Files on External Hard Drive Not Showing Up on Mac

First, I have to correct your knowledge about Windows NTFS. It is right that NTFS drives are not fully supported by macOS, but we can access and read files on it on a Mac. In theory, there's no problem for you to read from an NTFS-formatted external drive in macOS.

So, the files on your NTFS external hard drive that are not showing up on your Mac are none business of the NTFS format.

I've heard that many Mac users have problems accessing files on NTFS drives when using the new M1 Mac devices. So, I suspect that this issue is related to the partition table.

MBR is compatible with Microsoft Windows computers while GUID Partition Map is for Intel-based and Apple Silicon Mac machines. You can check the partition scheme you've set for this drive.

If it is not caused by a partition scheme, try using NTFS for Mac to make your NTFS drives fully readable and writable on your Mac. I've used iBoysoft NTFS for Mac for a long time. This tool can make you use an NTFS drive like a macOS native on your Mac. Then you can seamlessly switch NTFS drives from your Windows PC to your Mac freely.