Some USB drives can’t be used directly with a Mac system until you format them to be compatible with the macOS extended file system. There are basically two ways to format USB to FAT32 on Mac; Terminal Command and Disk Utility and in case you lose important data while formatting, it is possible to recover the data using a data recovery tool. We’ll look at all these in detail in this article.

• Fat32 Formatter For Mac Os
• Fat32 Formatter For Mac
• Fat32 Formatter Mac Os

Reasons to Format USB to FAT32 on Mac

Fat32 Formatter For Mac Os

There are a number of reasons why you need to format USB to FAT32 on a Mac. Let’s look at some of these in detail.

The Mac/Windows-compatible ExFat format allows larger file sizes than the old FAT32. Mac 911 By Glenn Fleishman, Senior Contributor Oct 7, 2020 10:00 pm PDT.

1. Formatting your USB to FAT32 is the most appropriate thing to do because it can be written and read on both Mac and Windows operating systems.

Fat32 Formatter For Mac

How to Format SD Card on Mac. Follow the given steps to be format or clean your SD card on Mac. Getting Started. Before we get to formatting the SD Card, here are a few things you should keep in mind beforehand: When you format data on SD Card, it erases all the data. Thus, it is advisable to backup any files/data you want beforehand. In addition, this software will format large removable devices to FAT32, which makes up for the drawback of Windows formatting utilities. For more information about formatting exFAT to FAT32 in Windows 10, please refer to format exFAT to FAT32 CMD. AOMEI Partition Assistant is a small tool with no bundled software.

2. Since many USB drives can’t be used on Mac PC directly, formatting it to FAT32 makes it usable whether you want to use it on Mac or Windows.

3. If you plan to use the drive to store different file formats, especially video files, formatting the USB to FAT32 is actually necessary.

Please note that it is recommended that you back up your USB drive first before you format it to avoid losing important data. Let’s look at the step-by-step guide to format USB to FAT32 on Mac.

Method #1: How to Format USB to FAT32 on Mac with Disk Utility

Follow the steps highlighted below to format a USB drive to FAT32 on Mac:

Step One: Connect the USB drive that you want to format into your Mac system.

Step Two: Navigate through the menu to Applications and then Utilities. Click twice to open the program.

Step Three: Choose the drive that you would like to format and click 'Erase'.

Step Four: Although this step is optional but it is recommended. Rename the USB and select 'MS-DOS(FAT)' as the format.

Step Five: Select 'Master Boot Record' for the scheme and click 'Erase' to format USB to fat32 on Mac.

When the formatting process is completed, the USB flash drive is ready to use as a FAT32 file system and you can begin to save data on it again. Note that any previous data you have on it would have been erased during the formatting process.

Method #2: How to Format USB to FAT32 on Mac with Terminal Command Line

Follow the step by step guide to formatting a USB drive to FAT32 on Mac using Terminal Command Line:

Step One: Insert your USB drive to the Mac system.

Step Two: Click 'cmd + space' to run the spotlight. Type in 'Terminal' and then click the 'Enter' key.

Step Three: Type in 'diskutil list' to locate your USB drive.

Step Four: Type 'Sudo Diskutil eraseDisk FAT32 MBRFormat/'(put the name of the location of your USB flash on your Mac PC).

Please note the following:

• 'Sudo' offers you the user right
• 'Diskutil' locates the disk utility program
• 'eraseDisk' gives the command to format the drive
• 'FAT32' identifies the file system
• 'MBRFormat' commands the disk utility to commence formatting with Master Boot Record

When this process is completed, type in 'diskutil list' in the command again to review the status of the USB drive and to see if it has been successfully formatted. You can start using your USB with the FAT32 file system to save data.

Method #3: How to Recover Lost Data after Formatting USB

Fat32 Formatter Mac Os

It’s possible to forget to backup your data before your format your USB. When this happens, you lose all data saved on the USB prior to formatting. Well, you don’t have to fret if you experience this as you can recover your lost data from formatted USB on Mac. To do this, you need a trusted data recovery tool. We strongly recommend iBeesoft Data Recovery software as the best software available to recover formatted data from your USB drive.

iBeesoft offers an effective and powerful USB recovery Mac tool to help you resolve any data loss issues fast and completely. It is 100% safe and you can depend on it to completely recover lost files from Mac format USB FAT32 bootable.

Your Safe & Professional USB Format Recovery Software

• It’s fully compatible with APFS drive/volume under macOS High Sierra and the latest macOS.
• Completely recover files from formatted SD card, USB drive, hard disk, and other external devices on Mac.
• Easily restore permanently deleted folders and files from emptied trash on Mac and restore deleted files from the hard drive and other storage devices.
• The unformat USB program fully supports data recovery for all types of USB and it also supports various file formats, including exFAT, NTFS, FAT, and HFS, among others.

Step-by-Step Guide on How to Recover Data from Formatted USB on Mac

The first thing is to download and install iBeesoft Data Recovery for Mac on your system. It is fully compatible with the latest macOS and it is virus-free. Follow the step-by-step guide below to recover files lost after format USB to FAT32 on Mac.

Step One: Select the file type(s) that you want to recover format USB files on Mac. By default, all file types are checked. So, you have to uncheck files you don’t want.

