Creating a Windows bootable USB on a Mac! (Windows 10 or Windows 11)

Making a Windows bootable USB on a Mac can give you a lot of problems but here is a video giving you step by step instructions how to make it easy. If you have any questions just drop a comment and I will try to get back to you as quickly as possible.
Make sure to check out my other videos and subscribe!
Instagram: darinwood_tech
Twitter: darinwood_tech

[@ChristiannKunT]

Darin GOAT Wood

[@Hisl1232]

Did it work

[@JohnnyWhateva]

Thanks to you, I was finally able to install Windows on a new computer, having only a MacBook.This is the only working tutorial on KZbin. And this is my first donation on KZbin.

[@darinwood_tech]

I appreciate it! Means a lot 🥲 I’m glad I was able to help though. That process took me forever to figure out so I knew other people were probably running into the same issue.

[@badams1581]

You probably won’t see this but just know you’re an absolute life saver! Spent a week trying to figure this crap out and I finally went to KZbin and found this video and it worked perfectly

[@CarTastic-fv6eo]

Same, it is insane how Apple limits a possibility to make a bootable USB of concurrent OS.

[@thisshitstupid]

@@CarTastic-fv6eobecause Apple is shit

[@pedrobarbeitos]

This is literally the only method that actually works on the whole internet. I know becasue I'ven been everywhere. Thank you!

[@darinwood_tech]

Thank you so much! It means a lot and I'm glad it was helpful.

[@DevonDassaw]

Everywhere man? So you've been to "Reno, Chicago, Fargo, Minnesota Buffalo, Toronto, Winslow, Sarasota Wichita, Tulsa, Ottawa, Oklahoma Tampa, Panama, Mattawa, La Paloma Bangor, Baltimore, Salvador, Amarillo Tocapillo, Baranquilla, and Perdilla,Boston, Charleston, Dayton, Louisiana Washington, Houston, Kingston, Texarkana Monterey, Faraday, Santa Fe, Tallapoosa Glen Rock, Black Rock, Little Rock, Oskaloosa Tennessee to Tennesse Chicopee, Spirit Lake Grand Lake, Devils Lake, Crater Lake, for Pete's sake...Louisville, Nashville, Knoxville, Ombabika Schefferville, Jacksonville, Waterville, Costa Rica Pittsfield, Springfield, Bakersfield, Shreveport Hackensack, Cadillac, Fond du Lac, Davenport Idaho, Jellico, Argentina, Diamantina, Pasadena, Catalina, see what I mean? Pittsburgh, Parkersburg, Gravelburg, Colorado Ellensburg, Rexburg, Vicksburg, El Dorado Larimore, Atmore, Haverstraw, Chatanika Chaska, Nebraska, Alaska, Opelika Baraboo, Waterloo, Kalamazoo, Kansas City Sioux City, Cedar City, Dodge City, what a pity"

[@calcumalations1235]

@@DevonDassaw bro really said "everywhere" and listed abunch of places in america 😭😭

[@DevonDassaw]

@@calcumalations1235 I mean it is a song I quoting this the quotation marks. A lil jokey jokey for the commentator @pedrobarbeitos

[@calcumalations1235]

@@DevonDassaw oh mb then, thought it was a case of American thinking America is the only place in earth 😭

[@scottrogers8068]

Still working September 2024, thanks, you're a lifesaver! I was constantly getting the "A media driver your computer needs is missing" when using bootable USB created on macOS. This was the only method I found that solved the problem

[@drkevinsullivan]

Thank you. I was concerned about not making (or even having an option to make) a bootable image. But it all worked when done just as described here. The one small surprise was the time it took to split the large file at the end of the process. It was maybe more than 15 minutes, on an M2 Pro Macbook. Thank you.

[@shantellejansz243]

This is literally the best video to explain how to do this. I watched like 10 other ones that were useless. THANK YOU DARINNNN!!! Pro tip for anyone struggling because i ran into a couple roadbumps, follow the video TO A TEE. I didn't let the homebrew and wimlib fully install before trying to split the files and it kept coming up with an error, i just rebooted the terminal and actually let it download (it will say NEXT STEP once homebrew is installed) and then i did the file split and it worked perfectly!!!! Also copy and paste the code directly from the homebrew website onto the terminal, that helped me out as well for some reason

[@vymaudio]

I rarely ever leave comments on KZbin. Like ever. not on my favorite bands, celebs or artists, or even the most hotly anticipated video games. Hell, I didn't even comment on my own videos when I was a techtuber. But that changes today. YOU SIR, are a gift to mankind. I can't thank you enough, and i hope reading this comment makes your day because this video certainly made mine. All the best!

