Create Bootable Windows USB Installers

To create a bootable Windows USB stick to install Windows, you can follow the instructions below. Plug in a USB stick up to 16GB, no smaller than 4GB and no bigger than 16GB or it will not work. Open an elevated command prompt. Type diskpart and press enter. Once in disk part, you should run […]

Create Bootable Windows USB Installers

To create a bootable Windows USB stick to install Windows, you can follow the instructions below.

Plug in a USB stick up to 16GB, no smaller than 4GB and no bigger than 16GB or it will not work.

Open an elevated command prompt.

Type diskpart and press enter.

Once in disk part, you should run the following commands in order:

  • list disk (you should then identify the disk you want to use)
  • select disk # (# being the disk number identified in the step above)
  • clean
  • create partition primary
  • format fs=fat32 quick (note the fat32 filesystem, this is because UEFI does not recognise NTFS) – also remember the “quick” part or else it will take hours to complete the format
  • active
  • assign
  • exit

The USB stick is then ready to copy the OS files to it. You should copy these files directly from your OS media to the USB stick.

Once complete, insert the USB stick into a machine and boot from it and it should then start to install the OS.

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Andrew Armstrong

Andrew Armstrong is a UK-based IT professional with 26+ years of hands-on experience in Windows, Windows Server, SCCM/ConfigMgr, Active Directory, PowerShell, and enterprise infrastructure.

He founded TechyGeeksHome in 2010 and has published over 1,500 practical guides covering real-world IT problems and solutions. When not solving IT problems,

Andrew develops free Windows utilities including Ultimate Settings Panel, which has been downloaded over 850,000 times.