top

Free Mac File System Recovery

When considering Mac OS X data recovery, much depends on the formatting (also called the file system) of the drive. But whether you are looking for HFS recovery for Mac, file recovery for Mac FAT32 systems, or NTFS recovery for Mac, Disk Drill can help. The tool can also be used to get data back from damaged APFS, FAT, and EXT3/EXT4 file systems.
Free Download
Upgrade to PRO

Why File System Repair on a Mac may be Necessary

Your Mac’s file systems can become corrupted or damaged for a variety of reasons. An infection by a virus or malware can result in a corrupted storage device. A failing drive with a bad sector may also be the cause of a damaged file system. Formatting problems, power spikes, and hardware failures can all be reasons that you may need to perform a file system repair on your Mac.
Signs that your storage device has a damaged or corrupt file system include:
  • The inability of the device to be recognized by Mac OS X;
  • Unexplained system crashes;
  • Missing or unusable files;
  • Application failure;
  • Slow response and performance degradation.
file system recovery

How to Recover System Files on Mac?

1. Download and Install Disk Drill

Download Disk Drill data recovery software for Mac to your machine and simply drag it to the Applications folder. When prompted, provide your administrator’s credentials to allow the program the functionality it requires. If the file system that you are interested in recovering is on your Mac’s main disk, perform the download and installation on an alternate stage device like a flash drive. This is to prevent the accidental overwriting of the information that you wish to recover.
ntfs data recovery mac

2. Select the Drive for Recovery

Launch Disk Drill and select the disk for recovery from the list presented in the app’s main window. If you are recovering a file system from an external device, connect it to your Mac before starting Disk Drill. It will appear in the disk list where you can select it to be scanned.
ntfs recovery mac

3. Scan for Lost Data

Click the Recover button to start scanning the selected disk. You can choose the type of scan you wish to run or let the program run all of its scanning algorithms in the optimal order. Using that option will provide the most complete recovery results.
ntfs repair mac

4. Preview the Recoverable Data

As the scan proceeds, Disk Drill will display a list of the files that can be recovered. You can pause the scan at any point and recover files that have been located by the software. Scan results can be mouted as a virtual disk, making it easy to move the recovered files to new storage locations.
data recovery ext4

5. Perform the Recovery

Click the Recover button a second time to recover the selected files. Choose a safe storage location that is not on the affected disk. This will prevent you from overwriting items that you wish to recover. You might want to reformat the original disk once you have recovered all of its data to install a fresh file system.
mac file system

Files Systems Supported for Recovery by Disk Drill

Disk Drill supports all major file systems for recovery. Here are the various file systems that can be restored with this versatile software tool.
  • APFS
    APFS
    Apple File System is the most recent Apple file system that is used by the macOS and iOS operating systems. Its features include support for full disk encryption and the ability to work with large storage volumes. APFS is optimized to provide better performance with solid-state drives.
  • HFS
    HFS
    The Hierarchical File System was the file system first introduced for use on Mac hard disks. It is rather inefficient and does not work well with large disks, which led to it being replaced by Apple.
  • HFS+
    HFS+
    The Hierarchical File System Extended was Apple’s answer to address issues with HFS. It uses disk space much more efficiently by reducing the minimum cluster size. This file system is very popular on Macs and MacBooks.
  • NTFS/NTFS5
    NTFS/NTFS5
    The New Technology File System was first introduced to the public with the Windows NT operating system. It is a native Windows file system that is still used by many storage devices. Disk Drill can be used to repair an external NTFS drive on a Mac.
  • FAT/FAT32/exFAT
    FAT/FAT32/exFAT
    The File Allocation Table and Extended File Allocation Table file systems are also Windows-specific file systems that can be recovered by Disk Drill for Mac. Just connect the device to your Mac and Disk Drill can scan and recover its contents.
  • EXT3/EXT4
    EXT3/EXT4
    Disk Drill for Mac can perform data recovery on EXT4 and EXT3 file systems. All you need to do is attach the storage device to your computer and select the Linux disk in the app’s window.

Supported File Formats for File System Recovery

Disk Drill’s advanced scanning capabilities enable it to recover over 400 different file formats when restoring a damaged or corrupted file system. All popular video, image, audio, document, and archive formats are supported when performing a Mac file system recovery. Files can be filtered during recovery to make it easy to find the items you need.
  • Images
    Images
    BMP, TIFF, PSP, JPEG, JP2, GIF. Polaroid/Sigma: X3F. Pentax: PEF. Adobe: AI, LRCAT, PSB, APM, IDML, PSD, INDB, INDD, INDL, INX.
  • Audio
    Audio
    MP3 (MPEG Audio Stream, Layer III), WMA (Windows Media audio files), AIFC, AIF, AIFF (Audio Interchange File)
  • Video
    Video
    AVI, FLV (Flash video), MPG (MPEG video), M4V (iTunes video), MP4 (MPEG-4 video), WMV (Windows Media Video)
  • Archives
    Archives
    DMG (Mac OS X Disk Image), RAR (WinRAR Compressed Archive), CAB (Windows Cabinet File), ZIP (Extended Zip File), 7Z (7-Zip Compressed)
  • Documents
    Documents
    XLSX (Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet), DOCX (Microsoft Word), PDF (Portable Document Format), PPTX (Microsoft PowerPoint)
  • Other Files
    Other Files
    DB (Paradox), SQL (bundled SQL queries), OTF (OpenType Font), ACCDB (Microsoft Database), MYO (MYOB Limited Windows File)
All supported file types

