This will wipe only the free space, overwriting it with zeros. If you don’t want to remove the content, you can choose to wipe only free space. This will take a bit of time to complete. On the format options, uncheck the ‘Quick Format’ option and click on the Start button. Here’s what you need to do.įirst of all, open File Explorer and right-click on the Drive you want to wipe. Well, if you want to wipe an entire drive, you need to perform a full format instead of a Quick format. Below, we have shared a step-by-step guide on how to Wipe a drive on Windows 10 or Windows 11 operating system. It’s pretty easy to Wipe a drive on both Windows 10 and Windows 11. To prevent file recovery, you need to wipe a drive, as a simple format won’t work in this case.Īlso Read: How to Hide Files, Folders & Drives in Windows 11 3 Methods to Wipe a Drive on Windows 10/11 # However, this doesn’t happen with modern solid-state drives, as they use TRIM by default which ensures that deleted files are deleted immediately.Įxternal storage devices that you use, like USB flash drives, also don’t support TRIM, which means the deleted files could be recovered.

This happens because the deleted files are ‘Marked’ as deleted on a traditional magnet drive, making recovery of deleted data easy. This is possible even when users have deleted the items from the Recycle Bin. If you are using a Hard drive, you might know that the data you have deleted can be recovered by using a third-party app.

Hence, in this article, we will share a detailed guide on how to wipe a drive on the Windows operating system. You can even extend/shrink partition, format the Drive, and more. Windows disk management utility lets you write zeros to a drive, securely erasing its content.

Wipe disk utility