Oct 29, 2019 just like windows, mac also allows a seamless solution to do pen drive format. Be careful using these instructions to ensure you are formatting the correct disk. In the file system list box, choose exfat, type in a volume label. How to format usb flash drive to fat32 on mac os xmacos easeus. Read mac formatted drives with windows the tech guy.
If you only use a mac computer, you can format your thumb drive so it can work on windows systems. Do these steps and you will then be able to format your flash drive on your mac. Although we know its limitation of 4gb file size only. If you have a usb flash drive inserted in your mac, you can see it under the external in the disk utility. In this article, we are taking a closer look at the disk utility, which comes with all recent versions of the mac os x operating system and how you can use it to format usb drive on mac. Jul 05, 2017 youll see the drives file system displayed to the right of format under the general heading. How to erase a disk for mac use disk utility to erase format a hard disk, ssd, flash drive, or other storage device.
If you have an old flash drive or one that was formatted to work with windows or another operating system, you can still format your flash drive to work on a mac. How to encrypt a usb drive on mac like pc, mac generally includes encryption software in their desktops already so you will not have to download another software program. This tool can help you securely and quickly format usb flash drive, external hard drive under macos catalina. Sep 26, 2018 need to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. The other formats microsofts ntfs and apples mac os extended dont work well on the other operating system. Format usb flash drive external hard drive with macclean360 on macos catalina.
In device manager, look for your usb drive in disk drives tab. How to format your usb drive with exfat in windows 7810. Fat32 file allocation table readwrite fat32 from both native windows and native mac os x. Usb drive format tool is a tiny freeware utility designed for formatting any usb storage devices usb flash drive, usb stick, usb pen drive, usb portable drive, and sdcard in fat, fat32, exfat. A drive with two partitions, for example can have one partitioned in exfat and another in a mac os extended format, so you can use the same drive on a mac and a windows computer. We delete comments that violate our policy, which we encourage you to read. How to format a usb flash drive on windows 10 windows. Go to the applications folder on your macs hard drive, then. Use the file system dropdown menu and select the ntfs option.
We all make mistakes, and you wouldnt be the first person in the world to accidentally format a usb flash drive. Connect the drive you wish to format for dual compatibility to the mac click the drive name on the left side list in disk utility, and then click the erase tab click the pulldown menu alongside format and select msdos fat optionally, give the drive a name. Jan, 2019 another disadvantage is if youre formatting a thumb drive larger than 32gb using a windows pc, you need to download extra software in order to do the formatting. If you want to partition your flash drive on your mac, then you will be glad to know that it is possible. How to format a usb drive for mac and pc compatibility.
The easiest way to do that is hit cmd and the spacebar at. How to format a flash drive for mac and pc compatibility in macos. Now, click on the top partition, name it windows, and change its format to msdos. After that, go ahead and launch the finder and click on your flash drive detected by your mac. Quickly format an external hard drive for mac and windows pc. Insert the usb drive into an open port on your windows computer and then launch the windows disk management utility. Double click on the finder icon that is located in the dock. In this article, we will introduce 5 disk formatting tools for windows and mac to help you securely format hard drive usb flash drive or memory card on a pc or a mac. You can format a hard drive or usb flash disk specifically so that it will be compatible with both mac os x and windows pc computers. How to format flash drive for pcmac with large file sizes. Apr 30, 2016 now, lets take a look at some ways you can format your usb drive on windows 10. Formatting a disk or volume erases all the files on it. When you have a flash drive, the first thing you may need to do is format it in such a way so it can be read by both mac and windows machines. Have you ever ran into a problem where youre trying to use a flash drive on both windows and mac.
Fat32 works with all versions of windows, mac os, linux, game consoles, etc. Free tool to format usb to exfat from fat32 or ntfs in windows 7810. How to format usb flash drive to ntfs in windows 10. Fortunately, theres a great tool that you can use for free to create bootable macos media on a usb drive in a windows 10 environment. However, each of these methods comes with deficiencies. Macclean360 also offers disk management tool, disk manager. To do this, you can take the assistance of disk utility, which is a dedicated system component in mac. Format usb flash drives to work with both mac and windows 7. Find my computer in the start menu or by typing it in the search bar. In disk utility on your mac, you can format an external disk for a windows computer.
Follow these easy steps to format a hard drive in windows 10, windows 8, windows 7, windows vista, or windows xp. How to format a flash drive for mac and pc compatibility in macos high sierra. If this is the case for you, rightclick the drive you want to format and click initialize disk. If you havent already plugged in your usb flash drive in to your mac. You can then rightclick in the empty space and select new simple volume to create a partition and format it with the windows ntfs or fat32 file systems. External data storage devices such as usb flash drives, external hard disk drives hdds, and solid state drives ssds provide one of the easiest ways to transfer files between separate computers without accessing the internet. However, single files on a fat32 drive cant be larger than 4gb.
