Nowadays, when you buy a USB drive, you can use it right out of the box with your Mac. However, unless it’s been designed for use with a Mac, it won’t be formatted using macOS’ preferred file system (either Mac OS Extended or APFS, depending on which version of macOS you’re running).
- How to Format a USB Drive to FAT32 on Mac. 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. Now, you can follow the steps to be highlighted below to get it successfully formatted. 1 Format a USB Drive to FAT32 in Mac OS with Disk Utility.
- Formatting With Windows 8.1: Insert the USB drive into an open port on your Windows computer.
- NO.1 USB drive formatting software for Mac – DoYourData Super Eraser. DoYourData Super Eraser.
That’s because most of the computers in the world run Windows, and Windows uses a different file system, usually one known as Fat32. Drives formatted as Fat32 can be read from and written to by macOS, but it’s not optimal and you’re more likely to run into problems than if you use macOS’ native format. So, if you’ve bought a USB drive that’s formatted as Fat32, or any other format other than Mac OS Extended (also known as HFS+) or APFS, here’s how to format a USB drive on Mac. It’s exactly the same procedure if you need to reformat a flash drive on a Mac.
How to format a USB drive on a Mac
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1. Plug the drive into a USB socket (if you have a recent MacBook or MacBook Pro that only has USB-C connectors, you’ll need a USB-C to USB-A adaptor).
2. Open a new Finder window and click on the drive. Make sure it has no files on it that you need. The process of reformatting it will wipe all the data from it.
3. Once you’ve copied any files you need from the USB drive to your Mac, go to Applications>Utilities and double-click on Disk Utility.
4. Click on the USB drive in the sidebar and then choose Erase from the toolbar at the top of the window.
5. In the window that drops down type a name for the formatted drive in the box next to Name.
6. Choose a format from the dropdown menu.
7. If you have previously stored sensitive data on the drive, click the Security tab.
8. Choose a security level using the slider. The further to the right you move the slider, the more ‘passes’ the erase tool will make and the more securely files will be deleted. However, it also increases the time it takes to format the drive quite considerably.
9. Click Ok then click Erase.
Tip: You don’t need to erase a whole drive to delete files securely. If you have confidential files or sensitive data you need to remove from your Mac completely, you should use CleanMyMac’s File Shredder. It’s specifically designed to securely delete sensitive data and will render it unrecoverable. You can download CleanMyMac X for free here.
Which format to choose?
If your Mac is running macOS High Sierra or later, you have two options for file formats: APFS and Mac OS Extended. Which should you choose? The key point is that disks formatted as APFS won’t be recognized by Macs running versions of macOS older than High Sierra. So if you think you might need to plug the USB drive into a Mac running an older version of macOS, format it as Mac OS Extended.
APFS is optimized for SSD (solid state drive) such as flash drives, so if you reformat a flash drive on a Mac, you should definitely choose APFS (unless you plan to use it with a pre-High Sierra Mac, of course). Even on hard drives, however, APFS is faster and more reliable than Mac OS Extended.
Finally, if you plan to use the USB drive as a destination for Time Machine backups, choose Mac OS Extended. Time Machine can’t currently back up to an APFS disk and if you select one for use with Time Machine, it will offer to reformat it as Mac OS Extended. You can, however, backup an APFS formatted disk to a Mac OS Extended Time Machine drive.
How to format a USB drive to FAT32 on a Mac
The main reason for formatting a USB drive as Fat32 on a Mac is that you want to be able to use the drive on a Windows PC, as well as a Mac — perhaps to transfer files between the two machines. You may also be preparing the drive for use as, say, a storage device for a media player or to record TV programmes on a TV with a USB port.
The fact that Fat32 can be read from and written to on both Mac and Windows makes it very versatile. However, there is a significant limitation — individual files have a maximum size of 4GB. So, if you’re using the USB drive to store large video files, you may run into trouble. There is a solution, however, exFAT. Unlike FAT32, exFAT doesn’t have a maximum file limit. Better still, it can be read from and written to on any Mac running Mac OS X Snow Leopard or later and on Windows.
To format a USB drive in FAT32 or exFAT:
1. Plug the USB drive into your Mac.
2. Go to Applications>Utilities and launch Disk Utility.
3. Click on the USB drive in the sidebar in Disk Utility.
4. Click Erase in the Disk Utility toolbar.
5. Type in a name for the formatted disk.
6. Click on the Format menu and choose either MS-DOS (FAT32) or ExFAT.
7. Click Erase.
Your USB drive will now be erased and re-formatted as either FAT32 or ExFAT, depending on the format you chose in step 6.
How to manage your drives easily
If you look for a quick and easy way to manage your drives, try using CleanMyDrive 2. With its help, you can drag-and-drop files directly to any drive, clean hidden junk from external drives, and check disk stats. It works for all drives, including USB drives, SSD, SD cards, external hard drives. All the drives will be at hand in the menu bar, so you can get to see types of drives you have and manage them easily. CleanMyDrive is absolutely free to use, so download it on the Mac App Store and enjoy!
It’s very easy to format a USB drive on a Mac using Disk Utility. There are a couple of things you should keep in mind, however. The first is that when you format and disk, you will erase all the data currently on it. So if you need that data, make sure you copy it onto another disk before you start. Secondly, there are several formats to choose from, each with advantages and disadvantage. Use the guide above to help you decide which is right for you.
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In this article we show you how to verify and install Tails 4.11 onto a USB Flash drive and browse the web anonymously using the Tor Web Browser. It is easy, anyone can do it and it is completely free, without having to burn any DVD’s.
