1. Format Thumb Drive Macbook
2. How To Format A Thumb Drive For Mac And Pc

Garmin Support Center is where you will find answers to frequently asked questions and resources to help with all of your Garmin products. To format the USB drive to FAT32, follow the next steps: Step 1. Connect the USB flash drive to your Mac computer. Step 2.Go to Applications Utilities Double click and open Disk Utility. 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. Click the Erase button.

By Adela D. Louie, Last updated: August 27, 2019

In today’s technology, if you buy a USB hard drive, you can just simply use it directly using your Mac. However, there are instances that not unless that your flash drive is build to use for your Mac, you will not be able to format it.

Why is this so? The answer to this is because most of the computers actually run on Windows and they actually use a different file format which is known to be the Fat32.

Those drives that are formatted in Fat32 can be used in your Mac for reading and writing but there might be an instance that you might experience some trouble once that you use your macOS native format.

So, in case that you have a flash drive that is formatted into Fat32 or any type of format rather than having a Mac OS Extended or AFPS, then we are going to show you in this article how you could possibly format your flash drive using your Mac.

Part 1: How To Format Flash Drive On Mac

Here are the steps that you need to follow. Do these steps and you will then be able to format your flash drive on your Mac.

Step 1: Go ahead and plug in your flash drive in the USB port on your Mac.

Step 2: After that, go ahead and launch the Finder and click on your flash drive detected by your Mac.

Step 3: See to it that there are no files saved on your flash drive that you no longer need. This is because formatting your flash drive will remove all the data that is stored in it. If there are some files that you want to remain, simply copy these files to your Mac.

Step 4: After getting all the files that you need from your flash drive, go ahead and click on “Applications” and then click “Utilities” and then choose “Disk Utility”.

Step 5: And then, go ahead and click on your flash drive from the sidebar.

Step 6: Once that you have chosen your flash drive, go ahead and click on the “Erase” button located at the toolbar at the top of the window.

Step 7: On the next window that will appear on your screen, go ahead and key in a name for the flash drive that you are formatting from the box next to the “Name” option.

Step 8: And then select a format that you want from the drop-down menu.

Step 9: No, if you have previously stored a data on your flash drive that is highly sensitive, just go ahead and click on the Security Tab.

Step 10: From the security tab, go ahead and choose the level of the security that you want. The more that you move to your right, then the more “passes” the deleted tool will be but it will securely delete your files. However, doing to so will take more of your time to format your flash drive.

Step 11: After that, go ahead and click on the “OK” button and then click on the “Erase” button.

Part 2: Choosing the Right Format

There are formats that you need to choose from depending on the Mac that you are using. If you are using the macOS Sierra or a later version, then you have to options to choose from. One is the AFPS and the other one is the Mac OS Extended. The question now here is that which one should you choose.

You have to keep in mind that once you have formatted your flash drive into AFPS, then those Macs that are running on macOS that is older than the High Sierra will not be able to recognize it.

So, if you would want to use your flash drive on Macs that are running on High Sierra, then you have to choose the Mac OS Extended format.

However, you also have to know that AFPS is actually optimized for SSD or “solid state drive” and it includes flash drives.

That is why if you are going to reformat a flash drive on your Mac, then you should definitely choose the AFPS format as it is known to be the most reliable and faster than the Mac OS Extended. But again, that is if you do not have any plans in using it on a pre-High Sierra course.

And lastly, if in case that you would want to use your flash drive as one of your backup options in Time Machine, then you should definitely have it formatted in Mac OS Extended.

This is because Time Machine does not have the ability yet to backup flash drives that are formatted in AFPS. So, if you are using an AFPS formatted flash drive on Time Machine, it will just ask you to format your flash drive into Mac OS Extended.

Part 3: How To Format Flash Drive To Fat32 On Your Mac

Once that you have a flash drive, then what you would need to do is to have it formatted into Fat32. Why? This is because once that you have formatted your flash drive into Fat32, then you will be able to use it on both Windows and Mac PC when you want to save or transfer files with either of the two.

