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. Therefore, now your usb drive is ready to boot macos high sierra and you can install macos high sierra from your usb flash drive. The other formats microsofts ntfs and apples mac os extended. How to format usb to fat32ntfsexfat on windows and mac. To find out the current format of the drive, you can look into the system information. Therefore, you can create bootable usb for your mac using transmac on windows 10788. It is better than os x recovery as you dont have to download the 5gb installer data, first, to reinstall the os or installer disk for macs that does not support os x recovery. How to format internal andor external drive to work properly on mac and windows computers. The mac os x image is required in order to proceeding further steps i. If youre having issues trying to create a bootable media, you can get a usb flash drive that comes with mac osx ready to install. How to create a bootable mac usb installer based on. For windows, it offers quick format feature when you rightclick the hard drive on the computer. Unlike fat32, exfat doesnt have a maximum file limit.
Mac os x dmg iso files and a usb pen drive with minimum. So, now go to your usb flash drive and check the macos high sierra files. In order to write on the usb drive on mac, you need to format the device into apple supported file systems like apfs or mac os extended. 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. Go to applicationsutilities and launch disk utility.
How to create a bootable mac osx usb stick in mac or windows 100% working bootable usb watch part 2 on how to install macos in your desktop laptop with all the fixes. Format an external hard drive or usb flash drive for mac os x. How to format a usb flash drive on windows 10 windows. Oct 25, 2015 select the usb drive that you want to format for mac and finally right click on it and hit on format disc for mac. How to create macos high sierra bootable usb on windows. Create mac os sierra flashdrive from windows 10 youtube. Create bootable usb for mac on windows 10, mac and windows file system is completely different, so you are not able to create bootable usb for mac with powershell, cmd or rufus. Under file system box, select exfat for this drive. How to create bootable macos usb drive on macwindows. For apple mac users, there are two ways to format a usb flash drive to fat32, including disk utility and. So you might want to use other applications to format your external storage devices. By default, they format disks with the mac only os x extended file system. On the left side panel, you will see the usb drive name.
Developers of the program claim that the fat is the best format for usb drive to avoid conflicts with other operating systems. Mar 12, 2020 connect the usb flash drive or other volume that youre using for the bootable installer. Whether you want to format a flash drive on your mac or convert a usb. One thing you need took care of that the usb drive needs in gpt partition in order to work on a mac computer otherwise it wont boot. Mar 16, 2020 choose between the format apfs or mac os extended format carefully. But luckily, there are file systems well supported by both mac and windows pc, and they are fat32 it might be called msdos on mac and exfat. On os x, linux, or any environment with bash, you can use the open source formatudf as a onestop udf formatting tool. Make sure that it has at least 12gb of available storage and is formatted as mac os extended. And we can use it to format the usb on mac as well. We also have a command line disk utility interface in mac. Im here to use a windows 10 based hp laptop to format my lexar drive. How to create mac os x bootable usb pen drive on windows 10.
How to create mac os x bootable usb pen drive with windows 10 7. How to create mac os x bootable usb pen drive on windows. Jul 05, 2017 macs support a variety of file systems. Type or paste one of the following commands in terminal. You want to do this before creating the bootable media because there is a good chance that the drive was formatted using a windows device. Right click on your usb drive option in transmac and select format disk for mac. Quickly format an external hard drive for mac and windows pc. How to create bootable usb for mac on windows 10 in 4 ways. Format a usb drive as exfat for mac and windows compatibility.
Windows uses ntfs and mac os uses hfs and theyre incompatible with each other. Use your usb drive rightclick on it and select format disk format this will format the usb drive so that it can be used to store the mac os operating system. The first format, fat32, is fully compatible with mac os x, though with some drawbacks. 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. Its a universal format that is compatible with mac os xmacos, windows, linux and dos systems. If you are using a mac, you can run the builtin disk utility to quickly format a hard drive or external hard. If this is the case, chances are that its using a mbr partition, and the usb drive needs a gpt partition to. How to format a usb flash drive on windows 10 windows central. Now, you can follow the steps to be highlighted below to get it successfully formatted. How to create a bootable installer for macos apple support. But if you want to use usb drives in crossplatform mode, i strongly recommend you using exfat file system.
Out of the two or three software for handling macos installer dmg in windows, transmac is the best one. However, you can format the drive to work with both windows and mac by. How to format a usb drive for mac and pc compatibility youtube. How to format usb drive or external hard drive on mac. Thats because most of the computers in the world run windows, and. On windows 10, the ability to format a usb flash drive can come in handy in a number of scenarios. Make bootable macos catalina usb installer on windows 10. However, the procedure is somewhat the same if you download a compatible macos high sierra or catalina in dmg format for creating a usb disk on a pc. Select one of the format from dropdown menu and click erase to start formatting usb to fat or exfat on mac. The release date of usb disk storage format tool for mac is unknown and we cannot say for sure if it will be released at all.
