How To Shrink A Partition In Windows
The Disk Management console in Windows Vista and later versions of Windows OS made it easier to managing partitions and volumes. You may want shrink a partition as a way to separate your data from your operating system, so that if you need to reinstall Windows OS, upgrade it, and so on, you can do so without affecting your data.
Here’s an easy way to shrink a partition to free up space so you can create a new partition on your disk.
1. Open the Disk Management console by typing diskmgmt.msc into Start Menu search box or Run dialog box.
2. Right-click the partition you want to manage. You’ll have a variety of options, depending on your system setup and the kind of partition you’re going to manage. Some options will be grayed out, depending on the partition type. For example, if your right-click a boot partition, the Format option will not be available to you.
3. Choose Shrink Volume. After a few moments, Shrink dialog box appears. Make your choice as to how much you want to shrink the drive. You’ll be shown the volume of the drive after you shrink it at the bottom of the screen. Click Shrink after you’ve made your choice.
The Shrink dialog box provides the following information:
4. The Disk Management Console will now show a new entry an Unallocated Space block to the right of the volume you just shrank.
5. Right-click the Unallocated Space block, and choose New Simple Volume. A wizard will launch that prompts you through turning the unallocated space into a new partition, including assigning a drive letter, using all the available space on it, formatting the volume, and so on.
If you want to limit the time of formatting a partition select “Perform a quick format.”
Here’s an easy way to shrink a partition to free up space so you can create a new partition on your disk.
1. Open the Disk Management console by typing diskmgmt.msc into Start Menu search box or Run dialog box.
2. Right-click the partition you want to manage. You’ll have a variety of options, depending on your system setup and the kind of partition you’re going to manage. Some options will be grayed out, depending on the partition type. For example, if your right-click a boot partition, the Format option will not be available to you.
3. Choose Shrink Volume. After a few moments, Shrink dialog box appears. Make your choice as to how much you want to shrink the drive. You’ll be shown the volume of the drive after you shrink it at the bottom of the screen. Click Shrink after you’ve made your choice.
The Shrink dialog box provides the following information:
- Total Size Before Shrink In MB Lists the total capacity of the volume in MB. This is the formatted size of the volume.
- Size Of Available Shrink Space In MB Lists the maximum amount by which you can shrink the volume. This doesn’t represent the total amount of free space on the volume; rather, it represents the amount of space that can be removed, not including any data reserved for the master file table, volume snapshots, page files, and temporary files.
- Enter The Amount of Space To Shrink In MB Lists the total amount of space that will be removed from the volume. The initial value defaults to the maximum amount of space that can be removed from the volume. For optimal drive performance, you should ensure that the volume has at least 10 percent of free space after the shrink operation.
- Total Size After Shrink In MB Lists what the total capacity of the volume in MB will be after you shrink the volume. This is the new formatted size of the volume.
4. The Disk Management Console will now show a new entry an Unallocated Space block to the right of the volume you just shrank.
5. Right-click the Unallocated Space block, and choose New Simple Volume. A wizard will launch that prompts you through turning the unallocated space into a new partition, including assigning a drive letter, using all the available space on it, formatting the volume, and so on.
If you want to limit the time of formatting a partition select “Perform a quick format.”