The Fat32 format can be used – read or write – with both Mac and Windows PC and because of this, it makes the device more versatile.

However, there are some limitations that you should need to know such as an individual file should only have a maximum size of 4GB. But do not worry because there is still something you can do about it and that is by formatting it to exFAT.

The exFAT format will not give any limitations on the file size that you are going to store on your flash drive and you can still use it on both Windows and Macs that are running in Mac OS X Snow Leopard or later version. For you to be able to format your flash drive into Fat32, here is what you need to do.

Step 1: Go ahead and connect your flash drive to your Mac.

Step 2: And then, go to Application and then click on Utilities.

Step 3: After that, go ahead and launch Disk Utility.

Step 4: And then, go ahead and click on your flash drive located at the sidebar in Disk Utility.

Step 5: After that, click on 'Erase' in the Disk Utility window.

Step 6: After that, go ahead and enter the name for the flash drive that you formatted.

Step 7: And then, choose the Format menu and then select MS-DOS (FAT32) or the ExFAT.

Step 8: After that, go ahead and click on the 'Erase' button.

Once that you are done with the provided steps for you, your flash drive will then completely wipe out all the data stored and it is re-formatted into either an ExFAT or FAT32 depending on what you have chosen on the previous steps.

Part 4: Getting Your Mac System Run Fast

Now that you have known with how you can format your flash drive on your Mac, now it is time for you to get your Mac cleaned up.

Getting your Mac clean on a regular basis after doing tasks can help your Mac maintain its speed and will also give you more space for your storage.

There is one great option for you to clean up your Mac in no time and this is by using the software called the FoneDog Mac Cleaner.

People Also ReadHow to Fix my Mac Running Slow?The Best iphone Data recovery Free Download on Mac

The FoneDog Mac Cleaner will help you to speed up your Mac with just a few simple clicks. This software can also help you in scanning your Mac faster and find all of your junk files on your Mac.

It also has the capability of checking your Mac's system status which includes your CPU status, your memory usage and more. This way, you will have an idea of what is the data that is actually eating up a lot of storage space on your Mac and which is causing it to perform slower than the usual.

The FoneDog Mac Cleaner will not only help you in removing all of the junk files that you have on your Mac. It can also help you to completely uninstall applications that you no longer use together with all the files that are associated with that app. It can also serve as a Similar Image Finder, an Extension Manager, a Duplicate Finder, and more.

For you to start cleaning up your Mac, all you have to do is to follow all the steps that we are going to provide to you. Do not worry, this is really simple and easy to follow and it will not consume a lot of your time. In addition, the screenshots below are shown under the dark mode on Mac.

Step 1: Download and Install

Have the FoneDog Mac Cleaner downloaded from our official website at https://www.fonedog.com/mac-cleaner/. Once that you have completely downloaded the program, go ahead and have the program installed on your Mac.

Step 2: Launch the Program

After that installation process is complete, go ahead and run the program on your Mac. Once that the program is up and running, you will be able to see on your screen the system status of your Mac. With that information, you will have an idea which files are taking up a lot of space on your Mac.

Step 3: Select Cleaner

Cleaner provides you with the cleaning function for the system, photo, email, files, apps and other fields on your Mac.

Step 4: Choose iTunes Junk

Here, take iTunes Junk as an example to show you how to clean junks on your Mac to make your Mac run faster.
Note: As for the other tools like 'System Junk' and 'Email Junk', the steps to clean up them is the same as that in 'iTunes Junk' tool.

Step 5. Scan iTunes Files

After clicking into the page of iTunes Junk, press the Scan button to start scan all the iTunes backups, Cache, updates and downloads on your Mac.

