formatting a drive for mac and windows disk utitlity

If you need to go between macOS and Windows then format your drive ExFAT on macOS Mac OS Extended (Journaled) does not work natively with Windows.Starting with Big Sur, Mac OS Extended (Journaled) is no longer the default when using Time Machine.It is important to keep the following in mind when formatting Mac OS Extended (Journaled): Not sure what version you are using? Click here to determine your version of macOS

Out of the box, USB flash drives may function unreliably or even fail to work on Macs at all.IMPORTANT: This article applies to the following macOS versions: The reason? Mac and Windows each use different file systems.Īfter unboxing a new storage-based item, it’s a wise move to look into how to format a hard drive for Mac (or SD card, flash drive, etc.) to reduce the likelihood of unexpected corruption, data loss, or other performance issues. Thanks to Disk Utility, the issue of how to format USB on Mac is fairly straightforward.

Likewise, you can use this tool to format Micro SD cards, hard drives, and so on, getting your new device into the right condition. Give the device a name and choose the desired format (more on that below)įirst of all, let’s cover the obvious point above: when you format USB drive on Mac, or any similar device for that matter, you need to erase everything that’s on it in order to do so.Select the relevant device or drive in the left sidebar and click Erase.Go to Applications > Utilities and open Disk Utility.Note that formatting a drive means completely erasing it, so make sure you read our recommendations on how to back up and recover files below. That’s not a problem if the device is new, but means you’ll need to take some precautionary measures if it’s not.

Second, the desired format will depend on the type of device you’re using.

Formatting a drive for mac and windows disk utitlity