Compress and Decompress a . bzip2 File in Linux

In this tutorial, we will look at how to compress and decompress .bz2 files using the bzip2 tool in Linux. To compress a file(s), is to significantly decrease the size of the file(s) by encoding data in the file(s) using less bits, and it is normally a useful practice during backup and transfer of a file(s) over a network. On the other hand, decompressing a file(s) means restoring data in the file(s) to its original state.

Suggested Read: Learn Linux ‘tar’ Command with This 18 Examples

There are several file compression and decompression tools available in Linux such as gzip, 7-zip, Lrzip, PeaZip and many more.

Bzip2 is a well known compression tool and it’s available on most if not all the major Linux distributions, you can use the appropriate command for your distribution to install it.

$ sudo apt install bzip2     [On Debian/Ubuntu] 
$ sudo yum install  bzip2    [On CentOS/RHEL]
$ sudo dnf install bzip2     [On Fedora 22+]

The conventional syntax of using bzip2 is:

$ bzip2 option(s) filenames

How to Use “bzip2” to Compress Files in Linux

You can compress a file as below, where the flag -z enables file compression:

$ bzip2 filename
OR
$ bzip2 -z filename

To compress a .tar file, use the command format:

$ bzip2 -z backup.tar

Important: By default, bz2 deletes the input files during compression or decompression, to keep the input files, use the -k or --keep option.

In addition, the -f or --force flag will force bz2 to overwrite an existing output file.

------ To keep input file  ------
$ bzip2 -zk filename
$ bzip2 -zk backup.tar

You can as well set the block size to 100k upto 900k, using -1 or --fast to -9 or –best as shown in the below examples:

$ bzip2 -k1  Etcher-linux-x64.AppImage
$ ls -lh  Etcher-linux-x64.AppImage.bz2 
$ bzip2 -k9  Etcher-linux-x64.AppImage 
$ bzip2 -kf9  Etcher-linux-x64.AppImage 
$ ls -lh Etcher-linux-x64.AppImage.bz2

The screenshot below shows how to use options to keep the input file, force it to overwrite an output file and set the block size during compression

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