Step 6: Review and Select Items

After that scanning process is completely done, you will be able to see on the left side of your window screen a list of category folders of all the junk files of iTunes that you have on your Mac. If you click each folder, you will see on the right side of your screen all the items that each folder contains.

Review each item on each folder for you to make sure that all the junk files shown on your screen are unnecessary any more.

Once that you are satisfied with the result, you can go ahead and simply click on the 'Clean' button to clean up all your junk files.

Step 7: Confirm Your Choice

There would be a pop-up window called Confirmation turning up. Please press the 'Confirm' button if you are sure to delete the selected files; otherwise, please press the Cancel button and return to the previous page.

Step 8: Cleaning Done

Once that the cleaning process is done, all those unnecessary files that you have there will all be deleted from your Mac.

Part 5: Conclusion

Now, as you can see, formatting your flash drive on your Mac is a very easy thing to do. All you need to have is the knowledge on how you can do.

And keep in mind that if you are going to format your flash drive, make sure that you choose the right format so that you can use it in any PC.

Formatting is easy, just like in cleaning up your Mac. Getting your Mac tidy is one of the best things that you should do for you to be able to maintain the speed of your Mac and of course for you to get more space on your storage. And the best way for you to clean up your Mac is by using the FoneDog Mac Cleaner.

Many users are looking for tools like 'HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool for Mac', 'Sandisk USB Format Tool Mac', 'Kingston USB Format Tool Mac', 'Lexar usb format tool mac', 'sd card format tool mac' or 'usb disk storage format tool mac' hoping that there are this kind of tools that could be used on Mac for formatting their hard drive or usb flash drive on MAC OS X, or sometimes you are searching for a bootable format tool on mac just as what HP Format Tool could perform the trick.

Some users may also want to erase the privacy files on their device by getting it formatted, is formatting true erasing on MAC? Could formatted files be retrieved? We will explain all this in this content.

Note: before any formatting or erasing the disk/pen drive, we would recommend you backup your data on your media that you want to format onto another device to avoid unintentionally data loss. We would not expect this happen that you accidentally reformatted your disk/usb stick and then later found out you had just lost some important files.

Also read: 5 best free backup software, or how to repair damaged usb drive on MAC

Table of Content

1. HOT FAQs

8 MAC Formatters for USB/SD/HDD

Here is a list of disk or usb formatting tools for mac or ways of formatting disk/usb flash on MAC to get it done.

Tool 1 - Disk Utility provided by Mac OS, the best free tool to format device

Disk Utility - the best free mac format and erase tool that is provided by Apple Inc. for users to manage digital devices not only the internal media but also external drives like hard disk, usb flash and more.

Note: Erasing and formatting with Disk Utility would delete files on devices, the deleted files could be no longer accessible without some professional data recovery tools, which usually cost around $60-100.

How to format/erase usb disk or memory card on MAC using Disk Utility

Here are the steps that you may follow to get your device formatted/erased.

• Get your device connected to MAC, and backup your data to somewhere else at first as the preparetion.
• Open Disk Utility, which can be found in Applications -> Utility
• View -> Show all devices
• Select the one you want to erase/format, and then click the Erase button. (The same function that is to perform the function of 'Format')
  Open Disk Utility
• Select a file system for it (if you want to format it fat32, select FAT. Exfat would be recommended since it is more powerful that fat32, later the difference would be explained)
  Choose a file system to format
• Confirm Erase
  Confirm erase to get it formatted/erased

See the video guide here.

Pros: - More than just a format tool on MAC

1. It is able to format a disk or usb flash to be hfs+, fat, EXFAT and more. (FAT VS FAT32 VS NTFS will be explained in the following parts)
2. It provides repairing functions to repair your storage device if it became damaged - that stars itself among the rest tools.
3. It is free of charge

Cons

1. It does not provide NTFS file system while formatting.
2. It is not truely data erasing since formatted/erased files could still be restored by other paid mac data recovery tools

File System Difference HFS+ VS FAT VS VS FAT32 VS EXFAT VS NTFS (Which one to use?)

