1. Formatting Usb Stick To Fat32
2. Usb Stick Formatting Tool
3. Formatting Usb Sticks For Macrame

Sep 28, 2020 • Filed to: Solve Mac Problems • Proven solutions

Connect the USB flash drive or other volume that you're using for the bootable installer. Make sure that it has at least 12GB of available storage and is formatted as Mac OS Extended. Open Terminal, which is in the Utilities folder of your Applications folder. Type or paste one of the following commands in Terminal. 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). How to Format USB Drive in Windows or Mac. After choosing the best format for USB drive according to your needs, you might start to wonder: how do I format USB drive to NTFS/FAT32/exFAT/EXT 2,3,4/HFS+ in Windows operating system or Mac? Well, don't worry. If you need to format USB drive to NTFS/FAT32/exFAT/EXT 2,3,4/HFS+ file system, please.

Most of the people in the world prefer using a Windows PC. And the Windows system uses a different file system which is known as Fat32. Usually, the Fat32 drive can be read and written by macOS, but it is not considered optimal. Even if you try to format the Fat32 drive on Mac, you might end up causing more issues. So, if you have got your hands on a drive which is formatted as Fat32 of any other format instead of Mac OS Extended or APFS, then you should go through this article.

Here, we are going to learn the procedure to format a USB drive and an external hard drive on Mac. Even if you want to reformat the drive on Mac, we have all the answers for you.

Part 1. Overview of Formatting Drive on Mac

Formatting isn't just a process of erasing the existing data on a drive. It is done as a routine maintenance task. But if you want to ensure that the drive has a complete Mac compatibility, then you'll have to format the drive using the Mac OS Extended filesystem. It is possible to read and write on a drive that has a different file system. But unless you format the drive on Mac, it can't be used as a bootable disk or with Time Machine.

Unless you intend to use the drive for file exchange between Windows and Mac, the formatting would be the right thing to do. Here are some other factors that will conclude that formatting the external drive with Mac is necessary as it will also improve the performance of the drive.

• To remove the data from a USB drive or any other drive completely. Simply erasing the data leaves a binary print on the drive. But formatting will erase the binary data too.
• To change the Operating system. Using another OS-compatible drive can make your OS vulnerable to viruses, malware, and other malfunctions. Thus, formatting the drive and deleting the previous system files and settings is vital.
• To improve the performance of the drive, frequent formatting is essential.
• To remove all kinds of viruses and malware, formatting works more effectively than deleting the files.

Thus, formatting the USB drive or external hard drive will get rid of any software conflict that you are facing and even glitches will disappear.

Part 2. How to Format a Hard Drive on Mac?

Now you can understand that there are several benefits of formatting a drive. Technically, when you want to switch a USB or hard drive system to another OS, it is termed as reformatting. It allows the users to reinstall OS and all other software once the format is complete. It is considered as a better process as it is comparatively easy to format the drive for Mac instead of removing files which are malfunctioning. So, from here on, reformat will be considered as a format.

So, here is the process by which you can format hard drive or USB for Mac. The same procedure is followed for all other storage devices too.

1. Connect the hard drive or USB with Mac and open Disk Utility from Applications.
2. Locate the drive from the left side panel of Disk Utility and open it.
3. Now switch to the Erase tab and click on the Format drag-down menu. Choose the Mac OS Extended (Journaled) option.
4. Change the name of the drive if you want to and finally tap on the Erase option at the bottom of the interface.

A popup window will appear and ask you to confirm the action. As you press the Erase button, everything on the drive will be deleted completely. If you are formatting a small flash drive or USB drive, the process will complete quickly. But if you are formatting a big size hard drive, then the process might take longer than you expect. And make sure that you don't close the Disk Utility before the process finishes.

Part 3. The Best Format Choice of External Drive on Mac

Using the external drive on Mac is a good idea as it provides additional storage. But it is hard to pick a suitable format as it depends on your usage. So, it is better that you know your options and understands which format is right for you. So, here are the best formats for an external hard drive for Mac. You can choose from a variety of file systems.

