![\"What](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/format-drive-screenshot.jpg\")
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As we already said, it’s technically impossible to provide a solution on how to unformat a hard drive on Windows 10 or later operating system(s), because a format process erases everything on a storage device, and irreversibly “resets” and “re-establishes” the necessary data structures for storing files and folders on it.<\/p>\r\n
Thankfully, as long as the data on the disk hasn’t been overwritten, it should still be possible to recover it. This “recoverability” of a formatted drive’s data depends primarily on two factors: the format method and the drive’s type.<\/p>\r\n
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- 🔵 Format method<\/b>: A drive can be formatted in three ways: a quick format<\/b> creates a new blank index, making the drive appear empty, but leaves all data untouched and, thus, recoverable.
\r\nIn contrast, a full format<\/b> overwrites all data with zeroes, while a secure format<\/b> goes the extra step by replacing those zeroes with character patterns. Since both a full format and a secure format overwrite all existing data, they render all files unrecoverable.<\/li>\r\n\t- 🟡 Drive type<\/b>: Old mechanical HDDs store data by moving multiple “heads” over spinning magnetic platters. As long as the computer can detect them, and all their metallic bits and pieces are in working order, most files on them are recoverable after a quick format. HDDs have been all but replaced by the much faster SSDs or the even newer M.2 drives, which store data on blazing-fast memory chips. As a countermeasure for the finite number of writes those memory chips can take, both SSDs and M.2 drives “spread the wear” equally among all chips using a feature called TRIM<\/b>. TRIM re-arranges the data on them and “cleans” obsolete files, but it also “garbles” or actually removes all data marked as deleted, complicating or entirely preventing any attempt at recovery.<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n
ℹ️ The good news is that usually TRIM doesn’t run automatically on external SSDs, like the type of storage devices we’re dealing with in this article, since they lack the necessary “triggers”. Not only must TRIM be supported by an SSD’s controller, but the external SSD also has to be connected to a Windows PC over USB-C or USB-A 3.0+, and, on macOS, using Thunderbolt.<\/div>\r\nIn this article, we’ll be dealing with a quick-formatted external drive that was used as secondary storage, since that’s the most popular scenario. Still, everything we’ll see also applies to secondary internal drives. Internal and external drives can both be formatted with the same methods, and it’s possible to recover data from either. What complicates things, though, is if the active OS booted from them.<\/p>\r\n
To prevent damaging its files, an active OS prevents<\/b> formatting the disk from where it booted, and where its files are stored. Still, it allows formatting all other storage devices<\/b>, internal or external, regardless of whether they’re used for storing files or housing secondary OSes. Additionally, if there’s such a secondary OS installed on another drive, or you boot from OS installation media, it’s also possible to format the disk with the primary OS (and even render the computer unbootable).<\/p>\r\n
If you’re dealing with data loss or have accidentally formatted the drive with the OS from which your computer booted, check our guide on how to recover files from a hard drive that won’t boot<\/a>.<\/div>\r\n<\/span>How to Unformat a Drive With Recovery Software<\/span><\/h2>\r\n
While it’s not possible to click a button on a GUI and have any formatted storage device return to its previous state, it is possible to recover most (if not all) of the files and folders from a recently quick-formatted HDD and sometimes an external SSD.<\/p>\r\n
In the following sections, we’ll explore two variations of the core process, which will show you how to unformat an external hard drive on Windows 11 by recovering the files on it to a secondary storage device using Disk Drill and PhotoRec. However, we won’t go over the actions that follow, after recovering files from a formatted hard drive on a Windows PC<\/a> or a Mac<\/a>, like copying the files back to their original locations and reorganizing them to match their initial hierarchy.<\/p>\r\n
<\/span>Method 1:<\/span> Use Disk Drill<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
- 🟡 Drive type<\/b>: Old mechanical HDDs store data by moving multiple “heads” over spinning magnetic platters. As long as the computer can detect them, and all their metallic bits and pieces are in working order, most files on them are recoverable after a quick format. HDDs have been all but replaced by the much faster SSDs or the even newer M.2 drives, which store data on blazing-fast memory chips. As a countermeasure for the finite number of writes those memory chips can take, both SSDs and M.2 drives “spread the wear” equally among all chips using a feature called TRIM<\/b>. TRIM re-arranges the data on them and “cleans” obsolete files, but it also “garbles” or actually removes all data marked as deleted, complicating or entirely preventing any attempt at recovery.<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n
![\"Disk](\"\/howto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/sidebar-ban-96.png\")
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