How to format usb flash drive on mac stepbystep tutorial. The first format, fat32, is fully compatible with mac os x, though with some drawbacks. How to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. Insert the flash drive or hard drive you want to format for windows compatibility. Under file system box, select exfat for this drive. The formatted data also can be recovered by mac data recovery software.
Both mac os x and windows also support the fat32 file system, but we dont recommend it for hard drives. Rename the usb flash drive, choose the format as msdos fat for format. Now you can share files between a mac and windows computer. Save any files you need to another volume before formatting. If the drive comes formatted in ntfs, which is the default file system for windows, youre going to want to reformat the drive because mac os x. Windows cannot read a mac formatted disk, but macs can read a windows formatted one. This is the easiest way and simply requires you to plug in your usb drive, open the windows file explorer and right click your drive to view a number of actions that you can perform.
In the disk utility app on your mac, choose view show all devices. How to format a hard drive windows 10, 8, 7, vista, xp. How to choose the best format for usb drive on windowsmaclinux. In the sidebar, select the disk you want to format to use with. Feb 21, 2020 its a universal format that is compatible with mac os xmacos, windows, linux and dos systems. How to format and create a usb drive or pen drive that is compatible with windows 10, 8, 7 or mac or linux.
Format usb drive, external hard drive on macos catalina. Give the drive a descriptive name and leave the default settings. How to choose the best format for usb drive on windowsmac. How to format external hard drive to use on mac and pc. This thing is still unknown for many users but doesnt worry its not complex. A windows computer, mac, smartphone, xbox and any place that stores data must adopt particular kinds of file systems to read, write, store and organize data on various storage media, including a flash drive, memory card, pen drive, hard drive, hdd or ssd. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac. How to convert a macformatted drive to a windows drive. How to format a usb flash drive using file explorer. Format a dr ive for mac os x and windows sign in to comment. If you want to use a different file system on your usb drive, youll need to format it.
So, if you want to use an external hard drive on both windows and mac, you need to format it to a filesystem that is compatible with windows pc and mac. For apple mac users, there are two ways to format a usb flash drive to fat32, including disk utility and. Moving from windows to mac transferring your documents. Aug 16, 2019 to clean and format a usb thumb drive with command prompt, use these steps. To format a drive on a mac, youll need the builtin disk utility application. Dec, 2019 you can format the external hard drive or usb drive to make it compatible with both mac and windows machines. Then click the second partition, name it mac, and change its format to mac os extended journaled. Aomei partition assistant standard is free usb exfat format tool that will assist you format usb flash drive, usb hard drive, thumb drive, pen drive, and sd card from fat32 or ntfs to exfat. If you want to share your files with the most devices and none of the files are larger than 4 gb, choose fat32.
The mac drive may have an efi system partition on it. To share a usb drive between a mac and a windows pc, there are two disk formats to choose from. To find it, type disk management or format disk in windows search and select create and format hard disk partitions. How to use diskpart to clean and format drive not working. If youre lucky, you can just rightclick each partition on the mac drive and select delete volume to remove the partitions. Your mac computer comes with a handy utility appropriately called disk utility, which can be used to format any. If you want to use the drive between a windows and mac machine, you can format it to fat32. The restore device defaults button will revert your drives settings to default. Click ok to the format warning and wait until the process is complete. If you want the usb device to be readable by the both mac and windows devices, then you have three options ntfs, fat or exfat.
So, if users anticipate using the flash drive with more than one operating system, they will definitely benefit from the fat32 file system. Now, when you are formatting a usb drive on mac, you have an important decision to make. Search for command prompt, rightclick the top result, and select the run as administrator option. Select your usb flash drive on the sidebar, choose erase. Like i said, if you want to use the device for both. Here you will see the devices capacity, file system and allocation unit size. So, if it needs to be formatted at all, you need to format it as fat32. Because fat32 supports only up to 4 gb large files, it should be used only with flash drives.
Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac. Read only ntfs from native mac os x to readwrite format ntfs from mac os x, here are some alternatives. Here, we will show you three ways to format usb flash drive, external hard drive, etc on macos catalina. Thankfully, exfat a strict upgrade over fat32, is a file system optimized for usb flash drives. It is freeware software available easily on the internet and can be used to read mac files on windows interface. The overwhelming majority of usb flash drives you buy are going to come in one of two formats. Rightclick on the drive you want to format, click on format. How to format a flash drive to work on os x and windows. Sep 19, 2011 the overwhelming majority of usb flash drives you buy are going to come in one of two formats. Here in this article we would use certain third party tools to read the mac formatted drive on windows. In this windows 10 guide, well walk you through the steps to use the diskpart command tool to clean and format a hard drive to fix data corruption and other disk problems. If you have files larger than 4 gb, but still want pretty good support across devices, choose exfat. For most reasons to erase, including when reformatting a disk or selling, giving away, or trading in your mac.
Need to format an external hard drive for mac and windows. Format a drive using disk utility on a mac launch disk utility applications utilities. Go ahead and plug in your flash drive in the usb port on your mac. This article will teach you how to format the usb flash drive so both macs and pcs can read them. In the file system list box, choose exfat, type in a volume label if you want, and then click start.
