Windows system uses a Master Boot Record (MBR) or GUID Partition Table (GPT) depending on the age, operating system, and system firmware. Sometimes it is necessary to convert MBR to GPT. EaseUS Partition Manager Free is your best choice to convert MBR to GPT without losing data. Select the disk to convert > Right-click the MBR disk and choose 'Convert to GPT' > Click 'Apply' to commit the changes. It doesn't require partition deleting or formatting before MBR to GPT converting process.

'Convert GPT Disk to MBR Disk' helps convert GPT disk to MBR disk. Three ways to activate this function: 1. Select 'Convert GPT Disk to MBR Disk' in the action panel. Employ 'Convert GPT Disk to MBR Disk' under 'Disk' menu. Select and right click the target disk, click 'Convert GPT Disk to MBR Disk' in the pop-up menu. How to Convert MBR to GPT Disk. If this is the case you have two options; the easy way and the hard way. We will start with the easy way: I. Using Third Party Software (Easy Way, Without data loss) The best option you have is to use the Minitool Partition Wizard Professional 10.The disk will be converted from MBR to GPT without losing any data.

• Applies to Windows 10/8/7/Vista/XP
• Trusted by over 10,000,000 users for more than 10 years
• Free Windows partition software helps you create, resize, clone, move, merge, and format partitions

Why Convert MBR to GPT

Users want to convert MBR to GPT for various reasons. Usually, people convert MBR to GPT due to three reasons: disk replacement, system upgrading, and personal willingness.

• You are going to replace the disk with a bigger one

A GPT disk supports larger than 2TB volumes while MBR cannot. If your bigger MBR disk is larger than 2TB, you'll need to convert it to GPT. Then you can break the 2TB limitation to make full use of the disk.

• Personal willingness

GPT does not have limitations that MBR suffers from. GPT can hold a nearly unlimited number of partition and there is no need to create an extended partition to make them work. As a result, most people would like to convert MBR to GPT. But the problem is how to convert MBR to GPT without data loss? Here, you can learn the way to convert to GPT easily and quickly.

How to Check the Partition Style of a Disk

You must identify the disk type before you are going to convert to the target type. The easiest way to identify the disk type is by using Disk Management. Under Windows Disk Management, you can check the partitioning scheme of a hard drive:

Step 1. Right-click 'This PC' and choose 'Manage'.

Step 2. Go to 'Disk Management'.

Step 3. Right-click the disk you want to check and choose 'Properties'.

Step 4. Go to the 'Volumes' tab and you will see the partition style under the disk information.

The Best MBR to GPT Converter - EaseUS Partition Master Free

Windows Disk Management can change MBR to GPT disk for free, but it only supports to convert a non-partitioned hard disk. That is to say, you must delete all your partitions on the disk before the converting process, which will result in data loss. Windows Disk Management is not the best choice. You can use free third-party partition management software to convert a hard disk from MBR to GPT. EaseUS Partition Master is our recommendation.

This free program enables you to convert MBR disk to GPT disk without deleting the partitions. So, you can avoid the data loss problem. This wonderful and considerate feature makes this program stand out all other partition management software. Besides, the quick partitioning capabilities allow you to resize disk space without data loss. This tool is useful for all computer users - home, business, and service providers.

How to Free Convert MBR to GPT Without Data Loss

It only takes three steps to easily convert an MBR disk to GPT disk with EaseUS Partition Master Free. Read on and convert to GPT with this converter. By the way, This partition magic software also supports to convert GPT disk to MBR disk, you can try at any time you have a need.

Note: If you want to convert your system disk from MBR to GPT, you need to upgrade to EaseUS Partition Master Pro version.

Step 1. Download and launch EaseUS Partition Master on your Windows computer.

Step 2. Right-click the MBR disk that you want to convert and choose 'Convert to GPT'.

Step 3. After that, find and click the 'Execute 1 Operation' button on the toolbar and choose 'Apply' to start the conversion. You need to restart your device to enable this change.

Other Manual Solutions to Convert MBR to GPT in Windows 10

If you don't want to download third-party software, you can also convert MBR to GPT using manual solutions.

Solution 1. Convert MBR to GPT Disk with Disk Management

Step 1. Right-click on 'This PC', choose 'Manage', then head to 'Disk Management'.

Step 2. Right-click the volumes on your target disk and choose 'Delete Volume...' (If you accidentally deleted a volume in Disk Management, you can recover the partition and the files on it referring to the linked article.

Step 3. When your disk becomes empty (shows as unallocated space), right-click your disk and choose 'Convert to GPT Disk'.

Solution 2. Convert MBR to GPT via Diskpart

You need to know the number of your MBR disk. If you don't know, you can refer to Part 2. Then, take these operations: open command prompt, type the following commands in Command Prompt, and press Enter after each command.

People Also Ask These Questions

There are some hot topics about MBR and GPT on the internet. You can find the answers here:

1. Can MBR be converted to GPT?

Yes. If you are using Disk Management, you can change a disk from MBR to GPT partition style as long as the disk contains no partitions or volumes. If you want to convert the system disk to GPT, you need to get EaseUS partition software.

2. How do I change from MBR to GPT in Windows 10?

In general, there are 3 ways to convert MBR to GPT.

1. 1. Convert MBR to GPT using EaseUS MBR to GPT converter.
2. 2. Convert MBR to GPT Windows 10 with Disk Management.
3. 3. Convert MBR to GPT via Diskpart.

3. What is GPT format?

GPT, GUID Partition Table, the format used to define the hard disk partitions in computers with UEFI startup firmware. The GUID Partition Table (GPT) replaces the previous master boot record (MBR) method. While the MBR supported partitions as large as 2.2TB, GPT partitions can be up to 18 exabytes.