Sep 23, 2019 once your bootable usb installation media is ready, remove it and insert it into your mac, power it on, holding down the option key, and select the usb you just created to reinstall mac os x. So, if users anticipate using the flash drive with more than one operating system, they will definitely benefit from the fat32 file system. For example, in windows xp my computer is equivalent to this pc on windows 10. Formatting a usb drive in windows is normally very easy, heres how it is done. Open windows explorer and simply rightclick on the. It will not affect the performance of the flash drive. When the internet recovery is stuck and fails to download the os files, you could use windows to make a bootable macos usb installer. Een usbstick formatteren voor gebruik op mac en windows iphoned. Similar to windows 10, you can format usb drives on mac using disk utility app. This means a lot of daily and advanced tasks on mac can be done via text commands such as creating bootable usb installer for mac. But, if you plan on using an external drive with both macs and pcs, you should format the disk with the exfat file system instead. Usb disk storage format tool by authorsoft corporation is a free utility that allows you to easily format your usb flash drives. To share a usb drive between a mac and a windows pc, there are two.
How to format usb flash drive to fat32 on mac os xmacos. However, os x and windows both can read and write to a format called fat32, which used to be used for windows all the way back into the msdos days. If you want to use a different file system on your usb drive, youll need to format it. Mar 30, 2020 on the left, rightclick the usb flash drive, select the format disk for mac option. How to format a hard drive for both windows and mac. Connect the usb drive to mac and launch disk utility from application. Click on the usb drive name in disk utility app and click restore button displayed on the top menu. 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.
Feb 21, 2020 its a universal format that is compatible with mac os xmacos, windows, linux and dos systems. After that transmac will create bootable mac os usb within few minutes. If you only use a mac computer, you can format your thumb drive so it can work on windows systems. Both windows and mac os offer builtin disk formatting tool. The file system column on the storage sidebar displays the current file format. How to create bootable usb installer for mac via commands. Apr 30, 2016 now, lets take a look at some ways you can format your usb drive on windows 10. How to create a bootable mac os usb on windows isoriver. How to create a bootable usb for macos mojave on windows pc. After that, rightclick the usb drive and select restore with disk image.
Once your bootable usb installation media is ready, remove it and insert it into your mac, power it on, holding down the option key, and select the usb you just created to reinstall mac os x. How to format usb drives on windows 10 make tech easier. Sharing a hardflash drive across windows, os x, and linux. Better still, it can be read from and written to on any mac running mac os x snow leopard or later and on windows. If only with mac and other apple device, choose mac os extended journaled. If you remembered, till macos sierra the apple file system was hackintosh, but macos 10. How to quickly make a mac os x bootable usb on windows. At this time, a couple of formatting options available. For example, you might want to reformat a new or used removable storage device to make sure it. How to choose the best format for usb drive on windowsmac. How to quickly create a macos bootable usb on windows 10. Again, formatting a drive will erase it completely, so make sure you have everything backed up that you want to keep.
Fortunately, there are some mac hard drive format software or smart disk formatting applications can help you securely and easily format, reformat, or erase hard drive under mac os. Best usb format tools pen drive stick formatters for. Sep 19, 2011 the overwhelming majority of usb flash drives you buy are going to come in one of two formats. How to choose the best format for usb drive on windowsmaclinux. How to format usb flash drive to fat32 on mac os xmacos easeus.
If you want to use the drive between a windows and mac machine, you can format it to fat32. The first format, fat32, is fully compatible with mac os. Hard drive format software for mac mac disk format software. Open terminal, which is in the utilities folder of your applications folder. Save any files you need to another volume before formatting.
Out of the two or three software for handling macos installer dmg in. It is advised not to change the builtin apfs format into mac os extended under any situation. If you plan to use the usb drive on linux computers, you can format it to this file system. Aug 16, 2019 on windows 10, the ability to format a usb flash drive can come in handy in a number of scenarios. Unlike windows os, mac os doesnt provide quick format tool.
Regardless of whether your block device is a hard drive or flash drive, and regardless of its logical block size, formatudf will produce a udf drive that can be recognized automatically on windows, os x, and linux. Dec 16, 2018 in order to write on the usb drive on mac, you need to format the device into apple supported file systems like apfs or mac os extended. If a mac is having some issues a bootable usb of the os can serve as an emergency disk. How to format a usb drive on a mac or windows alphr. As earlier stated, you need to first back up your usb drive before formatting the drive as you may not be able to recover the contents again. The program is able to format and repair usb flash drives under windows 7, windows 10 and earlier versions of the os.
How to format a flash drive to work on os x and windows. On the left, rightclick the usb flash drive, select the format disk for mac option. Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac apple. 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. 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. How to format and create a usb drive or pen drive that is compatible with windows 10, 8, 7 or mac or linux.
Step6 create bootable usb drive select the usb drive that you want to make it bootable and finally right click on it and hit on restore with disc image. Nov 17, 2019 bootable macos catalina usb on windows 10. Nov 01, 2011 format a flash drive for both mac os x and windows. Select the disc image to restore on usb drive finally hit on ok to continue. Format a disk for windows computers in disk utility on mac. Mar 15, 2020 here we use an old version of mac os, mountain lion, to make a bootable macos dvd. Dec 05, 2019 right click on your usb drive option in transmac and select format disk for mac. Have you ever ran into a problem where youre trying to use a flash drive on both windows and mac. The extended file system ext was the first file system created specifically for linux. How to create a bootable usb drive for macos sierra. If you are on an earlier operating system like windows 7, xp, etc. 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. How to format a flash drive for mac and pc compatibility in macos. The finished flash drive in exfat format will be recognized by both a windows pc and any mac.