Summary: This guide introduces three common scenarios in which you might find your WD My Passport external hard drive read-only on Mac. If the WD My Passport read-only on Mac problem is caused by the NTFS file system, installing iBoysoft NTFS for Mac to edit, rename, delete the saved files and transfer files to the read-only WD My passport hard drive.

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How to connect NTFS-formatted Windows external HDD or share data with Windows computers from macOS 10.15 Catalina. You can use paid software like Paragon NTFS for Mac or Microsoft NTFS for Mac. Full read-write access granted!.Paragon Ntfs Driver.Paragon Ntfs Driver For Mac.Wd Paragon Ntfs Driver For Mac Microsoft NTFS is one of the primary file systems of Windows. If you work on a Mac computer and need to read or write files from HDD, SSD. Or as ExFAT can have files transferred without driver software on your Mac. Mac OS Extended (Journaled) is the native file system your Mac uses. Your Windows PC won’t be able to read a Toshiba drive formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). But both a Mac and a Windows PC can read a Toshiba external hard drive formatted as ExFAT.

Western Digital is one of the most popular hard drive manufacturers. Its product line covers WD My Passport, WD My Passport Ultra, WD My Book, WD Elements, WD My Passport for Mac and more. Among those external hard drive categories, WD My Passport external hard drives are the most widely used ones. However, many users complain their WD My Passport is read-only on Mac like the user below in WD community.

'I have a WD My Passport 320GB external hard drive that I am trying to hook up to my iMac for the first time. I'm running macOS 10.13. I'm extremely frustrated because this drive is in a read-only mode, and I can't figure out how to change it! Any suggestion to fix this?'

Please continue reading and look for solutions for solving read-only WD My Passport on Mac problem.

Why is the WD My Passport read-only?

Western Digital also has a link to an older version of NTFS for Mac. Keep in mind that the new NTFS for Mac looks to be compatible with macOS 10.14 where WD’s software lists compatibility up to 10.12. Paragon Software does say in their FAQ that you may be eligible for an upgrade from WD or Segate’s older versions of NTFS for Mac. While it is very normal to write to NTFS on Windows, it comes to be tough to do that on Mac. This post gathers top 4 ways to enable NTFS writing on Mac by formatting the NTFS to FAT or ExFAT, mounting the Windows NTFS driver for Mac to write to NTFS files, use the third-party software, Apeaksoft Mac Cleaner to write the files into NTFS directly and exploit the experimental solution.

Sometimes, the WD external hard drive is read-only on Mac when you just got a brand new WD external hard drive. In other times, it suddenly became read-only after you have been using it for a while. The most common reasons for a read-only WD external hard drive, like WD My Passport, are listed below:

• 1. Your WD My Passport hard drive is NTFS-formatted
• 2. You have read-only permission to access WD My Passport hard drive
• 3. Your WD My Passport hard drive is corrupted

If you are not sure which reason has caused your WD My Passport external hard drive read-only on Mac, check the scenarios one by one. If you know the reason already, you can jump to the scenario that best describes your situation.

Scenario 1: Your WD My Passport hard drive is NTFS-formatted

For WD My Passport Ultra and WD Elements, check if the hard drive is formatted with NTFS file system. By default, macOS can mount a Windows NTFS volume or drive in read-only mode. You can view the files saved on the NTFS-formatted partition or drive but can't make any changes to them. In addition, the WD My Passport hard drive won't let you add any files to it. To check if your WD My Passport is NTFS formatted, follow the steps:

• 1. Go to Finder > Applications > Utilities > Disk Utilities.
• 2. Click the WD My Passport (you may have changed its name) at the left sidebar. The file system information will be displayed on the right.

Note: You can also right-click the disk icon at the desktop and choose 'Get Info' to check the file system information.

After having confirmed that the WD My Passport is formatted with NTFS, many people will choose to convert NTFS to APFS (for macOS Catalina, Mojave and High Sierra) or reformat the WD My Passport hard drive to make the WD external hard drive compatible with Mac. But as you know, directly formatting WD Elements or My Passport on Mac causes data loss.

In fact, installing an NTFS for Mac driver is a much easier way.

Solution: Install an NTFS for Mac driver to make WD My Passport writable

The NTFS drivers for macOS - iBoysoft NTFS for Mac can help you read and write to NTFS-formatted WD My Passport drives on Mac.

iBoysoft NTFS for Mac: NTFS for Mac driver and more

iBoysoft NTFS for Mac is an NTFS disk management tool. It can manage NTFS drives with NTFS write support. It can easily and effectively mount NTFS drive on Mac automatically in read-write mode. It works with macOS Big Sur 11/10.15/10.14/10.13.

Three simple steps to read and write to NTFS-formatted WD My Passport drive easily.

• 1. Download, install, and launch iBoysoft NTFS for Mac on your Mac. Then, restart your Mac.
• 2. Connect the NTFS-formatted WD My Passport drive to Mac.
• 3. Write to NTFS-formatted WD My Passport drive after the drive has been mounted successfully.