1. Apple File System (APFS):

All new Macs come pre-installed with this file system. It is optimal for use if you prefer using a Solid State Drive or flash drive. But it is also compatible with the mechanical hard disk drives too. If you don't want to use the drive with Windows OS, then you can pick this format.

• Fast copy and paste
• Better organization of data
• Improved metadata handling and focus on the encryption

2. Mac OS Extended (HFS+):

This format means a Hierarchical File System plus. This was the main file format for macOS before APFS was released. You can reformat USB on Mac to this format easily. This format is suitable for both mechanical and SSD. This format can't be accessed by Windows and if you want to do that, you'll need an additional program.

3. exFAT (Extended File Allocation Table):

This format is designed to overcome the limitation of format fat32 on Mac. By using this format, you can easily share the content between Mac and Windows.

• Read and write feature compatible with Mac and Windows OS
• Ideal for flash storage and External drives.

4. MS-DOS (FAT):

It is the FAT32 format on Mac and it is labeled as MS-DOS (FAT). This format is only ideal for old computers. If you need to transfer the files from an old computer, then you can switch to this format. Otherwise, you'll have to deal with its limitation. It is only good for Windows XP, so, you better avoid it for Mac.

As you can see, using the APFS or HFS+ format for Mac is ideal to avoid complications with your data files.

Part 4. How to Format USB to FAT32 on Mac?

process, make sure that you have made a backup, or extracted the files of the drive.

Method 1. With Disk Utility:

1. Connect the USB drive to Mac and launch Disk Utility from Application. On the left side panel, you will see the USB drive name.
2. Click on the USB name and switch to the Erase Tab. There, you will see the Format option where you have to select the MS-DOS (FAT) format and Master Boot Record scheme.

Finally click on the Erase button and the USB drive format will complete.

Method 2. Using Mac Command Line:

1. Connect the USB drive to Mac and press CMD + Space key to run Spotlight. Type Terminal in the search bar and hit Enter.
2. When the Terminal window opens up, type diskutil list and you'll find out which is your USB drive.
3. Type the command sudo diskutil eraseDisk FAT32 MBRFormat /dev/disk2 where
   • Sudo is the user right
   • diskutil call the disk utility program
   • EraseDisk command is to format
   • FAT32 set the file system
   • MBRFormat commands the Disk utility to use Master Boot Record to format.
   • /dev/disk2 is the location of your drive.

Wait for the process to finish and type diskutil list again to check whether formatting is done correctly or not. Now, you can use the USB with the FAT32 file system on Mac.

Video Tutorial on How to Format a USB Flash Drive on Mac

Part 5. How to Recover Formatted Data on Mac?

You will need a strong and reliable data recovery tool for this and Recoverit is the perfect answer. This software is specifically designed so that the users can restore the files that are lost from their system. Recoverit Data Recovery for Mac makes it convenient to get them back. It has a wide array of formats and files support. Plus, you can perform selective recovery along with the deep scan mode which has a 96% success rate.

You can download and install the software from the official website. Once it is installed, you can follow the steps below to recover the lost word files on Mac:

Step 1: Select the Recycle Bin Recovery mode

Launch the software and specify the location on the drive where you want to look for the lost files. In case you don't know the exact location, choose the 'I can find my partition' option and hit the Start button.

Step 2: Scan the Location

The software will scan the Mac drive to look for lost or deleted files. Once the scan is finished, the results will be displayed on the screen. The files will be sorted out according to their formats. Now you can select the files.

Step 3: Preview and Recover

Click on the file to have a preview and make sure that it is not damaged. You can perform multiple selections with this tool. After you've selected all the files, you can tap on the Recover option at the bottom of the screen.

So, you now know what you can do if you ever lost your important files on Mac. However, while you are saving recovered screenshots on Mac, don't save them to the location from where they get lost.

As you can see, it is easy to format USB for Mac and Windows both. As Windows OS is more common, people know a thing or two about it. But Mac OS seems complicated to them. Once you get familiar with the OS, it is not that hard. And if some error arises or anything goes wrong, Recoverit is always here to retrieve your lost data.

