If you have an external hard drive or USB flash drive that you’d like to use on both Macs and Windows PCs, choosing the right file system to format the drive can be confusing. Learn a few ways to make your drive Mac and PC friendly.

Insert the flash drive or hard drive you want to format for Windows compatibility. Go to the Applications folder on your Mac’s hard drive, then go to the Utilities folder, and launch Disk Utility. Select the drive you want to format. Warning: the following steps will delete any info you currently have on the drive.
As mentioned in the previous part, NTFS and HFS+ are not suitable, you should format Seagate drive to other file system. Both of FAT32 and exFAT are suitable for Seagate drive to be used with Mac and PC. Then, should you format the hard drive to FAT32 or exFAT file system?
To begin to format USB for Mac and PC on a Windows 10 computer, insert the USB drive into an open port and then launch the Windows Disk Management Utility. To find it, type 'disk management' or 'format disk' in Windows Search and select ' Create and Format Hard Disk Partitions.' Step 2: Select the Drive to Format.

Need to access or transfer files between Mac and PC? As simple as this task sounds, it’s not very straightforward for inexperienced users. Since Mac OS X and Windows use totally different file systems, the way a drive is formatted can determine what type of computer it will work with. In fact, there are four ways you can format an external or USB flash drive to achieve varying degrees of compatibility between Macs and PCs. Let’s take a look at them:

HFS+

For Apple Mac users, there are two ways to format USB flash drive to FAT32, including Disk Utility and Terminal command line. Refer to detailed steps of using both tools for FAT32 format. Formatting would erase data completely, make sure that you have a data backup. Mac mojave wallpaper.

Mac OS X’s native file system is HFS+ (also known as Mac OS Extended), and it’s the only one that works with Time Machine. But while HFS+ is the best way to format drives for use on Macs, Windows does not support it. If you’re only going to be using your external or USB flash drive with certain PCs – such as at home or the office – you might be interested in a program called MacDrive. When you install MacDrive on a Windows PC, it will be able to seamlessly read & write to HFS+ drives. This isn’t a good solution if you need your drive to work on any PC without installing software, though.

NTFS

The native Windows file system is NTFS, which is only partially compatible with Mac OS X. Macs can read files on NTFS drives, but it cannot write to them. So if you need to get files from a PC to your Mac, NTFS is a decent option. However, you won’t be able to move files in the other direction, from Mac to PC.

FAT32

The most universally supported way to format your drive is with the FAT32 file system. It works with all versions of Mac OS X and Windows. Case closed, right? Well, not so fast. Unfortunately, FAT32 is a very old file system and has some technical limitations. For example, you cannot save files that are larger than 4GB on a FAT32-formatted drive. This is a deal-breaker if you work with huge files. The other limitation is the total size of the partition. If you format your FAT32 drive in Windows, the drive partition cannot be larger than 32GB. If you format it from a Mac running 10.7 Lion, the drive partition can be up to 2TB. Much better, except for that pesky 4GB limit.

exFAT

Format thumb drive for both mac and pc computer

The exFAT file system eliminates the two major deficiencies of FAT32: the largest partition and file sizes it supports are virtually unlimited by today’s standards. Awesome, it’s perfect! Almost… since exFAT is fairly new, it isn’t compatible with older Macs and PCs. Any Mac running 10.6.5 (Snow Leopard) or 10.7 (Lion) supports exFAT, while PCs running Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista SP1, and Windows 7 are compatible. If you know you’ll be using computers running updated versions of these operating systems, exFAT is the clear best choice.

Format a drive using Disk Utility on a Mac

Launch Disk Utility (Applications > Utilities).
Select your external hard drive or USB flash drive from the list on the left.
Click on the Erase tab. Select the format – Mac OS Extended (HFS+), MS-DOS (FAT32), or exFAT – then name the drive.
Click the Erase button and the drive will start formatting. Be aware that formatting a drive deletes all of the files on it, so back up anything important before completing this step.

Format a drive using Windows

Go to Computer (or My Computer in Windows XP).
Select your drive from the list and right-click on it. Choose Format from the contextual menu.
A window will pop up where you can choose the format – NTFS, FAT32, or exFAT. Make sure the allocation unit size is set to default and type in a volume label.
Click Start to format the drive.

Since the PC and Mac are two different operating systems, they use different file systems. By default, Macs use HFS, while PCs use NTFS, which are not compatible with each other. If you plan on using an external drive with both Macs and PCs, you should format the disk with the exFAT file system instead.

You can format the drive on your Mac or Windows computer.

How To Format Hard Drive For Mac

How to format a USB drive as exFAT on Mac

So how do you know if your USB drive is in the correct format? You do not need to do anything special on the 'Disk Utility' - simply insert the USB drive and open Finder. Right-click the drive icon in the Finder sidebar (or on the desktop) and select Get Info. You will see the drive's file system shown on the right “Format”.

Formatting a drive will erase it completely, so make sure you have everything backed up that you want to keep. To format a drive on a Mac, you'll need the built-in Disk Utility application.

Go to Open Disk Utility, which is located under Applications in the Finder menu. If you have a USB flash drive inserted in your Mac, you can see it under the External in the Disk Utility. Select your flash drive from the list. Go to the Erase tab. You will be asked to provide the disk name and then select the file system as exFAT.

Then select the default GUID Partition Map (GPT) scheme. Click the Erase button when you are done and the Disk Utility will format your disk with the settings you specified. This will erase all the files on the drive.

You're now done. Be sure to eject the disk before you remove it from your Mac.

How to format a USB flash drive as exFAT on Windows PC

There are several ways to format drive in Windows PC, you can do that in This PC or in Disk Management.

Note: If you have important data on your USB flash drive, you should backup your drive before formatting it.

Option 1: Format a USB drive as EexFAT in This PC.

Press Windows logo key + E to open File Explorer. Right-click on the drive you want to format, click on Format. Under File system box, select exFAT for this drive. Then click Start button to go on.

Option 2: Format a USB drive as EexFAT in Disk Management.

Format Thumb Drive For Both Mac And Pc Drive

Press Win+X