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Unable to erase micro SD cards on Mac: File system formatter failed

I formatted my 32GB microSD card in a special way to restore a bricked Android phone. It has 54 partitions; most are in an unknown format, while some are FAT32. I tried several tools but still couldn't format it. When I erased it in Disk Utility, the erase process failed with the error "File system formatter failed."

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iBoysoft author Jenny Zeng

Jenny Zeng

Answered on Wednesday, November 22, 2023

The error "File system formatter failed" may suggest your drive has failed or doesn't have a proper partition map.

Before giving up on it, you can try formatting the whole drive with the GUID partition map or choosing a different file system. Follow these steps:

  1. Open Disk Utility.
  2. Click View > Show All Devices.
  3. Select the physical disk of your microSD card and click Erase.
  4. Set the scheme to GUID Partition Map and the format to exFAT.
  5. Click Erase.

If that doesn't work, try erasing the microSD card in Terminal.

  1. Open Terminal.
  2. Run the following command to list all devices connected to your Mac:diskutil list
  3. Note down the identifier of your microSD card. (e.g., disk 2)
  4. Run the following command to erase it: diskutil eraseDisk FAT32 MYSD GPT /dev/diskn

If you still can't format your microSD card, it likely has hardware failures.

Read Also:

[Fixed] Can't Partition SD Card/USB Drive/Hard Drive on Mac?

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