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 “MS-DOS (FAT)”. Optionally, give the drive a name. Click the “Erase” button to format the drive for Mac & Windows PC compatibility. Mac 101: Format choices for USB flash drives. Hook it up to your Mac and launch the Disk Utility app, located in your Utilities folder (which is in Applications). Your new drive should appear in the left-hand column, and clicking the 'Partition' tab will bring up info on the drive which includes its current format.
Advertisement Do you need to read a Mac drive on Windows? Unfortunately, it’s not a straightforward process; you can’t just connect the Mac drive and expect it to work. Here’s everything you need to know to get it working. Why Can’t Windows Read Mac Drives? Windows and macOS use different file systems.
Windows uses the NTFS file system for its internal drives, whereas Apple replaced HFS+ with its successor— Apple File System (APFS)—in early 2017. Today, APFS is used on Macs, iPhones, iPads, and Apple TVs. External hard disks and USB drives are generally formatted with the Windows FAT32 file system for maximum compatibility.
Most devices, including Macs, can read and write from FAT32 devices. There’s even a way to Some of the most common methods of adding NTFS support broke with the recent release of El Capitan, but you can still write to your Windows drives with a bit of tinkering. All new Macs will be formatted with APFS. Older Mac drives may still be formatted with the HFS+ file system. Windows can’t read either file system by default. We’ll show you how to access your Mac-formatted APFS or HFS+ drive on Windows.
How to Read APFS on Windows Firstly, let’s look at how to read the newer Apple File System format on Windows. All these apps will allow you to read drives from any updated Apple device, not just Macs. The app is focussed around the freshly redesigned Disk Management Window.
It acts as a hub for all the Mac drives connected to Windows. You will also be able to see your APFS or HFS+ drive directly within File Explorer, allowing easy integration with the rest of the Windows operating system. Other useful features include the ability to create and partition Mac disks direct from your PC, a powerful disk repair feature, and robust security tools. The standard version costs $49.99.
There’s also a Pro version. It adds several extra features, including automatic file defragmentation, support for RAID setups, and a way to create Mac ISO files.
The app provides read and write access to APFS-formatted partitions, read and write access to compressed and cloned files, and read-only support for encrypted volumes. It supports disk auto-mounting at start-up, but doesn’t have MacDrive’s partition tools. MacDrive has one big advantage over Paragon’s app: HFS+ support. Paragon APFS for Windows only supports APFS-formatted drives. If you have some older Mac drives lying around that are still running HFS+, you would need to separately purchase Paragon HFS+ for Windows.
MacDrive, therefore, is a more economical option. One license—which costs $49.95—works on three Windows PCs. Download: ($49.95) 3. UFS Explorer Standard Access Our third and final recommendation for reading APFS drives on Windows is UFS Explorer Standard Recovery. Once again, it’s a paid option. The app will cost you €21.95. UFS Explorer Standard Recovery is the most versatile app on this list.
It can read the two formats we care about—APFS and HFS+—as well as NTFS, FAT, FAT32, exFAT, SGI XFS, Linux JFS, Unix/BSD, UFS/UFS2, and VMware VMFS. As such, this is the app you should choose if you find yourself hopping between lots of different operating systems during your day. UFS Explorer Standard Recovery also comes with RAID support as standard. The app has a built-in RAID builder, so you can customize it for your array. There is a free version of the app with no time limits, but it will only let you copy files smaller than 256KB in size. Download: (€21.95) How to Read HFS+ on Windows If your Mac-formatted drive is still running HFS+, use one of these three methods instead. Install Apple HFS+ Drivers If you only need read access, you can install the Apple HFS+ drivers for Windows.
Be sure to remove Paragon or MacDrive before proceeding. Download the correct, then follow these steps:. Copy the ApplsHFS.sys and AppleMNT.sys files to C: Windows System32 drivers. Merge the AddAppleHFS.reg file with your Windows registry. Restart your system. The video above also demonstrates the process.
After restarting, your Mac-formatted drive should show up under This PC. This method only gives you read access to the drive. If you would like to edit or delete files, try one of the alternative methods below. 2. HFSExplorer HFSExplorer is completely free. You can use it to access Mac file systems from Windows without paying a dime. The developer hasn’t updated it since October 2015 due to the arrival of APFS, but it still works on older systems.
HFSExplorer requires. We generally recommend against having Java installed, but it’s necessary here unless you want to spend money. You also need to run the app as an Admin. This tool is simple to use. Connect your Mac-formatted drive to your Windows system, open HFSExplorer, and click File Load File System From Device.
HFSExplorer can automatically locate any connected devices with HFS+ file systems and open them. You can then extract files from the HFSExplorer window to your Windows drive. Note that HFSExplorer is read-only, so you can’t modify or delete files on your Mac drive. It also doesn’t integrate with Windows File Explorer—files are available in the HFSExplorer application and you must copy them elsewhere. Download: (Free) 3. Paragon HFS+ for Windows is a paid application, but it distinguishes itself with additional features. Unlike HFSExplorer, Paragon HFS+ for Windows provides full read/write access to Mac drives and promises high performance.
It even integrates HFS+ file systems with Windows Explorer or File Explorer on Windows. Any Windows program can read from or write to the Mac drive. The app costs $19.95, but it also offers a 10-day free trial. If you just need to recover files from a drive, 10 days is plenty of time to install this file system driver, copy your files over, and uninstall it. Paragon HFS+ doesn’t need Java to work.
