How To Format A Hard Drive On Mac

Your purpose for the drive after it’s done formatting will inform the choices you make during the formatting process. Of course, save any information you want to keep to another disk before you start to format any hard drive.

When Should I Format My Hard Drive?

What’s the Best Hard Drive Format for Macs?

The best hard drive format depends on how you intend to use the disk and what version of the operating system you’re using.

Setting Up Drive: When installing a new drive, you should always format it to prepare it to work with the system it’s going in. Different file system formats have various benefits; some are better than others for Mac computers, depending on your operating system. Even if the disk you’re planning to use is already empty of data, format it before installing it.Changing Drive Format: Formatting a hard drive can make it work differently. It has to use a specific format if you decide to share a hard drive between computers with different operating systems.Removing Junk Files: Removing excess, unwanted data can improve the performance of your hard drive. If you’re using an older drive that has many repeated deleted and saved files in the past, it might work better if you refresh it with a format.

Whatever your reason for formatting, everything on the disk will be removed when the format is complete. Never format a disk with information you haven’t backed up.

APFS: Use this format if you’re using macOS 10.13 or newer software. The Apple File System is the latest and best format for users of the newer operating systems. Some updates include snapshots, fast directory sizing, and space sharing. It allocates disk space on command; free space can be shared between volumes. It’s also very secure with good encryption options. This format is excellent for SSD and flash storage drives as well.HFS+: Use this format if you’re using macOS 10.12 or older software. Mac OS Extended was used for a long time and has many excellent options, but it isn’t as good as the APFS format for newer operating systems. This format is also helpful if you’re not using a flash or SSD drive. MS-DOS: It can be shared between Mac and Windows computers but doesn’t support file sizes over 4GB or volume sizes over 32 GB. exFAT: It is another format that works for both Windows and Mac systems. This format could be advantageous if you’re formatting a hard drive that you’ll move between Windows and Mac systems. It’s probably preferable to MS-DOS for drives shared between multiple computer operating systems.

Whichever format you choose, you can format a hard drive with it on your Mac computer.

Formatting Mac Hard Drives

Disk Utility is a program that can reformat drives on Mac computers. While each version is a little different, they are all comparable to procedures for reformatting on macOS Monterey 12. Your method depends on whether you’re reformatting your startup disk or a storage disk.

Reformatting a Storage Disk

Storage disks are a bit easier to format because they don’t store your operating system. You can use this for almost any drive as long as it doesn’t have the OS on it that you’re currently using. Once you do this, the process will start. It can take some time to complete, and you should wait until it’s done before removing the disk from the computer.

Reformatting a Startup Disk

Your startup disk is the one that stores and handles your operating system. If you erase it, you will need recovery media to install a new operating system on it before your computer functions again. Do not start this process unless you are prepared for that.

For Computers with Apple Silicon

For Computers with Intel Processors

Now you can turn off the computer and reinstall your Mac OS.

Can I Format a Hard Drive for Mac on A Windows PC?

You can format a hard drive for Mac on a Windows PC as long as you don’t mind using one of the shared formats. Built-in ways to format drives in Windows won’t include the Mac-specific formatting options, including APFS and HPS+. If you’re planning to use the hard drive only on a Mac computer, it’s better to format it with a method that lets you use the appropriate format.

Can I Format a Hard Drive for A Windows PC on A Mac?

You can format a hard drive for a Windows PC on a Mac if you use one of the formats shared between the systems. The exFAT format is probably the best option if you’re formatting a drive for a Windows PC on a Mac.