[@TheStoryofYote]

Bro thank you for taking out the time to do this tutorial. You seem like a really genuine guy who actually care for people. Keep being you bro! Thanks again my guy 🤝🏽

[@darinwood_tech]

I appreciate that! Glad it was helpful !

[@superberg13]

After hours of trying, yours was the only method that actually worked for me! (I'm on an M1 mac and created a Windows 11 bootable drive). Thank you!

[@franciscoxc]

did you need to set the path on home-brew to work? did you need to extract the Wim with wimextract??

[@superberg13]

@@franciscoxc I don't believe I needed to set a path on Homebrew. I followed the video instructions exactly and it worked for me.

[@CindyyCindz]

THIS WORKS!!! FINALLY! I tried so many YT tutorials, where they wanted me to download Virtual Machines of windows, and emulators, and my mac was just NOT having it. Error after error with them. Then, I came across this video and followed it step by step. I didn't understand anything that I was doing, but IT WORKED!!! You are a great teacher and explained everything super clearly. Thankyou!!

[@ciazz621]

Does zsh shell run the 'brew install wimlib' command, or do i have to install another shell before running this command. I get the error: 'zsh: command not found: brew' Im currently on my Macbook 13,3" 2022 M1

[@xnk11]

Did it work out for you

[@khirdanreza1302]

don't cancel homebrew installation, just following the step at your terminal

[@xorpgorp]

I want to earnestly thank you! this is the one solution that worked for me when all other solutions had issues and errors.

[@colechristensen588]

FINALLY a video that actually goes through all of the steps! This is the video I was looking for. Thanks!

[@darinwood_tech]

Glad it helped! Thank for the comment 🙏

[@thenastypatty]

Thank you so much! I spent 5-6 hours trying to figure out how to get Windows to work on my PC and this worked!

[@Vocgodly]

Anyone struggling getting “Wimlib” to install, make sure you let the first command install all the way through when it gets done at the bottom of the terminal it’ll say NEXT STEP: run these two commands it’ll be two command below that message, from there u then want to manual ( DO NOT DOUBLE CLICK) drag over the command all the way to the last character and enter it into the terminal you should do this two times because there are two command MAKE SURE TO DRAG OVER THE COMMAND DONT DOUBLE CLICK, after you done with that then type in “brew install wimlab”, then wimlab will install thank me later

[@antonio160595]

Thanks!

[@Vocgodly]

@@antonio160595 no problem

[@Whati6]

W

[@TrueShiftOne]

This got me to the next step. Also, I'll add for anybody who has never used the terminal like myself, and as others have mentioned: After you get Wimlib installed, make sure that when you're dragging over the files, the spaces are exactly as he has them in the video (/'s etc.). Also, splitting the file takes time, so be patient after you get it to work. If it says "part one of two," that's good; just wait for it to finish. After getting tripped up on a bunch of different steps, I got it to work. Then I almost screwed everything up because I pressed enter a bunch of times and closed the terminal. I only had one small install.swm file on my USB, so I deleted it (while it was still being processed) I went through the process again and just let it do its thing. It takes some time to finish, and I now have both install.swm and install2.swm files on my USB! Don't give up; it works. 🎉

[@TrueShiftOne]

I also titled my USB drive as "Windows 11" at first, and I think the space between "Windows" and "11" was causing issues with my file formatting. When I dragged the files over, a backslash (\) was showing up in the command line when I dragged the source destination folder over from my USB. I changed the drive name to "win11," and I think it fixed an issue. I'm sure someone more tech-savvy can confirm or deny that this can cause an issue. Either way, my son's computer had been blue-screened for over a month now because I'm a Mac user and didn't know how to fix his gaming PC. But now Windows is installed, and I'm almost done going through the final setup steps. It is 1:40 AM, though! 😂

[@GreaK213]

Clear and to the point ! Worked perfectly for me :)

[@aiironiko8891]

I know this takes a lot of time and time is precious so thank you for making this man. You are a lifesaver of sorts.