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May 12,2020 • Filed to: Flash Drive Recovery • Proven solutions

Not every USB flash drive available out there can be used with your Mac system right away after buying it. There are some flash drives that need to be first formatted before you store data on them. Mac system provides support for different file systems.

If you find that the USB flash drive you’ve purchased isn’t compatible with your Mac computer, then you need to format to file system supported by your system. The main reason behind why all USB drives aren’t compatible with Mac is because most of them are designed to use on Windows OS, which operates on the FAT32 system. On the other hand, Mac systems operate on either APFS or Mac OS Extended.

The good news is that there is no need to panic if you’ve purchased a USB flash drive running on a different format than what is supported by your Mac.

Here, in this article, we will show you how to format USB on Mac to a compatible file system. As formatting leads to data loss and that’s why we will also introduce you with best USB drive data recovery tool you can use to recover your lost data.

Part 1: How to Format USB on Mac?

Formatting a USB flash drive on Mac is a little bit lengthy process but yields the desired result. Also, before you process with the process, make sure that the device has no important data on it. This process will erase all the data from it. Thus, copy all important files that you need from the drive to your computer or another external storage device.

Now, let’s learn how to format the flash drive on Mac:

Step 1 Start the process by plugging the USB drive into a USB socket. If you’ve MacBook Pro or latest MacBook, then you need a USB-C to USB Adapter.

Step 2 Next, launch the new Finder window and then, click the drive. And move to “Applications”>” Utilities”> and here, double-tap on “Disk Utility”.

Step 3 After that, tap on the USB drive in the sidebar and next, you need to select “Erase” option from the toolbar located at the top of the current window.

Step 4 Now, a window will drop down and here, enter a specific name for the formatted drive. After that, choose the type of format you would like to have from the drop-down menu.

Step 5 If the flash drive has some kind of sensitive data, then click “Security Options”. This will enable you to select how securely you would like to have data to be deleted.

Step 6 Best apps for apple mac. Thereafter, you need to move the slider to right. The further you move the slider, the more passes the delete/erase feature will make the meaning more securely data will be deleted. But, this will boost the format time too.

Step 7 Finally, tap on “Ok” and next, choose Erase.

That’s how to format the flash disk on Mac. As you can see that it is quite a time-consuming process, and you need to follow every step to get the desired results.

Part 2: Which Format to Choose When Formatting?

Well, formatting USB flash drive isn’t a complex task, but the real struggle starts when it comes to choosing the file format. As per the currently running Mac version, macOS High Sierra or older, there are two options available for file format - APFS and Mac OS Extended. Following are some factors that will help you determine the best USB format for Mac according to your needs:

• If you are using a Mac running with macOS older than High Sierra, then it is important to format thumb drive with the Mac OS Extended format. The reason for doing this is that if you reformat a disk in the APFS file format, it will fail to load in your Mac system.


• If you want to format a flash drive on your Mac, then go for the APFS format because they are solid-state drive (SSD) optimized. More importantly, even if you plan to reformat a hard drive, then APFS is a more reliable and fast option.


• If you want to use USB flash drive for Time Machine backups, then you should consider Mac OS Extended format. The reason is that APFS disk does not provide supports for Time Machine backups. Moreover, if you prefer this format, then it will provide you with the option for reformatting USB drive using Mac OS Extended format.


• However, you can backup an APFS formatted disk or drive to a Mac OS Extended Time machine drive.

Keep the above points in your mind while formatting a USB flash drive to make sure that you choose the right file format.

Part 3: How to Format USB Flash Drive to FAT32 on Mac?

If you want to use a USB drive on both Mac and Windows, then you need to format the drive to the format supported by both systems. And FAT32 is the format that both Mac and Windows PC support. In other words, you can read and write FAT32 file format on both the operating system.

Moreover, there are a lot of users who want to use the USB drive on both Windows and Mac and there are also others who want to use it as a storage device for TV shows, and that’s why reformatting to FAT32 format is necessary.

