Normally, files compressed using gzip can be restored to their original form using gzip -d or gunzip commands. What if you want to view the contents of a compressed file without uncompressing it? For this purpose, you need the zcat command utility.

Read Also: 18 tar Command Examples in Linux

Zcat is a command line utility for viewing the contents of a compressed file without literally uncompressing it. It expands a compressed file to standard output allowing you to have a look at its contents. In addition, zcat is identical to running gunzip -c command. In this guide, we will explain zcat command examples for beginners.

1. The first example shows how to view contents of a normal file using cat command, compress it using gzip command and view the contents of the zipped file using zcat as shown.

$ cat users.list $ gzip users.list $ zcat users.list.gz

2. To view multiple compressed files, use the following command with filenames as shown.

$ zcat users.list.gz apps.list.gz

3. To view contents of normal files use the -f flag, similar to cat command, for example.

$ zcat -f users.list

4. To enable pagination, you can use the more and less commands as shown (Also read: Why ‘less’ is Faster Than ‘more’ Command in Linux).

$ zcat users.list.gz | more $ zcat users.list.gz | less

5. To get the properties (compressed size, uncompressed size, ratio – compression ratio (0.0% if unknown), uncompressed_name (name of the uncompressed file) of a compressed file, use the -l flag.

$ zcat -l users.list.gz

6. To suppress all warnings, use the -q flag as shown.

$ zcat -q users.list.gz

For more information, see the zcat man page.

$ man zcat

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That’s all! In this short article, we’ve explained zcat command examples for beginners. Share your thoughts with us in the comments section below.