Have you ever encountered a situation when you plugged in your USB flash drive or external hard drive to your Mac but it doesn’t show up? It can be frustrating, especially when you need urgent access to your files. However, don’t worry because there are several ways to fix this issue.
Before proceeding to more complex troubleshooting steps, check your settings. If hard and external disks are set to be shown on the desktop, go to the upper menu and click on the Finder menu. Go to Preferences, and under the General tab, check the boxes next to Hard Disk and External Disk. If the boxes are checked, and you still don’t see the external drive on your desktop, proceed to the next step.
Run Disk Utility. In the upper menu, click on the Go menu and select Utility. In the Utility window, find and click on Disk Utility. If you see your external drive in the Disk Utility window, but it shows that it’s not mounted, select the drive and click on the Mount button. Then go to the upper menu and click on the Apple logo. Click on About This Mac, and go to the Storage tab. If you can’t see your external drive there, go back to the Disk Utility window, select the drive, and click on First Aid. Then, click on Run and wait for the process to finish. The First Aid option will check the disk for errors and then repair the disk if necessary. Click on Repair Disk if you see this option pop up.
Reformat the external drive. In the upper menu, click on the Go menu and select Utility. In the Utility window, find and click on Disk Utility. In the Disk Utility window, select your drive, click on the Erase option, and choose the disk format as exFAT, MS-DOS FAT, or Mac OS Extended (Journal). Click on Erase, and go to the Storage tab to see if your external drive is visible.
Remount the external drive using Terminal. Go to the upper menu and click on the Apple logo. Click on About This Mac, and go to the Storage tab to see if your external drive is visible. Open Spotlight by pressing Command and Space keys on your keyboard. In the Spotlight, enter Terminal to open it. In the Terminal window, enter diskutil list. The diskutil list command will display essential information about all available drives and volumes attached. Then, search for /dev/diskexternalphysical. Make sure to remember the number following after the word “disk.” In the same Terminal window, enter another command line “diskutil info disk digit.” After that, eject your disk by entering the command “diskutil eject disk digit.” After executing the eject command, check if it was removed by entering the command line “diskutil list.” If you don’t see your drive in the list, it means you removed it successfully. Then remove the drive physically from your Mac.
Reset Non-Volatile Random Access Memory (NVRAM). Restart your Mac. When you hear the startup sound, simultaneously hold down Command, Option, P, and R keys on your keyboard for 20 seconds. When you hear the startup sound for the second time, you can let go of the keys.
Reset System Management Controller (SMC). Shut down your Mac, unplug all peripherals. Simultaneously hold down Shift, Control, and Option keys on your keyboard, together with the power button, for 10 seconds. If you have a MacBook Pro, the Touch ID button is also the power button. Then reconnect your power cable and other devices. Turn on your Mac.
Inspect the external drive via console. It won’t fix the problem, but it will provide information to diagnose the problem. In the upper menu, click on the Go menu and select Utility. In the Utility window, find and click on Console. Select the Error and Faults tab. Plug in your external drive to your Mac, then look to see if it detects your drive or if there’s an error. If no errors pop up, and nothing happens, then your problem is not with the external drive.
In conclusion, there are several ways to fix the issue when your USB flash drive or external hard drive doesn’t show up on your Mac. The above methods should help you diagnose and solve the problem.