Note: NTFS file system is not provided in Mac erasing/formatting inside of Disk Utility. If you want your device to be NTFS, you need to try other format tools or a Windows PC to get it formatted. Only by formatting could its file system be changed.

Which file system would you suggest for my device while formatting/erasing?->> EXFAT, which both works on MAC and Windows 10 compatible with no limit in file size and file storage size, volume size and you don't have to download other tools to get it formatted but just with the power of Disk Utility.

What if I want to use NTFS as my device file system, which tool shall I use to get it changed? Try some other mac format tools instead of Disk Utility. (We would tell you later in another article.)

How to tell which file system does my digital device apply?

Mac machines: right click your device in Mac -> Get Info -> General -> Format, and see what it shows, if it says 'MS-DOS FAT32', it means your drive is in fat32 file system, which is compatible with both Mac and Windows.

Windows PCs: You may get your device connected to Windows, and then right click it -> Property ->General, and you will see a photo that shows the information on file system.

File system is FAT32

Note: if your device is damaged and shows RAW FILESYSTEM, you may follow this guide to get it repaired: How to repair drive raw file system

Damaged media raw file system

You may also want to read: how to change raw file system to ntfs; how to convert raw file system to fat32

Tool 2 - WD Drive Utilities, formerly WD Quick Formatter by Western Digital Corporation (Freeware)

WD Quick Formatter is able to reformat any hard drive (not limited to WD Hard drives) to hfs+ or exfat file system and data on the drive would also be erased while changing its file system. No chance for a recovery unless with some special data recovery utility.

WD Drive Utilities formerly WD Quick Formatter

WD Drive Utilities software allows you to configure, manage, and diagnose your WD drive. With WD Drive Utilities, you can

• Run drive diagnostics
• Manage RAID configuration (For RAID supported models)
• Erase and format drive
• Set drive sleep timer (on supported drives)
• Register drive

(Information provided by WD)

You may download it here https://downloads.wdc.com/wdapp/WD_Utilities_Standalone_Installer_Mac_2_1_1_119.zip

If the above link expired, go to this page and get a download. https://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?lang=en

Tool 3 - Freecome Hard Drive Formatter or also called FHD Formatter for MAC by Freecome Technologies (Freeware)

This freeware is able to format digital device to be hfs+, fat32 as options while choosing a file system to format/erase.

It is called Freecom Mobile Drive CLS FHD Formatter Utility 1.15 or FHDFormatter for Mac.

Download sites: we checked the websites and only found the download is available on softpedia and softinformer. See the download link here

Bottomline: we would recommend you stay with the first two freeware Disk Utility or WD Disk Utility.

Tool 4 - SD Memory Card Formatter for Mac - free

SD Memory Card Formatter for Mac is introduced by SDCard.org as a external device storage formatter that is able to format usb flash, memory card on MAC for free. See details and download url at this page

Download url: https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter/eula_mac/index.html

Tool 5 - BitRaser, formerly named Stellar Disk Wipe by Stellar Information Technology(30 days free trial, Paid utility)

This one is useful that could erase confidential information on your devices. It has both Mac edition and Windows edition. And admin console, network erasure is still available as enterprise solution offered by Stellar. Highly recommended paid tool.

BitRaser

File eraser and Drive Eraser for different users need. Mobile eraser available too.

Tool 6 - AweEraser by Magoshare (Paid utility)

Tool 7 - Super Eraser by DoYourData (Paid utility)

Tool for erasing data on digital device on MAC. The erased/formatted files could not be restored. It needs a pay.

Free alternative of DOYOURDATA Super Eraser Mac - Mac Disk Utility

Tool 8 - MacClean360 by DoYourData (Paid utility)

It is a Mac cleaning tool that could clean files on Mac for digital devices. You may use the first Tool 1 Mac Disk Utility or WD Disk Utility as free alternative instead of this paid tool.

