Resolve External Hard Drive Not Mounting on Mac

Summary: This blog explains some of the best ways to resolve the external hard drive not mounting issue on Mac. You can also try a reliable data recovery software to recover data from an unmounting (or un-mountable) external hard drive on Mac.

When you connect an external hard drive on a Mac, it shows up in the following locations – Desktop, Finder, and Disk Utility. But sometimes, it doesn’t appear anywhere on your system.

An external hard drive that does not show up or mount on a Mac can make the data on it inaccessible. Luckily, there are ways to resolve this issue and make an external drive accessible on Mac.

This post will discuss the methods available to resolve the external hard drive not mounting on Mac issue. But first, let’s find out more about this problem and its causes.

Why an External Hard Drive Not Showing Up/Mounting on Mac?

Whether it’s a Toshiba, Seagate, WD, or any other brand’s external drive, if it doesn’t show up anywhere on your Mac, it could be due to several common reasons –

Methods to Fix the External Hard Drive Not Mounting on Mac Issue

Many users get confused between an external hard drive not mounting on Mac and external hard drive not showing up. There is a fine distinction between the two –

When an external hard drive is showing up only in the Disk Utility and is grayed out, it is not mounting. But if the connected external hard drive is not showing up anywhere on a Mac, then you won’t be able to access it at all.

If you notice your external hard drive not showing up or grayed out on the desktop, use the methods below to fix any underlying issues –

Pre-Activity

Before moving to the advanced methods, try updating your macOS. Running outdated macOS can sometimes cause numerous system issues and glitches. If you cannot mount an external hard drive on a Mac, it could be due to an unresolved bug or outdated drivers related to storage drives. A macOS update can easily fix such issues.

Method 1: Change macOS Finder Settings

Sometimes, when you connect an external hard drive to your Mac, it shows up in the Disk Utility but not anywhere else. This may happen due to specific settings in the Finder Preferences, where you did not select to show external disks on the Desktop and in Finder. The steps to fix this are quite simple –

You should also toggle the external hard disk visibility in the Disk Utility’s View menu. Ensure that the “Show All Devices” option is selected.

Method 2: Reset Mac Firmware Settings

If the connected external hard drive is not mounting on Mac, you may try to reset NVRAM & PRAM, and SMC on your Mac.

To Reset NVRAM (Non-volatile RAM) & PRAM (Parameter RAM)

To Reset SMC (System Management Controller) Reset

Method 3: Fix External Hard Drive Connectivity Issue

An external hard drive may not show up on your Mac due to connectivity issues. You can resolve such connectivity issues by trying these simple troubleshooting tips –

Method 4: Troubleshoot External Hard Drive with Disk Utility

Sometimes, when you connect an external hard drive to your Mac, it appears grayed out on the desktop and other locations, possibly due to some logical errors. You can troubleshoot such disk-related issues via First Aid in Disk Utility. Here’s what to do –

Mount the external hard drive from Disk Utility.

Repair the hard drive from Disk Utility.

NoteAfter repairing the problematic external hard drive via First Aid, if it unmounts intermittently or shows error messages, check its S.M.A.R.T. status from the Disk Utility. If you find a possibility of imminent drive failure, you can clone the drive on a new, healthy hard drive.

Method 5: Mount External HDD via Terminal Using the ‘diskutil list’ Command

You can also use the Terminal to mount the external HDD on your Mac. To do that –

NoteReplace disk0 with the identifier of the external hard drive you want to mount.

Method 6: Recover Data from Non-Mounting External Mac Hard Drive

If none of the above methods helped you mount your drive on Mac, it is time for you to use a professional Mac data recovery software to recover any critical data from the hard drive. Connect the external drive and ensure that it is at least showing in Disk Utility. Now, follow the steps below –

Here is a video tutorial –

Conclusion

We hope the methods mentioned above helped you fix issues preventing your external hard drive from mounting on Mac. In rare cases, you may find an incompatible file system causing the problem. Take a backup of the data on your external hard drive and then format it with APFS or any other Mac-compatible file system.

Tell us in the comments which method worked for you.

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