DevKits

application/*

application/x-tar

File extensions: .tar

Unix tape archive — bundles files without compression.

What is application/x-tar?

application/x-tar identifies a tar (tape archive) file — the traditional Unix way of bundling multiple files and directories into a single stream. Tar itself does not compress; it is almost always combined with gzip (.tar.gz) or xz (.tar.xz) for release archives.

Typical usage

Linux/BSD source and binary releases, Docker image exports, backup snapshots.

HTTP header example

Response header

Content-Type: application/x-tar; charset=utf-8

Registration status

This media type is not officially registered with IANA. It is widely used in practice, but strict clients or standards-conformant tooling may not recognize it — check your consumer's tolerance.

Related MIME types