Compare software

bzip2 vs XZ Utils: catalog facts
bzip2	XZ Utils
Free Free and open source under a BSD-style licence.	Free The software is free under its open-source licence. Hosting, hardware and external…
Windows, macOS, Linux, Command line	Windows, macOS, Linux, Command line
Better compression than gzip on many inputs Limited recovery from damaged media	LZMA2 compression gives some of the best ratios available for general-purpose data, and the tools ship on effectively…
Slower than modern compressors such as zstd Releases are rare	Compression is slow and memory-hungry at high levels, and the 2024 backdoor incident in the upstream release tarballs…
Downloadable app	Downloadable app
Open source	Open source
License: bzip2-1.0.6	License: 0BSD
No account needed	Not stated if an account is needed
Works offline	Not stated if it works offline
Official website Full listing and sources Checked September 23, 2026	Official website Full listing and sources Checked September 22, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.