For decades, when attempting to format a USB flash drive or memory card to FAT32 in Windows, the system has limited the maximum storage capacity to 32GB. This age-old limitation, originating from a "casual setting" by Microsoft developers in the 1990s, has finally been...In the recently released Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8170The change has been officially implemented. Microsoft announced that it will increase the maximum partition size for FAT32 to 2TB, although this lifting of restrictions is currently only available through the Command Line.
A limitation set "at will" has been in place for nearly thirty years.
The 32GB limit of FAT32 (File Allocation Table 32) format on Windows operating systems is actually a strange story in the tech world.
Back when Windows 95 OSR2 introduced the FAT32 format, it was theoretically capable of supporting single partitions up to 2TB. However, when designing the Windows formatting interface, Microsoft developers at the time (later confirmed to be former Microsoft engineer Dave Plummer) "casually" set the upper limit for FAT32 formatting on the UI to 32GB because hard drive capacities were generally very small at the time (compared to the current situation where they often start at several GB).
Unexpectedly, this temporary decision, which was initially thought to be "something that could be changed at any time," has become deeply ingrained in the Windows system's formatting dialog box, persisting from Windows 95 to the current Windows 11, becoming a "man-made seal" that plagues countless cross-platform users. As a result, when a user's flash drive capacity exceeds 32GB, Windows' built-in formatting tool forces the user to choose NTFS or exFAT to accommodate larger disk partition configurations.
The belated lifting of the 2TB embargo still requires processing via "command lines".
In the latest Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.8170 released to the Dev Channel, Microsoft finally addressed this legacy issue.
According to the official changelog, users can now increase the partition size of FAT32 to a maximum of 2TB. This means that users can natively format a 1TB external hard drive directly as FAT32.
However, Microsoft's lifting of the embargo is only partial so far. This 2TB partition capacity increase currently only applies to formatting commands executed via the Command Prompt or PowerShell. If users choose to format via the traditional Windows graphical interface (GUI), the limit remains at 32GB. It is expected that Microsoft will gradually remove this GUI limitation in future updates.
But in fact, Microsoft released it as early as August 2024.Canary beta versionThis feature was added a long time ago to allow developers to test it early on, but at that time it could only be formatted through command prompt characters. Obviously, Microsoft has no plans to make it easy for general users to change file partitions, perhaps because it still wants to collect more test feedback.
Analysis of viewpoints
Why would Microsoft want to remove the capacity limitations of FAT32 when NTFS is already the default standard for Windows and exFAT is already widely used? The answer lies in "ultimate cross-hardware compatibility".
While NTFS offers excellent performance and supports large files on Windows, it is only read-only on macOS by default, and many older devices do not support it at all. While exFAT solves the problems of large file sizes and cross-platform (Mac/PC) read/write, some older digital cameras, smart TVs, car stereos, dashcams, or open-source Linux devices and game consoles (such as some early handheld consoles or printers) are still limited to recognizing only the FAT32 format due to the lack of exFAT licenses or drivers.
Previously, if users bought a 128GB memory card to use on these older devices, they had to search for third-party software such as "Rufus" or "FAT32 Format" to force format it. Now, Microsoft has finally removed this absurd, artificial restriction from the operating system level. Although it still requires typing commands, this is a significant step forward (or rather, a significant improvement) for Microsoft in storage format compatibility.
