Repair Corrupt ZIP File (Online Free): 2026 Update

Thanks to ZIP, we are able to store more files in a limited space, also to email, transfer and download a wide range of documents quickly without effort. While due to its extensive use, the cases of ZIP files get damaged or deleted out of the blue, become more frequently in our work. Whether you’re dying to know how to recover a corrupted ZIP file or you’re just the curious sort, this article will suit your needs well.

Key Takeaways

• There are quick fixes to repair ZIP files, free without using or installing any other 3rd-party service or tools: redownload the zip file, force extract the zip files again, reinstall the zip viewer tool, scan virus, repair with Windows command.
• To repair corrupt ZIP files online free, there are 2 online ZIP repair tools reliable to use: officerecovery and ziprepair. Though none of them guarantees a 100% zip recovery, they are still worth to try.
• Also, we can use Zip repair tools like WinRAR, DiskInternals and Cisdem Data Recovery to fix corrupted Zip files, easily and quickly.

 Cisdem Data Recovery for Windows and Mac

Best Tool to Repair Corrupted Files in ZIP Securely

• Repair corrupted image, video, Word, Excel, PPT, PDF files and others in ZIP archive folder
• Preview repaired files in ZIP before recovery
• Also recover deleted, lost and formatted ZIP files
• Restore other archives formats: zip, rar, iso, sit/sitx, etc.
• Support 1000+ file types: videos, photos, audio, documents, emails, bookmarks, etc.
• Recover unsaved files in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Keynote, Pages, Numbers, etc.
• Repair corrupted images, videos and documents
• Recover lost data from both internal and external storage devices
• Additional features: recover data from iCloud, create disk backup, create bootable macOS/Windows installer

Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7 Free Download macOS 10.15 or later

Method 1. Re-download

In the event that your corrupted ZIP file was originally obtained from website, cloud storage platform or any shared folder, the most direct way for repair is to re-download it. Then you can easily replace the damaged file with a fresh new copy which is unbroken. This option would be particularly effective when the ZIP corruption happens in the initial download process out of potential interruptions. But if the original source is found to be inaccessible, just proceed to other solutions.

Method 2. Force Extract

The above method proves to be of no avail? Another repair option using WinRAR is to extract your ZIP archive while keeping any broken files and ignoring the error messages. Then you may access to the unzip files working normally.

How to repair ZIP files free by forcing extraction?

1. Right-click on the damaged ZIP > select Open with WinRAR.
2. From WinRAR tool bar, choose “Extract To”. This will open the Extraction path and options window.
3. Under General tab, specify a destination path to save the extracted files. Bear in mind to tick “Keep broken files” in Miscellaneous section.
4. Click OK to start the extraction. If any error messages pop up, just ignore them and continue.

Method 3. Reinstall ZIP Decompression Tool

Most people tend to input blame to the ZIP corruption when they can’t access their ZIP files as usual. However, that was not always the case. Instead, the problematic ZIP decompression tool is also one of reasons leading to ZIP file not working issue. Under this condition, we’d better attempt to uninstall and reinstall the decompression program for ZIP file recovery.

How to recover ZIP file free via reinstalling decompression tool?

1. On Windows PC, type “Control Panel” in the search bar > open it.
2. Click “Uninstall a program” from the Programs section.
3. Scroll down to locate your ZIP tool or decompression software (mine is WinRAR) > click on it and select Uninstall button.
4. Wait for the uninstalling process to finish.
5. Then reinstall the uninstalled ZIP program on your PC, reuse it to open your ZIP archives again.

After the reinstallation, if you still get the corrupted ZIP file error message, move to the final method.

Method 4. Run Virus Scan

As mentioned before, ZIP file damage can be resulted from virus or malware attack. If this is your case, it’s suggested to carry out a virus scan to identify and clear off any threats that have bad influence on your ZIP documents, like Windows Security scan on a PC.

How to do ZIP file repair freely with virus scan?

1. Type Windows Security in the search bar > open it.
2. Select Virus & network protection from the left panel.
3. Click Scan options > tick Full scan > choose Scan now button.
4. Wait for the scan to be done, and follow up any prompts to remove detected viruses.
5. Open the corrupted ZIP file again to check if it’s usable.

Method 5. Fix Corrupted ZIP Files with CMD

Alternatively, some users have reported that they’ve successfully fixed their corrupted ZIP files by Command Prompt combined with WinZip utility. Once you’re utilizing WinZip on Windows PC, this solution is exactly for you. Even if you’re not, you can download WinZip app at first and then check out the following guide to recover corrupted ZIP file.

How to repair ZIP files free by CMD?

1. Press Win+S > enter cmd > click “Run as administrator” to bring up CMD.
2. Change the directory to the folder where your damaged ZIP file is placed.
3. Type: "C:\Program Files\WinZip\wzzip" -yf zipfile.zip > press Enter to execute this repair command.“File\WinZip” represents the location where you have installed WinZip application; while “zipfile.zip” represents the file name for your corrupt ZIP.
4. Open the folder containing your damaged ZIP archive. Finally you may get a repaired one.