Besides an NTFS mounter, iBoysoft NTFS for Mac can also open, unmount, eject, erase and repair NTFS volumes. It can list all attached external disks including USB flash drives, SD cards, memory sticks, external hard drives and so on. You can open them with one click. Moreover, you can reformat them to NTFS with iBoysoft NTFS for Mac if you need.

Scenario 2: You have read-only permission to access the WD My Passport hard drive

If your WD My Passport external hard drive is not formatted with NTFS but you have no write permission to it, it is probably because you have read-only permission to access the WD My Passport. Since your WD external hard drive is write-protected, all your write access is denied.

To know your permission to the WD My Passport, follow the steps below:

• 1. Right-click the WD My Passport disk icon at the desktop and choose 'Get Info'.
• 2. Check the information at the bottom under the Sharing & Permissions tab.

If you can see the message 'You can only read', then you will understand why you can't write to your WD My Passport drive.

Solution: Change read-only permission on the WD My Passport drive

Follow the instruction below to change permission on Mac so that you can access the WD My Passport again:

• 1. Click on the lock icon at the right corner in the Get Info window.
• 2. Enter password if asked.
• 3. Check the 'Ignore ownership on this volume'.
• 4. Click on the gear button and choose 'Apply to enclosed items…'.
• 5. Click 'OK' when you are asked to confirm the operation.
• 6. Click the 'Read Only' in Privilege column and select 'Read & Write'.

By now, you have regained the read and write access to the WD My Passport.

Scenario 3: Your WD My Passport hard drive is corrupted

If you are sure that the read-only WD My Passport is not caused by NTFS file system nor read-only permission, another possible cause might be the disk corruption. When an external drive is corrupted, people suddenly have trouble reading or/and writing to the disk. Then you will have to fix the corrupted WD My Passport external hard drive to make it writable again. We will introduce two solutions here:

• Fix the read-only WD My Passport in Disk Utility on Mac
• Reformat the WD My Passport on Mac

Solution 1: Fix the read-only WD My Passport in Disk Utility on Mac

This solution might help you solve the read-only external hard drive problem without formatting. You will utilize a built-in tool on Mac called Disk Utility. It is used to manage internal and external disks on Mac. There is a function called First Aid in Disk Utility that can be used to check for and repair errors on the selected disk or volume.

Here is how to fix the read-only WD My Passport in Disk Utility:

• 1. Go to Finder > Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.
• 2. Select the WD My Passport drive at the left sidebar.
• 3. Click on First Aid and click on 'Run' to repair the WD My Passport drive.
• 4. Click 'Done' after the operation completes.

If First Aid fails to repair the WD external hard drive, your disk might be seriously corrupted. You will have to reformat the WD My passport to make it not read-only.

Solution 2: Reformat the WD My Passport for Mac

Reformatting the corrupted WD My Passport drive is the ultimate solution for fixing the read only file system on Mac. Follow the steps below to know how to make the WD My Passport compatible with Mac and PC.

• 1. Make sure you have a copy of your important files on WD My Passport hard drive, or recover lost data from the external hard drive for free with iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
• 2. Go to Finder > Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.
• 3. Click on the WD My Passport drive at the left sidebar.
• 4. Check Click 'Erase' on the top of the Disk Utility window.
• 5. Input a name.
• 6. Choose FAT or exFAT as format for convenience because either of them is compatible with both Windows and macOS. Then, how to format the WD My Passport for Mac exclusive use? Simply choose APFS or Mac OS Extend format in Disk Utility, which also works if you want to format WD Elements for Mac.
• 7. Choose 'GUID Partition Map' as Scheme.
• 8. Click on 'Erase' button.

You can reconnect the WD external hard drive to Mac again to see if it is writable now.

Conclusion

The external hard drive read-only on Mac problem doesn't happen to WD external hard drives only. Any external hard drive could be write-protected on Mac. It is quite common to see other notable external hard drive brand get the same complaint like Seagate, Samsung, Toshiba, etc. When you come across the read-only disk problem on Mac, the post is always helpful.

If you lost the data from WD My Passport hard drive, iBoysoft Data Recovery software is highly recommeded to recover your data.

When switching files between Windows and Mac, the portable external drive is the most frequently-used tool. However, when you insert the Windows NTFS drive into Mac, you must have found that you can only read the NTFS drive, but cannot write data into the drive.

Yes, Mac cannot write to NTFS formatted drive.

As the default file system on Windows computer, NTFS format is created for quick plug and file transfer for Windows users. However, the proprietary is designed to open and read files for Mac, instead of copy files to the NTFS format disk.

In this guide, you will discover 4 solutions to deal with the dilemma and enable NTFS to write for Mac.

Solution 1. Format NTFS to Enable NTFS Writing on Mac

The basic reason for not writing to NTFS on Mac is the incompatible file system. So, for solving the problem, the basic solution to this problem is changing the file system from NTFS to Mac compatible formats by formatting NTFS.

Then, follow the steps below to format the NTFS drive.

Step 1 Insert the NTFS disk into computer

Insert the NTFS disk into your computer, and run Disk Utility (Go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.).