Recover Damaged File Systems from Any Device

Disk Drill can recover files from damaged or corrupted file systems from any type of disk-based device. If you can connect the device to the Mac running the recovery software, Disk Drill can scan it and recover its data. Here are some of the devices that are supported by this flexible recovery program.
  • PC Mac
    PC / Mac
    Dell®, HP®, Acer®, Asus®, MacBook Pro®, MacBook Air®, Apple iMac® and more
  • HDD / SSD
    HDD / SSD
    HP®, Samsung®, Seagate®, Toshiba®, WD®, LaCie®, Intel®, Adata® and more
  • USB Drive
    USB Drive
    SanDisk®, Samsung®, Kingston®, Corsair®, Patriot®, PNY®, Verbatim®, Silicon Power® and more
  • SD / CF Card
    SD / CF Card
    SanDisk®, Transcend®, Toshiba®, Lexar®, Integral®, SP®, PNY®, Kingston® and more
  • Digital Camera
    Digital Camera
    Samsung®, HP®, Sony®, GoPro®, Canon®, Sigma®, Nikon®, Epson®, Panasonic® and more
  • iPhone / Android
    iPhone / Android
    Samsung Galaxy®, iPhone®, Lenovo®, Huawei®, OnePlus®, Google Pixel®, LG® and more

Features of Disk Drill File System Recovery Toolkit for Mac

The Disk Drill File System Recovery Toolkit for Mac includes many features that set it apart from the competition. Here is an overview of what you get with this comprehensive data recovery and protection application.
  • File Recovery Software for Mac
    File Recovery Software for Mac
    Recover files in over 400 different file formats and all major file systems from virtually any type of disk-based storage device with a few simple clicks.
  • SD Card Recovery
    SD Card Recovery
    Recover data from an SD or memory card quickly and easily by connecting the device to your machine with an external or internal reader.
  • Mac Hard Drive data recovery
    Mac Hard Drive data recovery
    Protect your valuable hard drive data with the free Recovery Vault and Guaranteed Recovery tools that streamline file recovery from accidental deletion.
  • Partition Recovery on Mac
    Partition Recovery on Mac
    Losing a complete partition can be devastating. Restore the data from a lost or formatted partition and escape disaster with this software tool.
  • Mac Trash Recovery Software
    Mac Trash Recovery Software
    If you accidentally empty the Trash while it contains important data, you can get it back in a few clicks and keep right on working.
  • iPhone Recovery Software
    iPhone Recovery Software
    Recover data from iOS devices such as iPhones and iPads by connecting to your Mac. Disk Drill treats its storage as a disk and can recover its data.

Protect Your File Systems

Disk Drills data protection algorithms have zero impact on your system, are safe to run and provide exceptional benefits. Recovery Vault increases the chances of a fast and successful data recovery. Guaranteed Recovery eliminates the possibility of losing your most important data. Data protection features are highly configurable and can be enabled in Disk Drill at any time. These tools protect designated files and file systems and are both completely free.

Frequently Asked Questions

Updated on by Disk Drill Team

Follow these steps to recover files in the Linux EXT3/EXT4 formats.

  1. Download and install Disk Drill on your Mac.
  2. Connect the Linux storage device to your computer.
  3. Launch Disk Drill and select the device from the disk list.
  4. Click Recover to scan for lost data.
  5. Preview the files that can be recovered.
  6. Click Recover again to restore your data.

Disk Drill can recover lost data from a Mac HFS file system in multiple different ways.

  • Traditional data recovery using its user-friendly interface and advanced scanning technology.
  • The Recovery Vault and Guaranteed Recovery features enable you to Undelete Protected Data with a single click. You can configure these tools to protect the designated folders and files that are important to you.

Use the following steps to perform NTFS data recovery on Mac.

  1. Download and install Disk Drill on the Mac.
  2. Connect the NTFS device or Windows computer to the Mac.
  3. Launch Disk Drill and select the disk containing the NTFS file system.
  4. Click Recover to search for lost data.
  5. Preview the files found during the scan.
  6. Click Recover to complete the NTFS recovery from your Mac.

Best File System Recovery Software in 2020:

  1. Disk Drill File Systems Recovery Software
  2. OnTrack EasyRecovery
  3. CrashPlan
  4. Piriform Recuva
  5. EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard Pro
  6. Wise Data Recovery
  7. Paragon File Recovery Software
  8. MiniTool Power Data Recovery
NTFS file system recovery is the process of recovering data from an NTFS formatted storage device. Repairing an NTFS file system from your Mac is possible with Disk Drill recovery software. Connect the storage device to your Mac and the app will scan it and recover its lost files and folders.

You will probably need to format the storage device to fix a corrupted file system on a MAC. First, you should use Disk Drill to recover the data from the device. Then follow these steps to format the disk or drive.

  1. Connect the external device if necessary.
  2. Open Disk Utility on your Mac.
  3. Choose View > Show All Devices.
  4. Select the storage device you want to format and click the Erase button.
  5. Click the Scheme pop-up menu, then choose GUID Partition Map.
  6. Click the Format pop-up menu and select the file system format.
  7. Enter a name for the disk if desired.
  8. Click Erase and then Done.
Disk Drill 4
Recover HFS or NTFS partition on Mac OS X to get your important files back now!
Free Download
Upgrade to PRO

More How To's on Mac file system recovery

How do I recover lost data?
  • 100+ Million
    TOTAL DOWNLOADS
  • 850,000+
    PRO CLIENTS
  • BUSINESS & HOME USERS
    in 150+ countries

See what Disk Drill fans say

softpedia.com
«Disk Drill is a practical and intuitive utility that can successfully assist you in regaining access to lost or damaged files from a variety of disk or file system types, making it quite worthy for considering, should you be in the market for such a tool.» by Marina Dan
Raphaël from Banzai Software
Amazing software that restores all my files from a damaged external hard drive file system. I takes some time to do the job but it worked like a charm compared to the other software I tested. Definitely worth the money! Thank you so much!
Used by world famous companies
Partners