Convert FAT32 to NTFS Without Formatting or Losing data

You have a flash drive or an external hard drive that currently has FAT32 file system and you want to change it to NTFS, because FAT32 does not support large file (over 4GB), you don't want to lose your saved data. In this article, I will show you how you can convert from FAT32 to NTFS.


Note : While this method works perfectly, I advises you to backup your data in case anything goes wrong. 

Convert FAT32 to NTFS 

Read : Format hard disk using notepad

Step 1. Click on Start, If you use Windows XP, go to Run, type cmd and press ok. If you use Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1 or Windows Vista, type cmd in the search box. 

Step 2. Type "chkdsk G: /fs" where G is the letter of your drive which you want to convert from FAT32 to NTFS. This checks the drive for errors and fixes them automatically.

chkdsk(space)G:(space)/fs


Step 3. Type "convert G: /FS:NTFS", G is the drive to be converted.

convert(space)G:(space)/FS:NTFS

Step 4. Command prompt or cmd will start conversion and after a few minutes, cmd will say that conversion was successful.

Step 5. Check the properties of your drive. You will see in the properties of your drive that the file system is NTFS.

This command can also be used to convert FAT16 disks and wprks on Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Vista. This method cannot be used to reconvert NTFS file system to FAT32 back. To convert back to FAT32, you will need to format the drive which will definitely cause data loss.