How to Format a Bootable USB Drive in Windows 10

Have no idea about how to format or reformat a bootable USB drive on Windows 10/8.1/7? Don't worry; this tutorial will help you to do it and make it work as a normal storage drive again.

"Hi, I'm thinking about formatting a bootable USB drive in Windows 10, but it's so weird that the USB drive is now showing several MBs capacity. It should be a 4GB size in total. What should I do to format the bootable USB drive properly and restore its full capacity?"

Solution 1. Format bootable USB drive with EaseUS Partition Master

EaseUS Partition Master is a free partition manager software that allows users to fully manage their hard drive storage. It's also a reliable and free USB formatting tool that helps to format a bootable USB drive, memory card, pen drive, and other hard disk storage devices easily and quickly without losing the original size.

Download and install EaseUS Partition Master on your Windows computer, and follow the steps below to perform the storage device formatting with ease.

Step 1. Launch EaseUS Partition Master, right-click the partition on your external hard drive/USB/SD card which you want to format and choose the "Format" option.

Step 2. Assign a new partition label, file system (NTFS/FAT32/EXT2/EXT3/EXT4/exFAT), and cluster size to the selected partition, then click "OK".

Step 3. In the Warning window, click "Yes" to continue.

Step 4. Click the "Execute 1 Task(s)" button in the top-left corner to review the changes, then click "Apply" to start formatting your external hard drive/USB/SD card.

🔍Related Reading: How to Convert a Bootable USB Drive to Normal【2024 Guide】

Below is a guideline page that teaches users how to use a professional formatter, Disk Management, File Explorer, and CMD to format bootable pendrive:

Solution 2. How to Format Bootable Pendrive in Windows 10 via Disk Management

On Windows, you can utilize two bootable USB drive format utilities: Disk Management and Command Prompt. It introduces Disk Management to solve how to format a bootable USB in Windows 10.

First, when you run a Windows PC, connect your bootable USB drive to it. Second, press "Windows + R" to open disk management on the pop-up window. Third, right-click the bootable drive and choose "Format."

Solution 3. Format bootable USB drive by using Diskpart command

It's also practical to use the diskpart command to format your USB drive. If you are quite familiar with the use or command prompt, this method is also a good choice for you.

Step 1: Press "Windows key + R" simultaneously, type cmd in the search box and open "Command Prompt".

Step 2: Type diskpart. Run the Pop-up window that appears.

Step 3: Type list disk.

Step 4: Type select disk 0 (or disk 1... the number is the drive of the bootable USB that is going to be formatted).

Step 5: type clean.

Step 6: Type create partition primary. 

Step 7: Go to "My Computer" or "This PC" (Windows 10), right-click on the bootable USB drive and select the "Format" option to format it.

The two methods given above will help to format a bootable USB drive successfully and restore it to original condition.

You can also check out the detailed steps for formatting USB using CMD in the video below:

Bonus Tip: How to Make a Bootable USB Drive

Speaking of making a bootable drive, some of you focus on two targets to finish the making process. One is for resizing partition, and the other helps you bring the Windows system back to a healthy environment when it is corrupted or fails to boot. The below guide suits to resize partitions with EaseUS Partition Master. If you want to deploy the Windows system, check to create boot disks on another guide.

Step 1. To create a bootable disk of EaseUS Partition Master, you should prepare a storage media, like a USB drive, flash drive or a CD/DVD disc. Then, correctly connect the drive to your computer.

Step 2. Launch EaseUS Partition Master, and find the "Bootable Media" feature on the left. Click on it.

Step 3. You can choose the USB or CD/DVD when the drive is available. However, if you do not have a storage device at hand, you can also save the ISO file to a local drive, and later burn it to a storage media. Once made the option, click the "Create" button to begin.

• Check the Warning message and click "Yes".

Step 4. When the process finishes, you'll see a pop up window, asking if you want to restart computer from the bootable USB.

• Reboot Now: it means you want to restart the current PC and enter EaseUS Bootable Media to manage your disk partitions without OS.
• Done: it means you don't want to restart the current PC but to use the bootable USB on a new PC.

Note: To use the bootable disk on a new PC, you need to resart the target computer and press F2/F8/Del key to enter BIOS, and set the USB bootable disk as the first boot disk.

Wait patitiently and your computer will automatically boot up from the USB bootable media and enter EaseUS WinPE desktop.

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Final Verdict

On this page, we collected 3 efficient methods to help you format bootable USB to a normal state and reuse it to store files and transfer data normally again. Among the three methods, EaseUS Partition Master offers the easiest formatting solution to Windows beginners.

If you are the one who need a simple guide to make a bootable USB work as a normal USB drive to save files again, turn to EaseUS Partition Master for help.

FAQs About Format Bootable USB Windows 10

If you have further questions about formatting bootable USB drive on a Windows computer, follow and find answers here below:

1. What format should a bootable USB be for Windows 10?

To make a bootable USB drive for Windows10, the best format should be FAT32 as Windows system requries it to be FAT32 on USB drive.

2. How do I format a botoable USB drive?

• Connect the bootable USB to Windows 10 computer.
• Launch EaseUS Partition Master and right-click on the bootable USB.
• Select "Format" and set FAT32 (32GB or smaller) or exFAT (64GB or larger) to the USB drive.
• Click "OK" and "Execute Task".

3. Should Windows 10 bootable USB FAT32 or NTFS?

When you plan to create a Windows 10 bootble USB drive, you need to set the file system as FAT32 as ther modern UEFI-based hardware requries a FAT32 to install Windows 10.