4. What is UEFI boot mode?

UEFI stands for Unified Extensible Firmware Interface. It's a modern solution to be gradually replacing the legacy BIOS on PCs since the introduction to Windows with Windows Vista Service Pack 1 and Windows 7 in 2007. It can do a lot more than a BIOS. It may be stored in flash memory on the motherboard, or it may be loaded from a hard drive or network share at boot. Different PCs with UEFI will have different interfaces and features.

5. Should I use MBR or GPT?

It depends on your disk space. If your hard disk is larger than 2TB, GPT is better than MBR. If your computer is BIOS-based, choose MBR for the system disk instead; If you use a disk under 2TB for data storage, both GPT and MBR are OK.

Summary :

What’s MBR2GPT? How to use MBR2GPT to convert MBR to GPT in Windows 10 V1703 or the later systems? If you experience such an issue: MBR2GPT conversion failed, MBR2GPT cannot find OS partition, MBR2GPT disk layout validation failed or MBR2GPT is not recognized, what should you do? This post will show you these answers in detail.

As is well known, you know MBR and GPT are two different disk styles. On an MBR disk, you can create at most four primary partitions or three primary partitions plus one extended partition. If you want to create many primary partitions for different types' data, to use a GPT disk is a good choice. Then, you need to convert MBR to GPT.

If you are using Windows 10 OS after v1703, MBR2GPT.exe will be your choice. Here we will show you this disk conversion tool in detail.

MBR2GPT Tool Windows 10

When referring to this tool, many of you probably are not familiar. Simply speaking, it is also known as Windows Creator's Update, starting in Windows 10 version 1703 build 15063. MBR2GPT.exe is a command line tool which is located in the System32 folder.

With it, you can effectively and non-destructively convert a Windows 10 OS disk from MBR (for Legacy BIOS) to GPT partition style (for UEFI) without modifying/deleting any data on the disk or making a clean installation of Windows 10.

You can run this tool by entering Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE), as well as the full Windows 10 operating system (OS).

If your MBR OS disk contains BitLocker-encrypted volumes, MBR2GPT.exe is still useful to convert the disk to GPT as long as protection has been suspended. You are allowed to use this tool to convert OS disks running the earlier versions of Windows 10, including version 1507, 1511, and 1607, on condition that you must run the tool from Windows 10 v1703 or later and then perform an offline conversion.

How to convert MBR to GPT with MBR2GPT?

Since MBR to GPT disk conversion program is available in both Windows PE and the full OS environment, the command line is different.

In WinPE, type mbr2gpt /convert /disk: n

In Windows 10, type mbr2gpt /convert /disk: n /allowfullOS

N means the disk number.

For more information about this conversion tool, please watch this video:

MBR2GPT Conversion Failed

In most cases, MBR2GPT can work properly. However, it sometimes disappoints you. After typing the above MBR2GPT allowfullos command line, you may be bothered by MBR2GPT disk layout validation failed, which is due to unsupportable Windows 10 versions.

For example, if you use this tool to convert MBR to GPT in Windows 10 V1607, the message “LayoutConversion: Layout conversion failed. Error: 0x00000032[gle=0x00000032]; Cannot perform layout conversion. Error: 0x00000032[gle=0x00000032]” will occur.

This requires you to run the PC from Windows 10 V1703 and perform an offline conversion, as mentioned above.

Besides, you may experience MBR2GPT cannot find OS partition. This is because this tool is only used to convert any MBR-formatted system disk to GPT and it cannot work for data disk that doesn’t have OS installed.

Additionally, some other issues like MBR2GPT is not recognized, MBR2GPT failed to retrieve geometry for disk, etc. may also appear.

Convert MBR to GPT with MiniTool Partition Wizard

MBR2GPT conversion is possible to fail, making you feel very bothered. Therefore, in order to finish the conversion from legacy BIOS (MBR) to UEFI (GPT), you can use an alternative to MBR2GPT. Here, we highly recommend using MiniTool Partition Wizard.

Besides, perhaps some of you don't use Windows 10 v1703 but run Windows 7/8/8.1. Then you are wondering: can MBR2GPT.exe be used to perform the conversion from MBR to GPT? The answer is no. In this case, if you need to convert your disk to GPT, you can also ask MiniTool Partition Wizard for help.

MiniTool Partition Wizard is available in Windows 10/8.1/8/7 and Windows Server 2016/2012/2008. It has six editions and each edition has different features. If you need to convert an OS disk from MBR to GPT, its Professional Edition or a more advanced edition is suitable. For a data disk conversion, the Free Edition is available. Click to learn edition comparison.

Before you do:

1. Please make sure your motherboard supports UEFI boot.
2. You had better make a system backup with MiniTool ShadowMaker for system restore on the event of some accidents.
3. We advise you to create a bootable disc with Bootable Media of MiniTool Partition Wizard in case of any accidents after the conversion.

Step 1: In the main interface of MiniTool Partition Wizard, right-click on the system disk and then choose Convert MBR Disk to GPT Disk or choose this feature from the Convert Disk menu.

Step 2: Step 2: Click Apply to execute this conversion. To boot from the GPT disk, you need to enable UEFI mode in BIOS.

Conclusion

Minitool Partition Wizard Mbr To Gpt File

In this post, we introduce you MBR2GPT.exe in detail and show you how to convert MBR to GPT with this tool in Windows 10 v1703. When MBR2GPT failed issues appear, or the earlier versions of Windows including Windows 8.1/8/7 don't support this tool, you can use MiniTool Partition Wizard Professional Edition to perform the conversion well.

Minitool Partition Wizard Free License

If you have any question or suggestion, please contact [email protected] or leave your idea in the comment part.