Download: ($19.95) Or Format the Mac Drive for Windows If you have a Mac drive lying around and you no longer have a Mac, you’re not stuck with the Mac file system forever. After recovering the files from your drive with one of the tools above, you can then format the drive and convert it to a standard FAT32 partition that will work with most devices. Formatting will erase all the files on your drive, so make sure you have. To format the drive, just use the dialog that appears when you connect the drive to your computer.
Check out our guide to The FAT and FAT32 formats support up to 16TB. Yet Windows sets a 32GB limit for formatting with FAT or FAT32. We'll show you how to format larger drives. Explore more about:,.
Nowadays, when you buy a USB drive, you can use it right out of the box with your Mac. However, unless it’s been designed for use with a Mac, it won’t be formatted using macOS’ preferred file system (either Mac OS Extended or APFS, depending on which version of macOS you’re running).
That’s because most of the computers in the world run Windows, and Windows uses a different file system, usually one known as Fat32. Drives formatted as Fat32 can be read from and written to by macOS, but it’s not optimal and you’re more likely to run into problems than if you use macOS’ native format. So, if you’ve bought a USB drive that’s formatted as Fat32, or any other format other than Mac OS Extended (also known as HFS+) or APFS, here’s how to format a USB drive on Mac. It’s exactly the same procedure if you need to reformat a flash drive on a Mac. How to format a USB drive on a Mac 1. Plug the drive into a USB socket (if you have a recent MacBook or MacBook Pro that only has USB-C connectors, you’ll need a USB-C to USB-A adaptor). Open a new Finder window and click on the drive.
Make sure it has no files on it that you need. The process of reformatting it will wipe all the data from it. Once you’ve copied any files you need from the USB drive to your Mac, go to ApplicationsUtilities and double-click on Disk Utility. Click on the USB drive in the sidebar and then choose Erase from the toolbar at the top of the window. In the window that drops down type a name for the formatted drive in the box next to Name. Choose a format from the dropdown menu. If you have previously stored sensitive data on the drive, click the Security tab.
Choose a security level using the slider. The further to the right you move the slider, the more ‘passes’ the erase tool will make and the more securely files will be deleted.
However, it also increases the time it takes to format the drive quite considerably. Click Ok then click Erase. Tip: You don’t need to erase a whole drive to delete files securely. If you have confidential files or sensitive data you need to remove from your Mac completely, you should use File Shredder.
It’s specifically designed to securely delete sensitive data and will render it unrecoverable. You can download CleanMyMac X for free. Which format to choose? If your Mac is running macOS High Sierra or later, you have two options for file formats: APFS and Mac OS Extended. Which should you choose?
The key point is that disks formatted as APFS won’t be recognized by Macs running versions of macOS older than High Sierra. So if you think you might need to plug the USB drive into a Mac running an older version of macOS, format it as Mac OS Extended.
APFS is optimized for SSD (solid state drive) such as flash drives, so if you reformat a flash drive on a Mac, you should definitely choose APFS (unless you plan to use it with a pre-High Sierra Mac, of course). Even on hard drives, however, APFS is faster and more reliable than Mac OS Extended. Finally, if you plan to use the USB drive as a destination for Time Machine backups, choose Mac OS Extended. Time Machine can’t currently back up to an APFS disk and if you select one for use with Time Machine, it will offer to reformat it as Mac OS Extended.
You can, however, backup an APFS formatted disk to a Mac OS Extended Time Machine drive. How to format a USB drive to FAT32 on a Mac The main reason for formatting a USB drive as Fat32 on a Mac is that you want to be able to use the drive on a Windows PC, as well as a Mac — perhaps to transfer files between the two machines. You may also be preparing the drive for use as, say, a storage device for a media player or to record TV programmes on a TV with a USB port. The fact that Fat32 can be read from and written to on both Mac and Windows makes it very versatile. However, there is a significant limitation — individual files have a maximum size of 4GB. So, if you’re using the USB drive to store large video files, you may run into trouble.
There is a solution, however, exFAT. Unlike FAT32, exFAT doesn’t have a maximum file limit. Better still, it can be read from and written to on any Mac running Mac OS X Snow Leopard or later and on Windows. To format a USB drive in FAT32 or exFAT: 1. Plug the USB drive into your Mac. Go to ApplicationsUtilities and launch Disk Utility. Click on the USB drive in the sidebar in Disk Utility.
Click Erase in the Disk Utility toolbar. Type in a name for the formatted disk. Click on the Format menu and choose either MS-DOS (FAT32) or ExFAT. Your USB drive will now be erased and re-formatted as either FAT32 or ExFAT, depending on the format you chose in step 6. How to manage your drives easily If you look for a quick and easy way to manage your drives, try using. With its help, you can drag-and-drop files directly to any drive, clean hidden junk from external drives, and check disk stats.
It works for all drives, including USB drives, SSD, SD cards, external hard drives. All the drives will be at hand in the menu bar, so you can get to see types of drives you have and manage them easily. CleanMyDrive is absolutely free to use, so download it on the Mac App Store and enjoy! It’s very easy to format a USB drive on a Mac using Disk Utility. There are a couple of things you should keep in mind, however. The first is that when you format and disk, you will erase all the data currently on it.
So if you need that data, make sure you copy it onto another disk before you start. Secondly, there are several formats to choose from, each with advantages and disadvantage. Use the guide above to help you decide which is right for you. These might also interest you:.