Step 2 Format NTFS disk

Select your NTFS disk from the left sidebar, and click the 'Erase' tab on the top menu > Then a pop-up window will appear, where you should give a new name of the NTFS disk optionally and select the format from the drop-down list. Here you can select 'ExFAT' or 'MS-DOS (FAT)'.

After confirming that, click 'Erase' to format the NTFS drive immediately.

Extended reading of disk format on Mac

Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled): Mac computer and read and write files from the driver formatted in this way, but Windows-running computers can only read files from this type drive.

MS-DOS (FAT): Windows and Mac computer can read and write files from this file system drive, but it only allows file transfer of size 4GB and below.

ExFAT: Windows and Mac computer can read and write such file system drive, and supports the file size larger than 4GB. However, Mac running in OS X 10.4 Tiger and before does not support this file system. Most consumer electronics (cameras, camcorders, video game systems) don't support exFAT.

If you want to write to NTFS files on Mac by formatting, then the file system recommended to you is FAT and ExFAT.

If you want to get rid of the limits of the formatted NTFS file system and do not want to lose data from the formatted NTFS drive, the next solution is what you will need.

Solution 2. Mount Microsoft NTFS Driver for Mac for Read-Write Access

Though Mac does not write to NTFS, you could install the Microsoft NTFS driver for Mac for writing access.

There are various NTFS drivers in the market, which can get the read-write compatibility for Mac computer. Microsoft NTFS for Mac by Tuxera, Microsoft NTFS for Mac by Paragon Software, MOUNTY for NTFS, and more. They work similarly and you can select which you want.

Though there are free NTFS drivers for Mac, the free version carries the slow speed to write to NTFS and there are reported corrupted NTFS cases from the users.

As a result, we will take Paragon NTFS for Mac as an example to show you how to write to NTFS.

Step 1 Free down Paragon NTFS for Mac

Free download this NTFS driver on your Mac. Double click the package and follow the on-screen instructions to install and run it.

It offers the free trial with no limitation for 10 days, and it can be extended to 5 more days if you would share the product information with your Facebook friends.

Step 2 Write to NTFS on Mac

After activation, this software will be restarted. Then you can obtain the full read-write access to any type of NTFS.

Just open the NTFS disk on Mac, and you can easily write the data like modify, delete and transfer data on Mac directly.

Solution 3. Write to NTFS for Mac with Apeaksoft Mac Cleaner Directly

Another third-party tool that can help you write to NTFS drive is Apeaksoft Mac Cleaner.

This software is the all-in-one Mac data cleaner and manager. Not only write to NTFS files, you could also benefit from its tools from its ToolKit like uninstall apps, optimize system, protect privacy, mange files, hide/encrypt files, check Wi-Fi status, compress/extract files from 7z and RAR.

What's more, it can be the powerful data cleaner to clean the junk files, old & large files, duplicated photos, duplicated Finder, and more.

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Write to NTFS files in macOS X 10.11 to macOS Big Sur.

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Clean data and monitor Mac system in simple clicks.

Step 1 Select ToolKit

Free download this software on your Mac computer, install and run it immediately.

In the main interface, you should select 'ToolKit'.

Step 2 Select NTFS

In the popup window, you should select 'NTFS'.

After that, insert your NTFS disk into Mac, and click 'Write'.

Step 3 Write to NTFS

Select your NTFS disk and click 'Write' at the bottom-left corner, and it will open a window where you should select the files that you want to transfer into this NTFS disk.

After you complete the file writing, you should click 'Eject' to exit the MTFS drive.

Very easy, right? This software deserves having with more functions on Mac.

Solution 4. Apple's Experimental NTFS-Write Support (Not Recommended)

The last solution to write to NTFS is the tested solution, not the official one. The solution is still unstable and may never be fully stable.

First, make sure your drive has a single-word label. If it does not, just change its label.

Step 1 Run terminal by going to Finder > Applications > Utilities > Terminal.

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Alternatively, just press Command + Space and type Terminal and press Enter.

Step 2 Type the following command into Terminal to open the ' /etc/fstab file'.

sudo nano /etc/fstab

Step 3 Add the following line to nano, replacing 'NAME' with the label of your NTFS drive:

LABEL=NAME none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse

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Step 4 Press Ctrl+O to save the file after you're done, and then press Ctrl+X to close nano.

Step 5 Connect the NTFS drive to the computer, unplug it and reconnect it. Then you will see it under the '/Volumes' directory.

In a Finder window, you can click 'Go' > 'Go to Folder' and type '/Volumes' into the box to access it, because the NTFS drive will not pop up automatically like other drivers normally no on your Mac.

The last solution is the not recommended, you should not blame us or Apple if it does not work.

Conclusion

While it is very normal to write to NTFS on Windows, it comes to be tough to do that on Mac. This post gathers top 4 ways to enable NTFS writing on Mac by formatting the NTFS to FAT or ExFAT, mounting the Windows NTFS driver for Mac to write to NTFS files, use the third-party software, Apeaksoft Mac Cleaner to write the files into NTFS directly and exploit the experimental solution from Apple.

Which way is your favorite one?

Do you have any better solution?

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Let me know b leaving your comments below.