Verdict

Mac Disk Utility and WD Disk Utility is highly recommended for no matter formatting a device or erasing a device, or repairing device errors.

If you want to erase files or erase drive permanently without any chance of recovery, try the Tool 3 - BitRaser provided by Stellar Information on Mac, if you don't mind erasing the device on Windows, freeware IM-Magic Partition Resizer Free could erase files/drive permanently.

Also read: 4 free tools to delete files or erase drive permanently on Windows

How to format usb flash or disk fat32 on Mac

Since Mac Disk Utility provides the formatting file system fat, exfat, you may want to know what's the difference between fat and fat32, or exfat?

See this is a photo that shows what's available when formatting the media in Disk Utility.

Choose a file system to format

More mac fat32 format tools? See how to format sd/usb fat32 on mac

1. Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
2. Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted)
3. Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled)
4. Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled, Encrypted)
5. MS-DOS(FAT) ----This is fat32, what you need
6. ExFat - recommended since it both works on Mac and Windows OS and it has no limit in file size and partition size.

Mac Disk Utility already provides an option when choosing a file system - MS-DOS(fat), WHICH IS FAT32 WHAT YOU WANT.

Note: Mac OS (FAT) is compatible with both Windows PC and Mac platforms, however, there's a limit to trasnferring files over 4GB.

The Answer - choose MS-DOS(FAT) ----This is fat32, what you need. However we would suggest you use EXFAT.

Formatting VS Erasing (Is formatting or erasing permanent data deleting?)

Formatting, is to make a media a new place for data storage that you may change its file system while you format it. Formatted drive data would be marked as available for new data to take its space.

There are three levels of formatting

1. quick format (no disk error checking and repairing)
2. full format (includes repairing bad blocks)
3. low-level format (it could only be performed by professional low level format tool, which is usually shorten the life of device)

Erasing, is to remove information on your device, which is more simplier than formatting, however it is not true wiping out all the information since erased files could be restored with help of free data recovery software.

Well, the truth is data could also be destoryed if you continue using your device after the formatting or the erasing and saved a huge number of files. If no data was saved to formatted/erased media, data could still be restored with professional tools.

How to erase data permanently on mac with freeware

Since erased files or erased media could still be recovered in Mac Disk Utilities and WD Disk Utlities, you may want to query how to erase data permanently on Mac? Is there any freeware that could do the permanent deleting?

The answer: BitRaser is a 30 days free program for erasing files permanently on Mac, we failed to find other free tools for the permanent erasing at this time.

Option: Erase data permanently with freeware on Windows OS using freeware IM-Magic Partition Resizer Free that provides 'Wipe Partition' to get everything truely deleted and removed without a chance of recovery.

Also read: 4 free tools to delete files or erase drive permanently on Windows

HP USB DISK Storage Format Tool for Mac Download

Is there HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool Mac available? Can I use HP USB Format Tool on Mac?

So far as we know that the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool, also called HP USB Format Uility by users is only for Windows OS for example Windows 10/8.1/7/Vista/XP and there was no news coming from the developer that a MAC edition would be released.

HP USB Disk Format Tool is provided by HP for disk formatting and making a bootable usb, however this program only provides Windows editions which is compatible with Windows 10, 8.1, 7, Vista, and XP.

The Answer: There is no mac edition of HP USB Format Tool, however here are some free solutions if you want to use it on MAC.

Formatting in HP USB Disk Format Tool, could be replaced by Disk Utility in Mac that you may save downloading HP USB Format Tool for Mac.

Creating bootable usb in HP USB Disk Format Tool, could be replaced by a bootable MacOS high sierra usb install drive, see the following video

Format Thumb Drive Macbook

Another option: see how to create a bootable installer for MacOS on https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201372

Also read: HP USB Format Tool Review and Error Fixing

Last updated on June 17, 2020

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