How to Format an External Hard Disk in FAT32 Format

Want to format an external hard drive or any drive larger than 32GB with FAT32? This tutorial shows you how to do it easily in two ways.

External hard drives have grown in disk space dramatically, and by default, they use NTFS or exFAT as the default file system. For example, if you bought a 1TB external hard drive, which is relatively cheap, it will most likely be formatted with NTFS or exFAT. One of the main reasons for using NTFS or exFAT is that they are modern and designed to handle larger hard drives.

However, not all devices support these (NTFS and exFAT) modern file systems. You might need to format the external drive with FAT32 in those cases. For example, maybe you have an old TV that only recognizes FAT32. The problem is that the Windows GUI format option (right-click on drive > Format) doesn’t support formatting larger drives in FAT32 due to inherent limitations in that file system.

That being said, we can use a simple PowerShell command or a free tool called FAT32 Format to format any drive in FAT32 format. Here’s how.

Before You Start

• Formatting deletes all the data in the drive. So, make sure to back up all the data in the drive before proceeding.
• Plug in the external hard drive and note down its drive letter. To get the drive letter, open File Explorer (press Windows key + E), go to “This PC” on the left sidebar, and the drive letters are displayed on the right page, for example, H:.
• Administrator rights are required to follow the procedures below.

Format External Hard Drive with FAT32 Using PowerShell

1. Right-click the Windows icon on the taskbar.
2. Select the “Terminal (Admin)” option.
3. If using Windows 10, you can select “Windows PowerShell (Admin)“.
4. In the Terminal window, run Format /FS:FAT32 X: command while replacing X with the actual drive letter of your external hard drive. For example, H.
5. When prompted, type a name of your choice for the drive.
6. Type “Y” and press “Enter” when prompted with the “Proceed with format” confirmation prompt.
7. Wait for the formatting process to complete. I will take a few minutes, depending on the drive size.
8. Once completed, you will see the “Format Complete” message.
9. With that, you’ve successfully formatted an external hard drive with FAT32.

Good to know: How to partition an external hard disk

Format External Hard Drive with FAT32 Using FAT32 Format

If you don’t want to follow the command line approach, you can use a free software called FAT32 Format. The GUI of this application is similar to the Windows Format GUI (right-click on drive > Format). The best thing is that it is portable software. i.e., you don’t need to install it to use it. Without further ado, let’s get started and format an external drive using FAT32 Format.

1. First, download FAT32 Format from this official dev page.
2. After downloading, open the File Explorer by pressing “Windows key + E”.
3. Click “Downloads” on the left sidebar to open the Download folder.
4. Find and double-click the FAT32 Format (guiformat.exe) file to open it.
5. Once it opens, select the drive letter of your external drive from the “Drive” dropdown.
6. Select the “Quick Format” checkbox.
7. Click “Start“.
8. The above action starts the formatting process. It will take a few minutes to complete.
9. Once done, you can close the FAT32 Format application.
10. With that, you’ve formatted an external drive in FAT32 format.

Wrapping Up — Formatting External Hard Drive in FAT32 Format

As you can see, while the default File Explorer’s format feature doesn’t allow drives larger than 32GB to be formatted with FAT32, we can do it using PowerShell or FAT32 Format, a free software. Whichever method you follow, the result is the same. If needed, you can also verify the file system of any drive using the File Explorer and Disk Management tool. Do keep in mind that compared to NTFS and exFAT, FAT32 is limited in terms of allowed individual file sizes. i.e., you cannot store files larger than 4 GB. In the future, if you decide to move away from FAT32, you can convert FAT32 to NTFS without losing data.

If you have any questions or need help, comment below. I’ll be happy to assist.

Update: This tutorial has been rewritten with updated steps and the FAT32 Format download URL.