Step Two: Connect the USB drive and choose the directory to scan. In the open window, you’ll see external hard drives. Select an appropriate location where you have lost files and click the 'Scan' button to launch the scanning for lost USB files.

Step Three: Recover data lost after format a USB drive to FAT32 on Mac. All files will be displayed in the result window at the completion of the scan. Click the directory on the left side of your Mac screen to preview the files. Select the files you want to recover and click 'Recover' to save the files on your Mac PC. If you can’t find the lost files you are looking for, try the 'Deep Scan' for further search.

If you’ve been wondering about how to format USB to FAT32 on Mac and how to recover lost files, the comprehensive guide highlighted above will help you format your drive and recover any lost files at the end of the formatting process.

If you need to format a USB flash drive, HDD, SDD, or some other form of storage to FAT32, you've come to the right place.

In this article we'll go over what a file system is, the FAT32 standard, and several ways to format a storage device to FAT32 on Windows 10.

What's a file system?

A file system is a standardized way of organizing data on a computer storage device like a flash drive or HDD.

A file system divides a storage device into virtual compartments, almost like a wall of post office boxes, and keeps track of all the information that gets stored in each box.

Some of the most common file system formats for portable storage devices are FAT32, NTFS, and ExFAT.

FAT32 compared to other formats

Of those three common formats, FAT32 is the oldest and most widely supported. Every major operating system will allow you to read and write from a USB flash drive that's formatted to FAT32.

Meanwhile, macOS can only read NTFS drives, and you would need to install third-party software to write back to the drive.

However, though FAT32 is well supported, its maximum drive and file size is severely limited when compared to newer formats like NTFS and ExFAT:

* 1 petabyte is about 1 thousand terabytes
** 1 exabyte is about 1 million terabytes

Note that the maximum drive and file size of NTFS and ExFAT is so large that there's basically no limit. (But it would be nice to have a 128 PB USB drive, wouldn't it?)

On the other hand, FAT32's max file size of 4 GB is almost nothing now that phones can record 4K videos. Also, it's a little more difficult to format a drive larger than 32 GB to FAT32 on Windows 10.

These days, the only reason why you'd choose to format a drive to FAT32 is for compatibility. For example, if you need to boot up an old computer, maybe with a different operating system, and backup some of its files. But you'd need to be sure that none of those files are greater than 4 GB.

If you're sure you want to go with FAT32, here's how to format a storage drive on Windows 10.

Important note: Before you format a drive, make sure that you backup all of your important files. In fact, make two backups, and keep one on a remote service like Google Drive or Dropbox.

Formatting a drive will delete all of the data that's currently on it.

How to use Windows File Explorer to format a USB drive to FAT32

A quick note about this method: it only works on USB flash drives that are less that 32 GB. If your USB drive is larger than 32 GB, check out one of the later methods.

With that out of the way, plug your USB drive into your computer and open Windows File Explorer.

Next, right-click on the drive on the left hand side of the File Explorer window and click 'Format':

In the window that pops up, ensure that 'FAT32' is selected. Also, feel free to rename the USB drive whatever you'd like:

You can leave the rest of the options alone. Just click start to format your drive.

Once it's done, your USB drive should be formatted to use the FAT32 file system.

To double check this, open File Explorer, right click on your USB drive, and click 'Properties'.

A window will pop up and you should see that the file system is now FAT32:

How to use Rufus to format a USB drive to FAT32

If your USB drive is larger than 32 GB, you'll need to use a third-party program like Rufus to format it.

There are lots of other programs that can format USB drives, but Rufus is really small and portable. This means you can stick Rufus right on a USB drive, plug it into any Windows computer, and format other drives on the go.

After you download Rufus, double click on the .exe file to start the application.

Make sure your USB drive is selected. Then, click the 'Boot selection' dropdown and select 'Non bootable':

Next, click the 'File system' dropdown and select 'FAT32'.

Also, feel free to change the name of your USB drive under 'Volume label':

Then, click the 'Start' button to format your drive. After a few seconds it'll be formatted to FAT32.

How to use PowerShell to format a USB drive to FAT32

While this method works with drives larger than 32 GB, it's really slow – even formatting a 32 GB drive can take up to an hour depending on your computer.

But, if you aren't able to use the previous two methods for some reason, this will work in a pinch.

First, click on the Windows Search Bar and type in 'powershell'. Then, click 'Run as administrator' to launch PowerShell with elevated privileges:

In the PowerShell terminal, enter the following command:

format /FS:FAT32 DRIVE_LETTER:

Use the File Explorer to double check your drive letter. My drive letter was D, so I entered format /FS:FAT32 D:.

Press Enter, make sure your USB drive is plugged in, and press the Enter key again to start the process:

Then go run some errands or something – it will take awhile.

Once the format command is finished, your drive should be formatted to FAT32.

In closing

Now you should be able to format a USB drive of any size to FAT32 on Windows 10. And with just a little modification, any of these methods can be used to format your drive to another file system like NTFS or ExFAT.

Now get out there and format all your USB drives. (But only after you backup everything important!)

Was this helpful? Is there a better method that you know of? Tweet at me and let me know how you format things on Windows 10.