Sep 28, 2020 • Filed to: Solve Mac Problems • Proven solutions
If your USB flash drive is not recognized by your Apple Mac computer because it has a different format it is kind of difficult to format it. You may not know how to format your USB flash drive to make it compatible with your Mac system but we do and will show you how to do it in this article.
- How to reformat a disk to FAT32 on a Mac. Technical notes: Formatting a disk using Windows maxes out the partition at 32GB, but not if the formatting is done.
- 1 Format a USB Drive to FAT32 in Mac OS with Disk Utility. Insert the USB to be formatted to a Mac PC. Navigate to Applications Utilities, and click it twice to open it. Select the drive you want to format and click on Erase. Rename the USB drive (optional), and choose the MS-DOS(FAT) for format.
- Fat32 free download - Midnight Mansion, Diet Sleuth, 32- or 64-bit Kernel Startup Mode Selector, and many more programs.
Overview of Formatting USB Drive on Mac
Mac Systems have a different OS to Windows and this is where most of the problems like. Most USB flash drives on sale are designed to work with Windows operating systems that run on Fat32. Mac devices on the other hand run on either Mac OS Extended or APFS. If your drive is an APFS format or a Mac OS format you can format your drive easily but if it is a FAT32 format this may be a problem. If you have made the mistake of buying a flash drive they run on a FAT32 file format you don't have to discard it altogether. There are ways to format a flash drive that runs in a different format and we will show you steps to take to remedy the situation.
Part 1: Format FAT32 Drive on Mac First, let us look on how to format FAT32 drive on Mac (macOS Sierra). You could be wondering what FAT32 is. It is a file system in Windows 95, 98, and windows Millennium Edition. One major advantage about this file system is that nearly all the operating systems can read and write from it.
Step to Format a USB Drive to FAT32 on Your Mac
- Plug the drive into the Mac system
- Choose Applications- Utilities then Disk Utility
- From the sidebar pick USB drive
- From the toolbar select Erase
- Name the formatted disk and choose either ExFat or MS-DOS(FAT32) from the menu
- Select erase to format your drive depending on the selection you have picked (FAT32 or ExFAT)
Convert/Format USB Flash drive to FAT32 using Command Line
- Connect Flash drive to Mac
- Tap CMD and space bar to open Spotlight. Type 'terminal' and press Enter
- Type in :diskutill land locate your USB drive
- Type in sudo.diskutilerasediskFAT32MBRFormat/Dev/disk2
- Sudo will give you the user right
- Diskutill will call in the utility program
- Erasedisk commands will format
- FAT32 will set the file system
- MBRFormat will tell the disk to format with Master Boot
- /Dev/disk2 will be the USB drive location
You will have to wait a while for the format to be completed. Type in : diskutill to check if the process was successful.
If you follow these steps religiously you should be able to resolve the issue quickly. If you're searching for a way that helps you recover formatted USB drive on Mac, download Recoverit Data Recovery software and go to the page telling you how to restore the formatted hard drive.
Video Tutorial on How to Format a USB Flash Drive on Mac
What's Wrong with Mac
- Recover Your Mac
- Fix Your Mac
- Delete Your Mac
- Learn Mac Hacks
Download Free FAT32 Formatter Tool
When I inserted a Toshiba USB flash drive into Windows 10 computer and chose 'Format', I got the dialogue box as shown below. I learned that my Toshiba USB drive was allowed to format to NTFS, FAT32 (Default) and exFAT. Many people would have the question about how to choose the proper file system, and next, I'll give the explanation.
- NTFS
NTFS works with all versions of Windows, but read-only with Mac OS X by default. It's mostly used for Windows system drive and other internal drives that will just be used with Windows.
- FAT32
FAT32 works with all versions of Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. Practically, most USB drives are pre-formatted with FAT32. And most game consoles, such as PlayStation, require external USB drive with the FAT32 format.
FAT32 has a limit that files larger than 4GB can't be stored on a FAT32 drive. It supports file size no larger than 4GB and a maximum partition size 8TB.
- exFAT
exFAT is an ideal file system for USB flash drives and other external drives. It's more compatible with Windows and Mac OS X than NTFS and has no file size limit as FAT32. However, exFAT is a newer file system that was introduced in 2006, some older devices may not support this file system.
