Learn how to format a write-protected USB pen drive or flash drive or SD card on Windows 11/10. Remove Read-only attributes using diskpart.

In this guide, we'll show you the steps to format a USB flash drive on Windows 11 using File Explorer, Settings app, Disk Management tool, Command Prompt, and PowerShell.

However, they can also have format errors that make them “undeletable.” Further reading: How to format USB sticks and external drives in Windows Such situations no doubt are frustrating.

If you need a USB drive that's widely compatible with different devices, you may want to format it to FAT32. Here's how to do so on Mac and PC.

You can format an external drive quickly and easily in Windows, without the need of any third-party tools. But before you format your USB drive, you need to consider which file system to use.