Windows 11 insider surprise: New update brings native archive creation

Windows 11, within the Insider program, received an update featuring native archive creation, a function announced earlier in the year. Surprisingly, these changes, now visible in build 25992, were not documented, catching users off-guard.

Windows Latest brings attention to the peculiar details. Native support extends to .zip, .7z, and .tar formats, allowing compression initiation from the file context menu, through right-clicking in Explorer. The extension of the built-in Windows 11 archiving functions has been long overdue. While the system efficiently unpacks various package formats and displays their contents, the real novelty is in the ability to create new archives.

Archive creation is now possible in the Insider program, after installing Windows 11 25992 in the Canary release or any later version. As noted by Windows Latest, this function works very efficiently, permitting almost instantaneous package creation from smaller files, mirroring the functionality of 7-Zip or WinRAR. Currently, Windows 11 doesn't support password-protected archive creation, but it is expected to be added soon.

In light of Windows 11's updates, it's crucial to mention the recently released version 23H2. This version should be available in Windows Update for most, if not all, Eleven users who regularly update their system. The installation should only take a few minutes, as it merely involves downloading a file that triggers already embedded changes within Windows 11.

We wish to remind you that most of the significant system updates have been continuously released throughout the year as part of subsequent Moment updates. Associated numerically marked "xxHx" releases have gradually lost their significance over the years, given the few new features they add to Windows.