However, no matter for what purpose you need to format the USB drive to FAT32, there are two methods available to how to format flash drive to FAT32 on Mac:

Formatting Usb Stick To Fat32

Method 1: Disk Utility

Here’s what you need to do format USB drive to FAT32 with disk utility:

Step 1 To start with, connect USB drive that you want to format to your Mac.

Step 2 Then, select “Applications”>” Utilities”. Next, open the Disk Utility.

Step 3 Now, you need to choose the USB drive from the sidebar of disk utility. Next, select “Erase” from the toolbar of disk utility.

Step 4 Now, provide a name to the formatted disk and choose a FAT32 file format from the menu.

Step 5 Finally, choose Erase and in a while, your drive or disk will be reformatted to the FAT32 format.

Method 2: Terminal Command Line

Generally, users prefer disk utility to format a disk or drive. But, users who are quite good at using the terminal in macOS can also format the drive from the command line on Mac.

Here’s how to how to format USB stick for Mac and Windows PC using the terminal command line:

Step 1 First, go to the “Applications”>” Utilities”. Here, double-click the “Terminal” application to run it.

Step 2 Now, you need to run the command i.e. Diskutil list. This will provide a list of all the mounted drives on your Mac system.

Step 3 After finding the drive you want to format, you need to copy its identifier for the next command. Here, you also need to choose a name and format type.

The next command you need to run in the command line - Diskutil eraseDisk FILESYSTEM DISKNAME DISKIDENTIFIER.

Let’s take an example - the drive you want to format has “/dev/disk5s2” as its identifier and the file system, in this case, is FAT32 and you named the drive as “Full”. So, the command you will run in the terminal becomes - Diskutil eraseDisk FAT32 FULL /dev/disk5s2.

That’s how format flash drive on Mac to FAT32 file system using terminal command line works. No doubt, it is a little bit complex for users who aren’t much familiar with the command line. That’s why this method is recommended for those who know how to use the terminal on Mac.

Once you’re able to format your USB drive to FAT32, you can use it on both Mac and Windows PC. If you realize that you’ve lost some important files after formatting the drive, don’t be panic. The next part of our guide will help you to get back lost data from a USB drive.

Part 4: Best USB Drive Data Recovery Software

Formatting a flash drive on Mac delete all data stored in the drive. To recover lost data from the USB drive, you need to use professional USB data recovery software like iSkysoft.

With the help of this software, you can recover various file types including photos, audio, video, documents, etc from any storage device, which include removable drives like USB. It is powerful enough to help you restore data under various data loss situations like accidental deletion, formatting, virus attack, etc. The best part of the software is that it provides support for all common file systems, which include FAT, APFS, etc.

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• It is compatible with both Windows and Mac operating system.
• It supports a large number of storage device type including hard drives, USB flash drives, SD cards, etc.
• All major types of files can be recovered including music, images, video, documents, emails, and archives.
• It has a deep scan features for in-depth scanning of the hard drive for searching files to recover.

Get Recoverit (IS) from its official site on your Mac, and follow the below steps to recover lost data after you format USB to use on Mac and PC:

Step 1 Choose a location

After installing the iSkysoft on your Mac computer, run it and connect your USB flash drive to the computer. Then, select the connected drive as a partition or location from where you lost your data.

Step 2 San the location

Next, the software will initiate the scan process to locate the files you’ve lost in the selected location. This may take several minutes to complete the scan process.

Usb Stick Formatting Tool

Step 3 Preview and recover data

Once the scan process completes, preview data and choose the desired files you want to recover. Finally, click “Recover” button to get back the selected ones into the safe location on Mac.

Conclusion:

Formatting Usb Sticks For Macrame

We hope that this guide helps you learn how to format USB on MacBook. There are many situations when you need to use the drive on both Mac and Windows PC. In such cases, you can make it possible by simply formatting the drive. Most users don’t back up their data before formatting and thus, end up losing their important files from the drive. Luckily, Recoverit (IS) can help you to perform USB drive recovery to get back the lost data.