[@aaronwallace5317]

Greatest youtuber of all time, spent way too long doing this and nothing worked till I saw this, you're amazing

[@EazyPurple]

Made it exactly how you said but it doesn't boot. Apparently it is not bootable. How do I even check if the usb drive is even bootable? I am positive I followed you and everything is 100% correct.

[@darinwood_tech]

Since you are certain you have everything correct. I ran into this issue on my device and it was the port it was plugged into so I tried all four usb ports and the last one worked. I would recommend this but I will also look into it and try to find what might have happened.

[@peite7878]

Edit. Worked! I got a warning that Homebrew/Winlib might not work on my older unsupported Mac OS Catalina 10.15.7. When installing wimlib I got some warning messages which I by mistake denied since something was asking permission for system stuff. And installing seemed to get stuck so I aborted and went on the Internet.... I did in Terminal write separately and pressing Enter in between : brew doctor brew upgrade (these might have improved my old installation of Homebrew from before) I found out that installing certain stuff such as wimlib on OS 10.15 takes a very long time because it has to do a special installation called "make" which newer Macs skips. So you just have to be patient and sit at the computer to accept all permission messages that pops up during the installation.

[@Woodsmiths]

Hey, why not just format it as exFAT so you don’t have to do homebrew?

[@FrankieZimmerman]

Thank you for this video! I looked everywhere and tried a lot of other guides but none of them worked. I really appreciate the time you took to make this and am so happy its working (after a long file splitting process with home-brew lol) You're the man!

[@elizaporterphotography]

Thanks! Exactly what I needed!

[@darinwood_tech]

You're welcome! I’m glad you found value in it and appreciate the Super Thanks! First one ever, means the world 😭

[@Johnvardas]

@@darinwood_tech is it required to merge the two files into one after the copy?

[@izulfiqar7]

@@Johnvardas No

[@CuriotiveAce]

Exactly what I wanted to say! The only KZbinr that got it 👍

[@execna]

Dude you freaking rule!!! Really appreciated and going to check out the rest of your channel to see what else I can learn

[@lumberfoot_jpg]

Just a good "old fashioned" tutorial with zero sketchy free trial links. Thanks man, you saved my PC!

[@killjoy2467]

“im not going to go through it because i already did it” great tutorial really helpful

[@killjoy2467]

terminal just decided to not let me enter password

[@InspiredSaints]

Thanks bud. That did the trick. I just had to be careful on the last part to fill it in exactly as you did. At first I missed a space so it wouldn't work at first. I tried following an other tutorial before yours and it had some vital bits of info missing. Yours was very concise, thanks buddy.

[@darinwood_tech]

Glad it helped!

[@Iheb-f3p]

After doing all the steps mentioned in the video , just restart your computer and once you hear the Mac sound starting up sound keep pressing alt(options) until the boot menu shows up then choose the right icon . Hopefully that helps.

[@snkd8224]

Man, thank you so much! I needed to install Win10 on my workstation and the only computer I had around was my wife's Mac. I've never used one for more than 5 minutes so I was kinda bummed out at the prospect of spending hours to simply get a bootable USB drive. Turns out BootCamp doesn't work on newer Macs, which sucks because almost every video I've managed to stumble upon shows you how to make a USB with this app. I spent a good hour or two trying to find a way to do it. It's no exaggeration that you were sent to me by the angels of the search algorithm. I followed along (not without screw ups, but who's perfect?) and it turned out great! Thanks, man, it's a great video and it was super helpful!

[@themaincrunch8773]

Does ANYBODY know how to actually boot it after completing all the instructions?

[@KevinDKao]

You have to be careful doing this. I did this and it looks like on Windows version 22H2 it will create a blue screen of death loop after trying to update some driver. I attempted to isolate the issue and can't seem to find which driver but I suspect a network or a display. If you do this, please use the windows instance to immediately make a windows 10 bootable drive from the installation tool on the Windows website and re-install windows using that after the initial installation.

[@darinwood_tech]

Thank you for sharing this! I have not run into this problem but definitely worth mentioning.

[@paulotremba4688]

Thank you for the video. I have barely used Mac and never used terminal before. Gods work 🙏

[@bortanradu]

Thanks for the video. Is there a reason why you use FAT32 instead of using exFAT which doesn't have the 4GB limitation?

