ALZ Format
A Korea-originated compression format from ALZip
History
ALZ is the native format of ALZip, developed in 1999 by ESTSoft of South Korea. Widely used in Korea, it was optimized for Korean filenames and split archives, and was effectively the standard format on the Korean internet during the 2000s.
Key Features
- DEFLATE-based — Uses the same algorithm as ZIP, ensuring stability
- Split archives — .a01, .a02, .a03 … format for splitting large files (originally to overcome floppy disk and email size limits)
- Password protection — ZipCrypto-style password encryption
- Korean filenames — CP949 codepage preserves Korean filenames safely
Strengths
Optimized for the Korean environment — preserves Korean filenames and offers simple, reliable split-archive handling. Compatible with ALZip for safely opening attachments received in Korea.
KingZip Support
KingZip extracts both single and split ALZ archives without needing ALZip installed. It supports password-protected ALZ files and auto-detects codepages so Korean filenames remain intact.