cbr2cbz

A fast and reliable CBR to CBZ conversion tool for GNU/Linux, written in pure bash, with support for single-file and directory processing (including recursive and parallel workflows). It preserves timestamps, handles tricky filenames, skips already converted files, supports optional cleanup, and can inject ComicInfo.xml metadata during single-file conversion.

Requirements

• A GNU/Linux distribution (tested on Ubuntu)

• unrar-nonfree for RAR5+ support and zip for creating CBZ files

• nproc or getconf for CPU detection (usually pre-installed)

  sudo apt-get install unrar-nonfree zip

Installation

1. Clone this repository or download the cbr2cbz.sh script

2. Make it executable:

   chmod +x cbr2cbz.sh

3. (Optional) Move it to your PATH, for example:

   sudo mv cbr2cbz.sh /usr/local/bin/cbr2cbz

Usage

Convert a single CBR file

./cbr2cbz.sh file.cbr

Convert a single CBR file and inject ComicInfo.xml

./cbr2cbz.sh --comicinfo /path/to/ComicInfo.xml file.cbr

Convert all CBR files in a directory

./cbr2cbz.sh /path/to/comics

Convert recursively through subdirectories

./cbr2cbz.sh -r /path/to/comics

Process files in parallel

Use the -j or --jobs option to specify the number of parallel jobs (defaults to number of CPU cores):

# Use 4 parallel jobs
./cbr2cbz.sh -j 4 /path/to/comics

# Combine with recursive and cleanup
./cbr2cbz.sh -r -c -j 8 /path/to/comics

Show help

./cbr2cbz.sh --help

Inject ComicInfo Metadata

Use -i or --comicinfo to add a metadata XML file into the output archive as ComicInfo.xml. This option is supported only when processing a single input file. If the archive already contains ComicInfo.xml, the script asks whether to overwrite it.

./cbr2cbz.sh -i ./ComicInfo.xml ./issue_001.cbr

To skip the overwrite prompt and always replace an existing ComicInfo.xml, add:

./cbr2cbz.sh -i ./ComicInfo.xml --comicinfo-overwrite ./issue_001.cbr

Cleanup Original Files

To automatically remove the original CBR files after successful conversion, use the -c or --cleanup flag:

# Convert and remove original CBR files
./cbr2cbz.sh -c file.cbr

# Process a directory and clean up
./cbr2cbz.sh -c /path/to/comics

# Combine with recursive processing
./cbr2cbz.sh -r -c /path/to/comics

⚠️ Note: The cleanup option permanently deletes the original CBR files after successful conversion. Use with caution!

How It Works

1. Scans for CBR files in the specified location (recursively if -r is used)
2. Processes files in parallel (up to the number of CPU cores by default, or as specified by -j)
3. For each file:
   • Creates a temporary directory
   • Extracts the CBR (RAR) file contents using unrar
   • Optionally injects ComicInfo.xml when --comicinfo is used in single-file mode
   • Creates a new CBZ (ZIP) file with the same name
   • Preserves the original file's modification timestamp
   • If --cleanup is specified, removes the original CBR file
   • Cleans up temporary files
4. Shows progress and summary of processed files

Why Convert from CBR to CBZ?

• Open Format: CBZ uses the standard ZIP format, which is open and widely supported
• Better Compatibility: Many comic book readers have better support for CBZ
• Free Software: Avoids dependency on proprietary RAR format

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License

Thanks to

This repository is based on the original work from oogg06/cbr2cbz.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.