diff --git a/bzip2/build.sh b/bzip2/build.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000..75ab2c7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/bzip2/build.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,45 @@
+#!/usr/bin/env bash
+set -e
+
+DIR="$(cd "$(dirname "${BASH_SOURCE[0]}")" >/dev/null && pwd)"
+cd "$DIR"
+
+VERSION="1.0.8"
+INSTALL_DIR="$DIR/bzip2/install"
+
+# Idempotent: skip if already built
+if [ -f "$INSTALL_DIR/lib/libbz2.a" ]; then
+  echo "bzip2 already present, skipping build."
+  exit 0
+fi
+
+NJOBS="$(nproc 2>/dev/null || sysctl -n hw.ncpu 2>/dev/null || echo 2)"
+
+# Download
+if [ ! -d "bzip2-src" ]; then
+  curl -L "https://sourceware.org/pub/bzip2/bzip2-${VERSION}.tar.gz" -o bzip2.tar.gz
+  mkdir -p bzip2-src
+  tar xzf bzip2.tar.gz -C bzip2-src --strip-components=1
+  rm bzip2.tar.gz
+fi
+
+# Build static library with -fPIC
+cd bzip2-src
+make -j"$NJOBS" libbz2.a CC="${CC:-cc}" CFLAGS="-Wall -Winline -O2 -fPIC -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64"
+cd "$DIR"
+
+# Copy to package install dir
+rm -rf "$INSTALL_DIR"
+mkdir -p "$INSTALL_DIR"/{lib,include}
+
+# Library
+cp bzip2-src/libbz2.a "$INSTALL_DIR/lib/"
+
+# Headers
+cp bzip2-src/bzlib.h "$INSTALL_DIR/include/"
+
+# Clean up
+rm -rf bzip2-src
+
+echo "Installed bzip2 to $INSTALL_DIR"
+du -sh "$INSTALL_DIR"
diff --git a/bzip2/bzip2/__init__.py b/bzip2/bzip2/__init__.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..49c7fbd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/bzip2/bzip2/__init__.py
@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+import os
+
+DIR = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), "install")
+LIB_DIR = os.path.join(DIR, "lib")
+INCLUDE_DIR = os.path.join(DIR, "include")
+
+
+def smoketest():
+  assert os.path.isfile(os.path.join(LIB_DIR, "libbz2.a")), "libbz2.a not found"
+  assert os.path.isfile(os.path.join(INCLUDE_DIR, "bzlib.h")), "bzlib.h not found"
diff --git a/bzip2/pyproject.toml b/bzip2/pyproject.toml
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b7bbaa6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/bzip2/pyproject.toml
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+[build-system]
+requires = ["setuptools>=64", "wheel"]
+build-backend = "setuptools.build_meta"
+
+[project]
+name = "bzip2"
+version = "1.0.8"
+description = "bzip2 compression library (static build)"
+requires-python = ">=3.8"
+
+[tool.setuptools.packages.find]
+include = ["bzip2*"]
+
+[tool.setuptools.package-data]
+bzip2 = ["install/**/*"]
diff --git a/bzip2/setup.py b/bzip2/setup.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7dd2b7b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/bzip2/setup.py
@@ -0,0 +1,61 @@
+import os
+import platform
+import subprocess
+
+from setuptools.command.build_py import build_py
+
+try:
+  from wheel.bdist_wheel import bdist_wheel
+except ImportError:
+  bdist_wheel = None
+
+
+class BuildBzip2(build_py):
+  """Run build.sh to compile bzip2 before collecting package data."""
+
+  def run(self):
+    pkg_dir = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
+    marker = os.path.join(pkg_dir, "bzip2", "install", "lib", "libbz2.a")
+
+    if not os.path.exists(marker):
+      build_script = os.path.join(pkg_dir, "build.sh")
+      subprocess.check_call(["bash", build_script], cwd=pkg_dir)
+
+    super().run()
+
+
+cmdclass = {"build_py": BuildBzip2}
+
+if bdist_wheel is not None:
+
+  class PlatformWheel(bdist_wheel):
+    """Produce a platform-specific, Python-version-agnostic wheel."""
+
+    def finalize_options(self):
+      super().finalize_options()
+      self.root_is_pure = False
+
+    def get_tag(self):
+      system = platform.system()
+      machine = platform.machine()
+
+      if system == "Linux":
+        plat = f"linux_{machine}"
+      elif system == "Darwin":
+        plat = "macosx_11_0_arm64"
+      else:
+        plat = f"{system.lower()}_{machine}"
+
+      return "py3", "none", plat
+
+  cmdclass["bdist_wheel"] = PlatformWheel
+
+
+def setup():
+  from setuptools import setup as _setup
+
+  _setup(cmdclass=cmdclass)
+
+
+if __name__ == "__main__":
+  setup()
diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index eaea3f3..7f3f202 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -1,5 +1,6 @@
 [tool.uv.workspace]
 members = [
+  "bzip2",
   "capnproto",
   "cppcheck",
   "eigen",