Because we take web security very seriously at Wisevu we wrote an article and did a video several months ago on How to Install Tails 4.2 on a USB Drive on Mac OS and Launch Tor Browser, it got a lot of attention on our site and on youtube, and so we are doing another article and video on the same topic but this time for the latest version of Tails at the present moment – Tails 4.11 and this time with Tails 4.11 running on 3 of all our tested Mac’s.
You can either watch our video below or read the article.
We Tested Tails 4.11 On The Following Mac Computers
We tested Tails 4.11 on MacBook Pro 2018 with Touch Bar, iMac Late 2013, and MacBook Air 2015. Tails 4.11 worked on all our devices.
However, please note that you may need to use either a wired internet connection using an Ethernet cable or a cheap USB/WiFi adapter to connect to the internet. Many people report that their wifi does not work in Tails 4.11 (as well as earlier versions of Tails) either.
Also if you are using a MacBook Pro with a touch-bar, your built in keyboard and trackpad will not work once you load Tails 4.11. Therefore, you will need an external keyboard and mouse. Doesn’t matter if they are wired or wireless.
Formatting Your USB Drive for Tails 4.11
Step 1: You will need a USB thumb drive that is at least 8GB and it must be formatted using the Mac OS Extended (Journaled) Format. If you also see a Scheme dropdown, select the GUID Partition Map Scheme.
How to Download and Verify Tails 4.11 on Mac OS
Go to https://tails.boum.org/
Scroll down and click the Get Tails 4.11 link, click MACOS link, click INSTALL FROM MACOS link, click the LET’S GO link
- Click Download the Tails 4.11 USB Image (1.2GB)
- Click ‘Instal Tails Verification Extension’, once installed go back to Tails 4.11 Download page, or click here and refresh the page. You should see a message that says .Tails Verification Extension Installed’ with a green checkmark. If the section is greyed out, click the green text link that says ‘I already downloaded Tails 4.11.
- You will see a green ‘Verify Tails 4.11..’ button. Click it, locate the tails-amd64-4.11.img that you already downloaded to your computer and click Open. The extension will verify your Tails. Before doing so, ensure that Tails 4.11 is done downloading to your computer because it is a 1.2GB file and may take some time. If Tails does not verify, you may have to download it again and follow the above steps once more without having to download the browser verification extension again.
How To Format Usb Drive On Mac
Install Tails 4.11
Follow the steps here, or simply click here to Install Etcher for MacOS,
Once Etcher is installed, make sure the USB stick that you want to install Tails 4.11 is plugged into your Mac > Click the ‘Flash From File’ button on the left of the Etcher application and select tails-amd64-4.11.img from your computer that you already downloaded.
Next, click the ‘Select Target’ button and select your USB stick y clicking on the checkbox. Finally click flash and let Etcher do its magic. Once Etcher is done flashing Tails 4.11 to your USB stick you are ready to load Tails 4.11 on you Mac.
Formatting Usb Drive For Mac And Pc
With you USB Stick still inserter into your Mac, restart your computer and hold down the alt/option key on your keyboard as the computer starts up.
You will see the various bootable drives, one of them will be the USB Drive with Tails 4.11 on it, the name may say EFI BOOT or Windows or possibly something else. Click it to boot using Tails OS 4.11
If the USB stick does not appear in the list of possible startup disks:
- Make sure that you have verified your download of Tails.
- Try installing again on the same USB stick.
- Try installing on a different USB stick.
- Try using the same USB stick to start on a different computer? If the same USB stick works on a different computer, please report the problem to the Tails help desk as per this article.
Once you Click on the Tails startup disk, you may get the following security warning “Security settings do not allow this Mac to use an external startup disk.” read the instructions here or watch our video above which shows you how to fix this issue.
Formatting Usb Drive For Mac And Windows
Next, restart your computer again holding down the alt/option key on your keyboard, select the Tails startup disc and wait for Tails 4.11 to load up.
Format Usb Drive For Mac Backup
You can now access the Tor browser and surf the web anonymously.
Troubleshooting
Please see below links related to some common problems with installing Tails 4.11 on some Mac computers, as well as Tails 4.2.
If Tails 4.11 disk does not show up when you restart your computer while holding down the alt/option key on your keyboard, Tails may not be compatible with your mac model/version.
Security settings do not allow this Mac to use an external startup disk. – If you get this warning read the instructions in the provided link or watch our video above.
Formatting Usb Drive For Mac And Pc
Keyboard and trackpad do not work on Mac Book Pros with touch-bar when Tails loads – The only way to get Tails working on any Mac’s that have a touch-bar is to use an external mouse and an external keyboard.
Format Usb Drive Mac Fat32
Connecting to a WiFi network in Tails – If you cannot use an Ethernet cable, USB tethering or USB Wi-Fi adapter and must connect to WiFi to access Tails , you can try disable MAC spoofing to get your Wi-Fi interface to work in Tails. However, this does not always work. Disabling MAC spoofing has security implications, so read carefully the documentation about MAC spoofing before doing so. Note that even if MAC spoofing is disabled, your anonymity on the Internet is preserved. In this reddit thread on Help with Tails WiFi on Mac Book Pro, it is recommended to use a cheap USB/WiFi adapter.
Format A Usb On Mac
Are you having any issues installing Tails OS on a Jump Drive on your Mac? What do you use Tails OS for? What is your favourite application on Tails OS? Please do share in the comments below.