Detailed herein are embodiments of systems, methods, and apparatuses for decompression using hardware and software. For example, in embodiment a hardware apparatus comprises an input buffer to store incoming data from a compressed stream, a selector to select at least one byte stored in the input buffer, a decoder to decode the selected at least one byte and determine if the decoded at least one byte is a literal or a symbol, an overlap condition, a size of a record from the decoded stream, a length value of the data to be retrieved from the decoded stream, and an offset value for the decoded data, and a token format converter to convert the decoded data and data from source and destination offset base registers into a fixed-length token.