[@poolkrooni]

It's weird... exFAT worked just fine

[@adl0cky]

I searched for that question and answer. Thanks guys ❤

[@benjaminburdon5498]

Had a lot of trouble getting this to work, had some issues running the commands in terminal and could not figure out what error I was making. So I bailed. Luckily I had a windows pc around. Took about 10 minutes and it worked flawlessly.

[@C05M1C_FN]

before this tutorial, i was working hours upon hours with thousands of errors with your tutorial i was able to install windows on my new pc and create many memories on my computer. I cant thank you enough.

[@buildingbri]

When I go to split the file, mine says "some uncommon options are not listed; see 'man wimlib-imagex". Can anyone help?

[@manunoyonify]

hi and thx, but then installing windows says the install wim is missing... any idea ? thx !

[@alainserrano254]

Hey I'm having the same issue how did you end up resolving it?

[@ahmedplayz1293]

Man, great Video! I was beginning to think that I couldn't install Windows (Because my Mac requires a USB to Install Windows) But this video made the installation process very Clear.

[@atheersaddam6139]

many thanks, just one thing please, when I try to install wimlib it tells me that ''command not found: brew''

[@Ctheflow]

I have same issue and this guy won't respond telling us. Is this scam??

[@khirdanreza1302]

don’t abort the instal homebrew, just click enter and following the steps

[@shantellejansz243]

make sure your homebrew is fully installed before downloading the wimlib, then try copy paste the brew command straight from the website into the terminal, i had this issue as well and copy pasting it did the trick for me

[@salehzand4673]

Awesome guide, great job, thanks a lot

[@thettrio3617]

be careful that you but the slash directly behind the direction (sources folder). I tried and tried but the I realised that there was a space. Great video, Thanks man

[@darinwood_tech]

Great advice! Glad it helped🙏thanks for the support.

[@thekevinc]

been a dev for almost 10 yrs and didn't know you could drag files into terminal like that 🤣

[@adrianplascencia6905]

bro I spent so long trying to do this. I had just built my dream PC after many damn years and I couldn't boot bc I have a MacBook. Thank you soooo much bro I was stuck for hours and bummed until I found this video praying it worked. Ur a g. Keep up the damn good work brother.

[@gibsonden2]

how do you get it to boot into the usb afterwards? I did everything as specified and it's completed, yet nothing shows on boot menu. m1 MacBook Air

[@mattexdee8424]

Thanks alot for this video, I have a question pls, once the bootable drive is created using this method, will I be able to use that flash drive to install windows on a Microsoft computer?

[@racineurr.8924]

I have the same question.

[@darinwood_tech]

Sorry for the late reply but this method would allow you to install Windows OS on any compatible device. Make sure to check Windows system requirements.

[@luan7664]

Works ! I tried windows 11 and it went trough with no issues ! Thanks

[@allisterhawes9224]

Trying to split this file is like trying to split an atom.

[@darinwood_tech]

I agree!

[@alfredabate3176]

GOOD JOB man!👌🏾👌. You explained it so well. Thank you. I was scratching my head on how to go about this using a Mac! Thank you so much.

[@andrewarteaga4146]

I can't thank you enough for this video! This was So So So helpful!

[@darinwood_tech]

You're so welcome!

[@abdul-azizi]

Hey Man, Great video tutorial. I never thought about making a bootable USB with MAC and spliting the install file. Thank you so much!

[@taylorerickson7855]

I did everything according to the instructions in your video, but when I go to plug in my USB and boot to Windows and start the install, I get an error saying that it can't find the .wim file. I'm guessing it's because I split it into two. Any recommendations on what to do?

[@Jay-ps1rt]

Same here :( did you figure it out?

[@alainserrano254]

@@Jay-ps1rt I'm also having this issue, did you resolve it? if so how?

[@kuemagecollector]

Thanks! Just in time to build my gaming pc.

[@acidnrg5620]

my windows boot didn’t recognize install.swn and install2.swn, how fix?

[@iAmSoCheesy]

Same..

[@bntreze2052]

@@iAmSoCheesy Open the resources directory, and just rename "install.svn and install2.swn" to "install.wim and install2.wim". It solved it for me.