Format an external hard drive or usb flash drive for mac os x. How to password protect usb flash drive on macos mojavehigh sierra. In the screenshot below, the drive is formatted with the exfat file system. Insert an 8gb or larger flash drive into a usb port on the mac. If your external drive saves files larger than 4gb or you plan to save larger files to. Jan 15, 2019 its exactly the same procedure if you need to reformat a flash drive on a mac. Under the devices and drivers section, rightclick the flash drive and select the format option.
Although microsoft just developed and released bitlocker for windows and theres no mac implementation, but with help of m3 bitlocker loader for mac, bitlocker password protected usb flash drive can be readable on mac. This article shows you how to download a macos dmg file, format a usb drive using a guid partition table, burn the dmg to the drive and boot your mac from the usb. Among many quality flash drives, sandisk extreme pro 128 gb drive is considered the most popular usb flash drive for windows and mac. How to format a usb flash drive on windows 10 windows central. Disk drill, a premium data recovery solution for mac os x with support for all popular file formats and common storage devices, is here to help you recover deleted files from usb flash drive.
There are many tools can help you format usb flash drive, portable hard drive, memory card or other storage device on macos catalina. How to format internal andor external drive to work properly on mac and windows computers. If you need to format external hard drive mac or windows, you may also consider the exfat files system. If you are techy and use windows and mac computers frequently, then you might need to transfer data between mac and pc. Select your external hard drive or usb flash drive from the list on the left. Means if one want to transfer movie or any stuff greater than 4gb it cant be done in this format. Volume format most manufacturers use the fat 32 or msdos fat volume format. Opening disk management can be done a number of ways depending on your version of windows, but the easiest method is to type diskmgmt. How to share an external hard drive between mac and windows. In the application windows look for the utilities folder. Youll generally use one of the mac os options for a maconly flash drive e. Ntfs windows nt file system readwrite ntfs from native windows.
To format the usb drive to fat32, follow the next steps. A file system is a method and structure of data used by an operating system, called windows, linux or mac os, for reading media files such as disks, removable drives, etc. Go to the applications folder on your macs hard drive, then go to the utilities folder, and launch disk utility. Plug the drive into a usb socket if you have a recent macbook or macbook pro that only has usbc connectors, youll need a usbc to usba adaptor. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac laptop mag. Whether the usb should be readable by windows machines and mac machines or just by mac and not readable in windows. The quickest way is to search on spotlight and click. Usb flash drive format tool free download and software. Go to applications utilities double click and open disk utility. Macs and pcs use different file systems, which can make it tricky to put data from your mac on a flash or hard drive and give it to a windows.
Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac apple. Also windows may believe that your drive is damaged and ask you to format the drive. Open disk management, the hard drive manager included with all versions of windows. If you want to format a hard drive or usb flash drive on your computer, disk formatting tool is the best choice. How to create macos bootable usb on windows 10 uubyte. Go to my computer and rightclick on your usb drive. Here are three proven methods on how to format usb flash drive to ntfs. Three ways to format usb flash drive, external hard drive on macos catalina. How to format a usb flash drive on a mac techwalla. Learn how to format your usb flash drive or usb external drive so you can use it on both mac os x and windows computers. You can use this format if you share the drive between mac os x and windows computers and have no files larger than 4gb.
Following are the top features of this usb flash drive. Format a usb drive as exfat for mac and windows compatibility. Follow these instructions to partition flash drive on mac. It can help you manage system partitions, erase an external unit like a thumb drive, and even repair your disk.
Create a windows 10 bootable usb flash drive on a mac. Format usb flash drives to work with both mac and windows. How to format a usb drive for mac and pc compatibility youtube. Using windows format method means that the resultant udf drive cannot be recognized on os x at least as of os x 10. To format a hard drive for compatibility of both mac and windows you can use fat32 format which has both readwrite capability on winmac respectively. The best ways to format an external drive for windows and.
Its exactly the same procedure if you need to reformat a flash drive on a mac. One simple way to make the drive readable on both platforms is to format it to exfat, which both operating systems can understand. How to read a macformatted drive on a windows pc safe. Yes, connecting an external hard drive or usb flash key to a mac will generally read and work fine as is because the mac can easily read other filesystem formats, including windows msdos, fat, fat32, exfat, and ntfs formats, but unless you intend on using the drive between a windows and mac machine, formatting it to be entirely mac compatible. It is important to use this mac since it will be used to identify the correct windows drivers. Go to open disk utility, which is located under applications in the finder menu.
Sharing a hardflash drive across windows, os x, and linux. Just carry on reading to learn the methods in real. Now, lets take a look at some ways you can format your usb drive on windows 10. How to format usb drives on windows 10 make tech easier. Dec 29, 2015 the instructions below are for windows 10, but other versions of windows from windows 7 and up can also format an external drive as exfat for use with mac as well. Rightclick your flash drive and then select format.
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