Understand the difference between NTFS, FAT32, and exFAT now? Whenever you need to format USB flash drive to FAT32, even reformat a drive to FAT32, you can download the free FAT32 formatter tool to perform the task. Besides, the FAT32 formatter can also help to convert NTFS to FAT32.
Effectively Apply FAT32 Formatter in Three Ways
1. Free FAT32 Format Tool - EaseUS Partition Master
EaseUS Partition Master is an all-in-one internal drive and external USB, SD, memory stick FAT32 formatting/reformatting solution in Windows 10/8.1/8/7/XP/Vista. The problem about FAT32 that you cannot solve in Windows Disk Management shall be easily overcome by EaseUS free partition manager. People seeking for a powerful, easy-to-use and Windows 10-compatible disk and partition management tool have chosen it as the best free FAT32 formatter. Use the software to format new drive as FAT32. In addition, you can also convert NTFS to FAT32 without losing data.
Fat32 Format Utility
- Warning
- Before downloading the FAT32 formatter for Windows 10, you’d better back up all data on the disk because the FAT32 formatter will wipe all data. Read this article for details on how to backup your pc.
Step 1: Launch EaseUS Partition Master, right-click the partition you intend to format and choose 'Format'.
Step 2: In the new window, enter the Partition label, choose the FAT32 file system, and set the cluster size according to your needs, then click 'OK'.
Fat32 Format Mac Sd Card
Step 3: Then you will see a warning window, click 'OK' in it to continue.
Step 4: Click the 'Execute Operation' button in the top-left corner to review the changes, then click 'Apply' to start formatting the partition to FAT32.
2. Built-in FAT32 Formatter - Windows Disk Management
As I've said, when you plug in a USB drive in a Windows computer, you can directly format the drive to the FAT32 file system by using the built-in Windows Disk Management. However, once your drive's default file system is not preformatted as FAT32, You can only be allowed to format it to NTFS, the default file system in Windows. So, the first attempt sometimes may fail. In this case, move on to the second option of FAT32 formatter tool.
1. Press Windows + X to open Disk Management.
2. Choose the target partition of your disk that you want to format to FAT32 and click Format from the right-click menu.
- Notice:
- You may ask: can a 64gb USB be formatted to fat32? The Disk Management does not allow you to format disk larger than 32GB as fat32. As the same, you can not format it to fat32 in Windows File Explorer and Diskpart.
3. Appilable FAT32 Formatter - Diskpart
Now we are going to show you the last fat32 format tool in Windows 10. This method is more complicated than the other ways, do as following:
Step 1. Open search box and input diskpart.
Format Fat32 Windows 10
Step 2. Copy the following commands.
Logitech C920 Pro. Best Webcam for Most People. Resolution: 1080p FPS: 30 Built-in Mic: Stereo. Use the built-in camera on Mac Many Mac computers and displays have a built-in iSight, FaceTime, or FaceTime HD camera located near the top edge of the screen. The camera automatically turns on when you open an app that can take pictures, record videos, or make video calls. You can decide which apps are allowed to use the camera on your Mac. We use cookies, including third-party cookies, on this website to help operate our site and for analytics and advertising purposes. For more on how we use cookies and your cookie choices, go here for our cookie policy! By clicking below, you are giving us consent to use cookies. Some apps and websites can use your camera to take photos or video. You can decide which apps are allowed to use the camera on your Mac. On your Mac, choose Apple menu System Preferences, click Security & Privacy, then click Privacy. Mac os camera settings. Camera app free download - Snap Camera, BlueStacks App Player, RAR Expander, and many more programs. Uninstall apps from your Mac and clean all their left-over files safely. Free Editors' rating.
How to get acrobat reader for mac. Step 3. Then type exit. (You can not format disk larger than 32GB to fat32, go back to the method one.)
Elmedia Player is a free media player for Mac OS X. Enjoy playing videos in any format with advanced options. Players for mac os x. VLC for Mac OS X VLC is a free and open source cross-platform multimedia player and framework that plays most multimedia files as well as DVDs, Audio CDs, VCDs, and various streaming protocols. Adobe® Flash® Player is a lightweight browser plug-in and rich Internet application runtime that delivers consistent and engaging user experiences, stunning audio/video playback, and exciting gameplay. Installed on more than 1.3 billion systems, Flash Player is.