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CBZ
What is a CBZ file?
A comic as a ZIP full of page images. Simple, open, what most readers prefer.
What CBZ is
CBZ is a container: a wrapper that holds streams encoded by something else. It is used for handing a finished file over.
The extension is .cbz, and the full name is Comic Book Archive (ZIP). Both matter less than what the file can hold, which is what the rest of this page is about.
The specification is public
Anyone can implement it without asking permission or paying a licence, which is why it turns up in so many programs and why files written twenty years ago still open.
It can hold a whole folder
CBZ stores a directory: names, folders and the structure between them. That is what lets it stand in for a folder in an email attachment.
It can hold several pages in one file
A CBZ file is not limited to one page, which matters when converting to something that is: a target that holds one image produces one file per page, and the numbering it chooses is worth checking before you send it on.
What opens CBZ
Calibre, YACReader and ComicRack read it, and so do most programs of the same kind.
If a file will not open, the format is rarely the problem — it is more often that the program predates it. Converting to something older is the reliable way past that, and it is what the rest of this site is for.
Opening it in a browser
No browser reads it.
That is the single most common reason to convert it: not that the format is bad, but that the place you want to show the file cannot read it.
It is a delivery format
CBZ is meant to be handed over rather than worked in. Editing one is possible and rarely pleasant; the sane approach is to change the source and export again.
The facts, in one place
| Extension | .cbz |
|---|---|
| Media type | application/vnd.comicbook+zip |