python3

# importing the zipfile module
from zipfile import ZipFile

# loading the temp.zip and creating a zip object
with ZipFile("C:\\Users\\sai mohan pulamolu\\Desktop\
             \\geeks_dir\\temp\\temp.zip", 'r') as zObject:

    # Extracting specific file in the zip
    # into a specific location.
    zObject.extract(
        "text1.txt", path="C:\\Users\\sai mohan pulamolu\\D\
        esktop\\geeks_dir\\temp")
zObject.close()

Output