![\"how](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/fix-corrupted-usb-flash-drive.jpg\")
<\/p>\r\nUSB drives are great for providing additional storage for your Mac or MacBook. Many people use them to share music or photo libraries with friends. But like all disk-based storage devices, it can suffer data loss or corruption. You may need to fix a corrupted USB drive on Mac or fix a broken USB device while saving its data.<\/p>\r\n
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We are going to show you how to retrieve files from a corrupted USB drive with your Mac. We will also look at things like how to format a corrupted USB drive on a Mac. Let\u2019s get started.<\/p>\r\n
How do you know if your USB drive has been corrupted? Before looking at the signs that your USB drive is corrupted, let\u2019s look at how to figure out if your USB port is broken on a MacBook or Mac computer.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n
If your computer has more than one USB port, your first course of action should be to connect a USB device that is having issues to a different port. If that is not an option, try connecting the device to another computer\u2019s USB port. In this way, you can determine if the drive is fine but the interface is the problem.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n
There are multiple signs that you may have a bad drive that requires you to recover corrupted files from USB on your Mac. Here are some of the most common indicators of a corrupted USB drive.<\/p>\r\n
If you are experiencing any of these issues, you may have a corrupted USB drive. Let\u2019s look at how to recover USB files from a corrupted drive on a Mac and show you some methods that may get your data back.<\/p>\r\n
❗️If you suspect your USB drive is corrupted, stop using it immediately<\/b>. Any attempt to write new data to the drive can further corrupt its contents and make it impossible to recover files with data recovery software<\/a>. Don\u2019t use the device again until the issue has been fixed or the data has been recovered.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n<\/div>\r\n Multiple methods are available with which to attempt to recover corrupted files from a USB device on a Mac. Some involve destroying the data stored on the drive so it can be reused and others recover the data from the corrupted device.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n Let\u2019s investigate these methods and see if one of them can help you in getting data off a corrupted USB drive.<\/p>\r\n Disk Utility<\/a> is an application that is installed with macOS. By default, it should be located in the Other folder in Launchpad. The following steps show you how to fix a corrupted USB flash drive on Mac with Disk Utility.<\/p>\r\n The USB drive should be recognizable by your Mac if Disk Utility is successful. You should be able to access the data on the drive at this point. If not, you may want to try data recovery software which is discussed in a later section of this article.<\/p>\r\n If Disk Utility is not successful in fixing the drive, proceed to the next method.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n You can also use Terminal<\/a> to fix your corrupt USB drive. This method offers slightly more control over the whole process compared to when using Disk Utility for this job. But if you’re not comfortable with using Terminal commands, it’s best for you to choose the previous solution.<\/p>\r\n Before you start repairing your flash drive with this method, it is important to note that this process will erase all of the data from your device.<\/p>\r\n The following steps show you how to fix a corrupt USB drive on Mac via Terminal.<\/p>\r\n If Terminal didn’t fix the issue with your USB drive, you should give the next solution a try.<\/p>\r\n The USB device driver is updated automatically through macOS software updates. Follow these steps to see if there are any updates currently available for your Mac and manually install them.<\/p>\r\n If there were any USB driver updates, they will now be installed. Try to access the USB drive again to see if the update resolved the problem.<\/p>\r\n Maybe there’s nothing wrong with your flash drive? There is a chance that you can’t access the files located on the device because it’s encrypted (password protected).\u00a0<\/p>\r\n You won’t be able to access the data from an encrypted USB drive on Mac without knowing the password.<\/p>\r\n However, if you want to make such a drive usable again, then you can use Disk Utility<\/b> to reformat the drive (check out Solution 5<\/i> for more information). But keep in mind that this will erase all of the data stored there.<\/p>\r\n Another possible reason for you not being able to access the data from your USB drive is because the drive uses a file system that isn’t supported by your Mac. Not all file systems are compatible with macOS (for example, ext3), which means if your flash drive has such a format, you won’t be able to use it on your Mac.<\/p>\r\n To check your flash drive file system type, do the following:<\/p>\r\n The file systems supported by macOS<\/i> are APFS<\/b>, Mac OS Extended<\/b>, MS-DOS (FAT)<\/b>, and exFAT<\/b>. So if the USB drive uses a different file system, you should reformat the drive and choose a file system for the drive that is supported by the Mac operating system.<\/p>\r\n Before attempting this method of fixing a broken USB stick on a Mac, be advised that it may result in the loss of any information residing on the drive. You may be able to recover data with recovery software after formatting, but it is better to try the recovery before you format the USB drive. The following steps show you how to fix a USB flash drive by reformatting it on your Mac.<\/p>\r\n A normal format may allow you to recover data with recovery software as outlined in the next section. Formatting with multiple passes will fully clear the storage space and make it impossible to recover any data from the USB drive<\/a>. Formatting the disk is a method of permanently fixing a broken USB device.<\/p>\r\n<\/span>How to Recover a Corrupted USB on Mac with\/without Data Loss<\/span><\/h2>\r\n
<\/span>Solution 1: Fix a Corrupted USB on a Mac With Disk Utility<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
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![\"fix](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/first-aid-disk-utility-mac.png\")
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<\/li>\r\n\t<\/span>Solution 2. Repair the USB Drive With Terminal on Mac<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
💡If you have any valuable data stored there, make sure that you have a backup available to avoid losing those files.<\/div>\r\n\r\n\t
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<\/li>\r\n\t<\/span>Solution 3: Update the USB Driver<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
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![\"Update](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/mac-overview.jpg\")
<\/li>\r\n\t<\/span>Solution 4. Check If the USB Device Is Encrypted or Has No File System<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
💡The easiest way to find out if your USB drive is encrypted is to connect it to your Mac. If this popup window appears asking you to type in the password, it means that the device is encrypted.<\/div>\r\n![\"password](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/encrypted-usb-drive-mac.jpg\")
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![\"how](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/usb-drive-file-system-mac.jpg\")
<\/li>\r\n\t<\/span>Solution 5: Fix an Unreadable or Broken USB Flash Drive by Reformatting<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
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![\"Fix](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/erase-flash-drive-mac-disk-utility.png\")
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<\/li>\r\n<\/ol>\r\n<\/span>Solution 6: Recover a Corrupted USB on Mac with Data Recovery Software<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
![\"Disk](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/sidebar-ban-96.png\")
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