---
title: Apple Archive
framework: Apple Archive
role: collection
role_heading: Framework
platforms: [iOS 14.0+, iPadOS 14.0+, Mac Catalyst 14.0+, macOS 11.0+, tvOS 14.0+, visionOS 1.0+, watchOS 7.0+]
path: applearchive
---

# Apple Archive

Perform multithreaded lossless compression of directories, files, and data.

## Overview

Overview Apple Archive provides fast compression that includes file attributes, such as, ownership, permissions, flags, times, extended attributes, and error correction. Apple Archive offers these features: Multithreaded processing that uses all cores, is energy efficient, and yields faster results An ability to transport files and their attributes and use Apple File System (APFS) features when they’re available, for example, filesystem compression, full clones, and sparse files Flexible encoding formats, so you can use archives, for example, for error correction, digests, manifests, and external data storage API support for in-memory archive processing, streaming access, random access, and back-to-back archive and extraction

## Topics

### Apple Archive essentials

- [Compressing single files](accelerate/compressing-single-files.md)
- [Decompressing single files](accelerate/decompressing-single-files.md)
- [Compressing file system directories](accelerate/compressing-file-system-directories.md)
- [Decompressing and extracting an archived directory](accelerate/decompressing-and-extracting-an-archived-directory.md)
- [Compressing and saving a string to the file system](accelerate/compressing-and-saving-a-string-to-the-file-system.md)
- [Decompressing and parsing an archived string](accelerate/decompressing-and-parsing-an-archived-string.md)

### Apple Encrypted Archive essentials

- [Encrypting and Decrypting a String](applearchive/encrypting-and-decrypting-a-string.md)
- [Encrypting and Decrypting a Single File](applearchive/encrypting-and-decrypting-a-single-file.md)
- [Encrypting and Decrypting Directories](applearchive/encrypting-and-decrypting-directories.md)
- [ArchiveEncryptionContext](applearchive/archiveencryptioncontext.md)

### Apple Archive headers

- [ArchiveHeader](applearchive/archiveheader.md)

### Apple Archive streams

- [ArchiveStreamProtocol](applearchive/archivestreamprotocol.md)
- [ArchiveStream](applearchive/archivestream.md)
- [ArchiveByteStreamProtocol](applearchive/archivebytestreamprotocol.md)
- [ArchiveByteStream](applearchive/archivebytestream.md)

### Apple Archive errors

- [ArchiveError](applearchive/archiveerror.md)

### Constants

- [APPLE_ARCHIVE_API_VERSION](applearchive/apple_archive_api_version.md)

### Reference

- [Apple Archive structures](applearchive/apple-archive-structures.md)

## See Also

### Related Documentation

- [About Apple File System](foundation/about-apple-file-system.md)