[@davidmaestre4810]

It's .SWM not .SWN

[@bntreze2052]

@@davidmaestre4810 Yes, I wrote it wrong. I realized that during installation there was an error because of this file, but I just renamed it correctly and it installed fine.

[@jonathanzea3076]

Man, this is a SPECTACULAR explanation. Thank you so much

[@anthonybui9444]

Thanks for the video, very helpful! I hit a few snags along the way with downloading Homebrew initially, but it all worked out.

[@darinwood_tech]

It took me awhile to get it also, glad it ended up working out 🙏

[@ercecanbekture5512]

This actually worked thanks (did Windows 11 btw)

[@reviewsvr7083]

Wow thank you so much for taking the time to make this video. I am not very technical but this was pretty easy to follow! Great job man :o)

[@twang9735]

It’s not allowing me to install wimlib for some reason I did everything just as you did

[@Juangassymexican]

If you try this PLEASE CHECK ALL YOUR SPACES IN THE TERMINAL do it exactly as it is in the video if you put too many spaces or no space errors will come up for you in the terminal like “unknown command” and such so do it just like in the video

[@DCAISTHEWAY]

Hey there, do you know how to install wimlib. He kinda glosses over it.

[@kylemctaggart2187]

Still not working

[@DanieltheGe0rge]

Only yt tutorial I've ever found helpful

[@williamiiifarquhar4345]

This is a good tutorial. Better than many others! You deserve praise good sir.

[@ykhemani]

This was super helpful and worked perfectly! Thank you for putting this together!

[@SheLuvsOmar]

Someone give my man a medal, a cup, and everything he needs in life. bro you just helped me a lot and I really wanna show my appreciation but im broke.

[@steveharmancambridge]

Worked third time! Would have worked first time or second time if only I could type properly. lol! Many thanks - great video.

[@fpsSYRIA]

What a legend! very helpful

[@doctor1alex]

This was a really good video. I can't believe it's as difficult to do as it is.

[@darinwood_tech]

It’s crazy! Exactly why I made this video though because it took me hours to get it to work.

[@NosurfOfficial]

@@darinwood_tech @Alex Jackson It's because Apple wants everyone to live on their little ecosystem and have zero incentive to make it easy for people who want to work outside their ecosystem. They make beautiful hardware, but other than that, fuck Apple.

[@bruhmoment9948]

Thank you very much, helped me get windows on my new pc!

[@darinwood_tech]

Glad I could help! It gave me a lot of problems when I was trying to figure it out so I thought I’d share the knowledge 😊

[@xJeyrushx]

After hours of swapping wrong files onto my USB, this tutorial finally made it work. Thanks for explaining why i dont use exFat (file is too large) , and how to split one file into two ! Now it finally made sense and I can boot my PC :)

[@foilcap]

exFat does not have a file size limit for all practical purposes. Just used an exFat formatted USB to copy all those files and upgraded a Windows machine found in the street (donating it now).

[@vitalisopili1154]

Worked like a charm

[@patriciaolsson5841]

I have an issue where wimlib-imagex split command wont work. It says error:unrecognized command even though it starts splitting for a second and there is no .swm file in the source file. Im out of ideas, anyhelp ?

[@MrToothGap]

Can’t figure out how to download wimlib

[@raymondmoreno4559]

After you install Homebrew, it gives a warning letting you know homebrew is not in your filepath. It lets you know 2 commands you need to run first. After that you should be able to install wimlib. Hopefully that helps!

[@ohfice]

Purchasing a MacBook was probably one of my life's biggest regrets. You have to go through brain surgery anytime you want to do the simplest things

[@Devex-Tech]

Man Mac is easy Try Linux lol

[@ohfice]

@Devex-Tech I'm sure it's more difficult, but Linux doesn't market itself as simple or target students and other groups with a baseline understanding of computer science.

[@Devex-Tech]

yeah I know but it was just funny to see someone saying that using Mac is hard, what is hard for you in Mac OS? @@ohfice

[@ohfice]

Why are you watching a Mac tutorial video?

[@Devex-Tech]

bc i didnt want to fuck up something when making my backup w11 pendrive@@ohfice

[@godamkeras4144]

Thank you sir. Have a nice day!

