How to Create a Partition: Complete Beginner's Guide

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Allocate space for a new partition on PC or Mac

Co-authored by Luigi Oppido and Rain Kengly

Last Updated: April 142026 Fact Checked

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Using Windows 11 or 10

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Using Mac

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Partitioning a hard drive allows you to treat the hard drive like two separate hard driveswhich is helpful when installing multiple operating systems on one computer. You can partition your hard drive on both Windows and Mac computers. Here's how to create a partition on Windows 11Windows 10or Mac.

Partition a Hard Drive in Windows

To create a partition on Windowsright-click the Start button and select Disk Management. Select your hard drivedetermine the partition's sizeand then shrink the volume. Select the unallocated partitionand then set the sizedrive letterand additional settings.

Method 1

Method 1 of 2:

Using Windows 11 or 10

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Right-click the "Start" menu and select Disk Management. A new window will open.^{[1]
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- This method will work on both Windows 11 and Windows 10.
In the window near the bottom of Computer Managementclick your hard drive's box. This box should have the hard drive's letter (e.g."(C:)") as well as the number of gigabytes (GB) of storage available to use.

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It's a tab in the upper-left side of the Computer Management window. Doing so prompts a drop-down menu.
This option is near the bottom of the drop-down menu. Selecting it prompts a pop-out menu to appear.
It's in the middle of the pop-out menu. Clicking Shrink Volume... will prompt Windows to determine how much free space you have. When it finishes doing soa new window will open.
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Determine your partition's size in megabytes. Type the number of megabytes that you would like your partition to be into the "Enter the amount of space to shrink in MB" text field on the right side of the page.
- The maximum number of megabytes that you can allocate is listed directly above the field that you type in.
- There are 1000 megabytes (MB) in one gigabyte (GB). To create a 5 GB partitionyou would type 5000 into the text field.
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Click Shrink. It's at the bottom of the page. This will begin creating a segment of your hard drive to serve as the partition.
- This process may take a few minutes.
Click the new partitionwhich will say "Unallocated"to the right of the hard drive's space.
This tab is in the upper-left side of the window.
It's near the top of the pop-out window.
It's in the bottom-right side of the window. This will take you to the beginning of the partition setup.
Doing so will accept your partition's size and take you to the next page.
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Select a drive letterthen click Next. You can change the partition's drive letter (e.g."E") by clicking the drop-down box and then clicking a new letter.
- This is an optional step.
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Check the "Format this volume with the following settings" box. It's near the top of the page. This option will set up your partition with Windows default settingswhich will allow it to work with Windows like your regular hard drive.
- If the "File system" box doesn't say "NTFS"click it and then click NTFS. This will format your partition for Windows.
- You can also change the partition's name in the "Volume label" box.
It's at the bottom of the page. This will take you to the final page.
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Click Finish. Doing so will begin partitioning your drive. Once this process completesyou will be able to interact with the partition in the This PC program; it will appear alongside your hard drive in the "Devices and drives" section.
- Partitioning can take several minutes to several hoursdepending on the size of the drive and the partition's size.

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Using Mac

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Click Go. This tab should be in your Mac's menu bar at the top of the screen.
- If you don't see Goclick the desktop or open a new Finder window to make it appear.^{[2]
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It's at the bottom of the Go drop-down menu.
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Double-click Disk Utility. This icon resembles a Mac logo on a white hexagon with a wrench gripping it from the bottom. Double-clicking it will open the Disk Utility program.
Click your Mac's hard drive in the upper-left side of the Disk Utility windowjust below the "Internal" heading.
This tab is at the top of the Disk Utility window. A new window will pop open with a circular diagram of your hard drive’s current space allocation.
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Click +. It's below the hard drive circle that's on the left side of the page.
- You may be asked whether you want to create a partition or a new volume. Specify that you want to create a partition.
- If the drive you selected already has partitionsyou’ll need to select the part of the drive you want to add the partition to before you can use the + icon.
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Determine your partition's size. You’ll see a small circular anchor at the outer edge of the circle when you create a new partition. Click and drag it in either direction to make the partition larger or smaller..
- You can also type a number in into the "Size:" field to set your partition's size. Use the dropdown to change the size unit between megabytes (MB)gigabytes (GB)and more.
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Select a file format for your partition. Click the Format drop-down boxthen click a format. This will set your partition's file system as your selected format.^{[3]
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- If you're setting up your partition for use with Macclick one of the APFS or macOS Extended options in the drop-down menu. APFS is best for modern SSD Macs.
- You can also enter a name for your partition in the "Name:" field.
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Click Apply. It's in the bottom-right corner of the page. Doing so will prompt your Mac to begin creating your partition.
- This process will take a whileespecially if your hard drive and partition are both larger than one terabyte.
- If you change your mind or want to start overclick Revert in the bottom left corner instead.
Your Mac's partition has successfully been created.

Expert Q&A

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Why might you need to partition a hard drive?

Luigi Oppido
Computer & Tech Specialist
Luigi Oppido is the Owner and Operator of Pleasure Point Computers in Santa CruzCalifornia. Luigi has over 25 years of experience in general computer repairdata recoveryvirus removaland upgrades. He is also the host of the Computer Man Show! broadcasted on KSQD covering central California for over 7 years.

Luigi Oppido

Computer & Tech Specialist

Expert Answer

There are a few reasons you might need to partition a hard drive. Creating a partition can help you: divide a computer so you can run MAC on one side and Windows on the other halfrun multiple versions of the same operating systemsuch as Windows 7Windows XPand Windows 10or separate the operating system from your stored data to protect it from potential viruses.

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What do I do if the options to shrink and extend the volume are grayed out?

Community Answer

You could install a free programsuch as MiniTool Partition Wizardto create your partitions.

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How do I create a partition using diskpart.exe?

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Run diskpart.exe from a command line and select a disk (use the command "LIST DISK" if you need to see which ones you have). Use the command "CREATE PARTITION" followed by the type of partition. AlthoughI would recommend using Window's disk management as it's easier to use.

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Tips

Partitioning an external drive is similar to partitioning a computer hard drivewith the main exception being that you must first format the external hard drive before you can partition it. Once your external drive is formattedsimply select its name from Computer Management (Windows) or Disk Utility (Mac) and partition it like you would a computer hard drive.

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Warnings

Always back up data before formatting or partitioning. While nothing should happen to your data when shrinking an existing volumethere is always a small chance of failure. Having backups of everything important will minimize the damage if something goes wrong.

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