Method 6. Repair ZIP File Online Free in officerecovery

To be honest, useful ZIP repair tools are not common online. Luckily, officerecovery is such a rare tool you can try, which specializes in scenarios when ZIP file can’t be successfully opened, or you see errors or warnings while opening the ZIP archive. It supports several archive formats like WinZip, RAR, 7-Zip, InfoZip, PKWARE ZIP. Also, it is a popular repair tool for documents like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, etc.

How to recover a damaged ZIP file online?

1. Visit the official website of officerecovery in your browser, drag your corrupt file into the repair box.
2. Click Start Repair button.
3. Wait for the corrupted ZIP file to be fixed.
4. By clicking Preview Results button, you can download the repaired ZIP archive.

Method 7. Repair ZIP File Online Free in Zip Repair

Another trustworthy tool to repair a ZIP file online for free is Zip Repair Online. It’s designed to deal with common errors like cannot opening ZIP file and invalid zipped folder. Likewise, only demo version of your repaired ZIP can be downloaded for free, while an entire document will cost $3.5.

How to repair a corrupt ZIP file online?

1. Visit the Zip Repair website.
2. Click Choose File to select your damaged ZIP archive > click Send for upload.
3. After uploading, this online tool will generate a reference number. Verify it and click Check button to start the fixing process.
4. After fixing, the number of files that have been recovered will be showed. Scroll down to click Download to save the repaired ZIP documents on computer. Meanwhile, a copy of the repaired ZIP will be sent to your email address provided before.

Method 8. Use WinRAR

WinRAR refers to a file archiver utility for Windows. It’s universally used to create and view archives in ZIP or RAR file formats, and unpack other numerous archive versions. Many users might lose sight of one useful archive option built in WinRAR utility --- its Repair archive feature. Just follow up the steps below to access it.

How to recover corrupted ZIP files free in WinRAR?

1. Head to the WinRAR homepage > click “Download WinRAR” button > follow the prompts to download and install the latest version of this program on your PC.
2. Open WinRAR > find and highlight the damaged ZIP file > select Tools menu > choose Repair archive option.
3. Click Browse to select a preferred directory to save the repaired ZIP archive file. Don’t forget to choose “Treat the corrupt archive as ZIP” if it hasn’t been selected.
4. Click OK to recover the broken ZIP file.

Method 9. Use DiskInternals

Born in 2017, DiskInternals ZIP Repair has become a freeware file archiver and ZIP repair tool utilized by numerous Windows users. It performs well in repairing a ZIP file which is inaccessible due to transmission errors or media damage, through restoring ZIP structure and extracting the contents of archive.

How to repair damaged ZIP file free with DiskInternals ZIP Repair?

1. Go to ZIP Repair homepage.
2. Click Try it Free to download this freeware.
3. Follow up the setup prompts > click Finish to install it on your PC.
4. Click Next in the Zip Repair Wizard.
5. Click Browse to select the ZIP file you need to repair > click Next to start. The output folder path will generate automatically in the Repair file bar, which can be also changed as you wish.
6. After repairing, the tool will list out all the repaired archive files and you should continue to click Next.
7. Click Finish > open the output ZIP archive folder to check if your ZIP files are properly fixed.

Method 10. Use Cisdem Data Recovery

Have extracted all the files from a ZIP archive, but only to find all the images, videos, office documents in the archive corrupted? Don't worry, we still have a practical approach: use a piece of dedicated file recovery software --- Cisdem Data Recovery.

It is a feature-packed tool trusted by over 2 million users, designed to recover deleted, formatted and all kinds of lost data, from both internal and external storage devices that are connected to a Mac or PC. It does excellent on recovering deleted files in various type, but also equivalently great on repairing files, especially for repair corrupted videos, images and documents. And the repair process is straightforward, when users click to preview a recoverable items, if Cisdem detects that its original file is corrupted, it will start the repairing process automatically.

Main Features of Cisdem Data Recovery

• Recover deleted, formatted files from various storage media
• Recover unsaved files in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Keynote, Pages, Numbers, etc.
• Repair damaged photos, videos, documents, songs, archives, emails, bookmarks, etc.
• Support data recovery from crashed Mac/PC
• Preview files before recovery
• Quickly filter and search files
• Save recovered files to local disk or to cloud
• Create disk backups

How to repair corrupted files in a ZIP file on Windows/Mac?

1. Extract all the files from the corrupted ZIP first.
2. Free download Cisdem Data Recovery on your computer.
   Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7 Free Download macOS 10.15 or later
3. Launch it. Navigate to Hardware Disk, select the location where the extracted files from the corrupted ZIP are stored , and click Search for Lost Data to continue.
4. During or after scanning, go to Type > Pictures, Videos, Documents or other folders, according to the type for the files that you've extracted from the corrupted ZIP file.
5. Double click to preview the corrupted files, and click on the File Repair tool to start fixing.
6. Then select all repaired files, click Recover to save them to your drive.

Summary

Reasons causing a corrupted ZIP file can be various, but we basically cover all the possible solutions here in this guide to help you repair the ZIP files. Online free ZIP recovery tools are worth a try in general, even they often fail to repair your files, however, they are free to use and there is no need to install any plugin or software onto your device. But visit safe websites only, as we recommended in this article. Also, we are lucky to have professional ZIP file recovery tools like WinRAR, Cisdem Data Recovery, etc.