[@darinwood_tech]

Of course! I’m glad it helped, thank you for commenting 🙏

[@neta1538]

thank you so much for sharing the Information! won‘t there be problems during windows installation due to the now renamed and split install-file? elmar

[@956.al3jandro]

I need help I’m at the end of video and almost done !! But when I type wimlib-imagex split (file) (sourced from usb etc.. it doesn’t wanna split it says “some uncommon options are not listed

[@Itsconus]

Commenting for the same problem/solution

[@956.al3jandro]

@@Itsconus have you fixed it yet

[@gabeisgoated316]

You have to type it exactly as he does it like with the spaces and everything

[@gabeisgoated316]

@@Itsconusyou have to type is exactly how he does it I had the same problem until I re did it the way he did it with the spaces and stuff

[@snappytheaverage]

When you get errors like these, type posting the command in the commnet. KZbin might give you some struggle with exact formatting, but knowing what you typed makes it far easier for one to help you.

[@anderlex]

Thank you! It worked perfectly!

[@s.w.9536]

I did everything you did and it all worked. What do you mean by boot your new windows installation tho? When I go to download the Windows 10 and try to open it my Mac still says that it can't read windows files. What do I have to do to actually boot up windows?

[@marwanfikrat7716]

perfect thank you. im spltting the file rn, hopefully works

[@xenialange8719]

Does anyone know where to get the already split install.wim files as download for example? (without having to run the split as administrator)

[@JoseLuRu]

Thank you so much for the tutorial!

[@kidd_impressive]

I did everything now I don’t know what else to do??.

[@anuchek]

Thank you so much! Worked as charm!

[@duelstar5449]

"Windows could not collect information from [OSIimage] because the specified image file [install.wim] does not exist." how to fix this error message

[@DjentyDjamie]

when i go to install wimlib, it says command not found: brew on M1 OSX Monterey please advise

[@damion2938]

just try without the „brew“

[@Emerald_Coast_Bonsai]

THANK YOU sooooooo much this helped me sooooooo much!!!

[@GUCCIPAPERPLATE]

You're an actual goat, thank you!

[@justaracist]

YOU ARE THE BEST THANK YOU

[@MaggieMixon]

I've gotten through the tutorial, but how do I actually boot windows 10

[@karinady13]

It was going so well ;( but i keep getting stuck on the part after installing homebrew, it won't give me permission to do the 2 next steps

[@MrMcoogles]

this was incredibly thank you so much!!!

[@JohnAuHermes]

Thank you so much, this is a life saver.

[@Rebel0001]

Its doesn’t work when I enter install wimlib command. Says command not found

[@ZowskiV]

It’s not popping up after I boot it and I followed instructions twice what do I do I’m on a Mac booo air m1

[@SARADataScience]

Thank you it worked perfectly. 😃

[@CagatayBaysal]

You are my hero thanks a lot its work immediately

[@Me1forpresident]

I’m doing everything step by step and it’s working until I try to install, I get the windows could not collect information for osimage error

[@G00rds]

Lifesaver! Thank you!

[@ralphlamao]

Thanks for the walkthrough. Unfortunately homebrew failed to recognize "brew install wimlib" for me. I changed the format of my external drive to ExFAT though and was subsequently able to install Windows 11 without having to split that one large file at all.

[@nicovanderwalt8747]

Having the same problem. 😭

[@nicovanderwalt8747]

So you just copied the ISO files as is??

[@ralphlamao]

@@nicovanderwalt8747​​⁠I copied the contents of the iso as is to the exfat formatted external drive. Note this worked for my B550 board; but I later tried to use that same drive to install windows on an older B450 machine, and the format was not recognized by its bios. So it isn't guaranteed this will work.

[@calebyoung1367]

⁠@@ralphlamao so just copy all the contents from the iso file without any splitting and you should be good?

[@ralphlamao]

​​@@calebyoung1367 I copied the contents of the iso as is to the exfat formatted external drive. Note this worked for my B550 board; but I later tried to use that same drive to install windows on an older B450 machine, and the format was not recognized by its bios. So it isn't guaranteed this will work.

[@emircanmesin6936]

Install command: "brew install wimlib" doesn't work :(

[@snappytheaverage]

You probably didn't install homebrew. If you get a message that brew is not found, either it isn't installed, or your shell for your command line doesn't know where to find it automatically. Ask a tool like bing copilot to help you get brew installed and working. If should give you a short list of commands to run to make it work.