Windows OS Hub / Windows 10 / How to Create a UEFI Bootable USB Drive to Install Windows 10 or 7?
This is a step-by-step guide on how to create a bootable USB flash drive with a Windows 10 or Windows 7 install image for a UEFI computer. We’ll need the following:
- USB flash drive (USB v2 or v3) with a capacity of at least 4 GB for Windows 7 or 8 GB for Windows 10;
- 64-bit Windows install image (32-bit Windows versions won’t boot on the UEFI computer). A Windows distribution could be in the form of the installation DVD or an ISO image file.
In order to make a UEFI computer boot from a USB flash drive, you must format it in the FAT32 file system.
Let’s look at a few of the most popular ways that you can create a bootable UEFI USB flash drive for installing Windows 10.
Contents:
- Use Media Creation Tool to Create Windows 10 Install USB Stick
- Using Rufus to Create Windows UEFI USB stick
- Using Diskpart to Create UEFI Boot-Stick with Windows
- Create UEFI Bootable USB Drive to Install Windows 7
- Create UEFI Bootable USB Media with PowerShell
Use Media Creation Tool to Create Windows 10 Install USB Stick
Microsoft’s official tool for creating installation media and ISO images with Windows 10 is Media Creation Tool. You can download the latest version here – https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
Old version of the Windows USB/DVD download tool formatted USB drive in the NTFS file system when burning Windows 7 image. A computer with UEFI architecture cannot boot from that media in native mode. Therefore, this tools is not suitable for creating an installation flash drive with Windows 7.
- Run the file MediaCreationTool2004.exe;
- Select Create installation media (USB flash drive, DVD, or ISO file) for another PC);
- Select the language, edition and architecture (bitness) of the Windows 10 image that you want to write to the USB drive;
- Then select that you want to write the image to a USB flash drive;
- Select your flash drive in the list of removable devices and USB drives.
That’s all. Click Next -> Next -> Finish and wait until the install Windows image is written to the USB drive.
In this case, all data on the USB flash drive will be deleted permanently during formatting.
This USB flash drive can be used to boot on both UEFI and BIOS computers.
Using Rufus to Create Windows UEFI USB stick
It is much easier for novice users to create bootable UEFI flash drive for installing Windows using the graphical interface of the popular Rufus utility. At the moment, the Rufus version 3.10 is available on the developer’s website https://rufus.ie. The tool is quite compact (about 1 MB), doesn’t require installation and it’s completely free. In addition, it works much faster than analogs.
Run the Rufus tool with administrator privileges and specify the following settings:
- Device: select your USB flash drive;
- Boot selection: specify Windows ISO image file (you can create an ISO image with the latest Windows 10 build using the Media Creation Tool, see example);
- Partition scheme: GPT;
- Target system: UEFI (non-CSM);
- File system: FAT32.
Click START to write a Windows image to a USB flash drive. After 10-15 minutes, your bootable USB flash drive with Windows install image for UEFI computer is ready.
Using Diskpart to Create UEFI Boot-Stick with Windows
You can create a bootable UEFI flash drive with the Windows install image manually. The procedure described below is suitable for advanced users, is performed from the command line and allows you to fully control (and understand) all the steps in the process of creating a bootable USB flash drive.
Step-by-step guide on how to create a boot Windows flash drive for a UEFI system using diskpart:
- Connect a USB flash drive to the corresponding PC port;
- Run the command prompt as an administrator;
- Run the DISKPART tool by typing in the command prompt:
Diskpart - Display the list of all drives in the computer:
list disk - Find the disk that corresponds to your USB flash drive (in our example it is Disk 2) and select it:
Select Disk 2 Warning. The following command will completely remove all information and partitions on the USB flash drive. So, it is better to make sure that you have selected your removable USB device in the previous step, and not one of the computer’s hard drives.
Remove all data from the drive using this command:clean- Create a primary partition:
create partition primary - Make this partition active (a system volume):
active - List the system volumes with this command:
list volume - Select the partition you have created (in our example, it is Volume 3):
select volume 3 - Format the selected partition with FAT32:
format fs=fat32 quickNote. Unlike legacy computers with BIOS, which allow booting from partitions with FAT, FAT32, exFAT or NTFS file systems, a UEFI allows to boot only from a bootloader located on a boot drive formatted with the FAT32.
- Assign a drive letter to the formatted partition (if Windows doesn’t assign a drive letter to a USB flash drive automatically— see the article):
assign - Exit DISKPART:
exit
Copy the contents of your Windows x64 install image to the USB flash drive that you have prepared. You can do it using Windows Explorer, your favorite file manager or from the command prompt, for example:
xcopy d:\* f:\ /s /e
(where D:\ is an installation DVD or mounted ISO image containing a Windows distro, and F:\ is a letter assigned to the USB flash drive);
Note. Since the maximum file size on the FAT32 file system should not exceed 4 GB, you won’t be able to copy the large image file install.wim. The size of the install.wim file may be more than 4 GB if you integrated updates, drivers, etc. into it. In this case, you will have to split the install.wim file into several files up to 4 GB in size (for example, 3 GB files). To do this, you can use the command Dism /Split-Image:Dism /Split-Image /ImageFile:D:\sources\install.wim /SWMFile:c:\tmp\install.swm /FileSize:3000
Or using the imagex tool:imagex /split D:\sources\install.wimc:\tmp\install.swm 3000
The resulting files (install.swm, install2.swm, install3.swm …) need to be copied to the USB flash drive into the directory F:\sources. The Windows Installer will assemble the swm files and apply the full wim image to the disk during the install process.
This completes the process of creating a bootable UEFI flash drive with Windows 10.
Create UEFI Bootable USB Drive to Install Windows 7
If you are creating an install USB flash drive with Windows 7 for a UEFI computer, you need to perform additional steps:
- Go to f:\efi\microsoft\boot folder on the USB flash drive;
- Entirely copy its contents one level up (to the F:\efi\boot directory);
- Copy the bootmgfw.efi file to the f:\efi\boot folder and rename it to bootx64.efi.
Note. The UEFI environment should pass control to the bootx64.efi file. The file bootmgfw.efi can be copied from the deployed Windows 7 x64 computer (located in the %windir%\Boot\EFI folder). You can also get it using 7ZIP archiver, for example, from install.wim in the ISO install image. You can find it in the folder sources\install.wim\1\Windows\Boot\EFI\bootmgfw.efi.
Note. Some motherboards require bootx64.efi to be additionally copied to the USB flash drive root; it has to have either the same name or shellx64.efi.
Create UEFI Bootable USB Media with PowerShell
You can also use PowerShell cmdlets to create a bootable UEFI flash drive.
The following PowerShell one-liner will list the connected USB media devices. After you select the flash drive you need, it will be cleaned up, the primary partition will be created and formatted in the FAT32 file system (using cmdlets from the Storage disk management module):
$Results = Get-Disk |Where-Object BusType -eq USB |Out-GridView -Title 'Select USB Drive to Create UEFI bootable device' -OutputMode Single |Clear-Disk -RemoveData -RemoveOEM -Confirm:$false -PassThru |New-Partition -UseMaximumSize -IsActive -AssignDriveLetter |Format-Volume -FileSystem FAT32
Mount the install ISO image of Windows 10:
$Volumes = (Get-Volume).Where({$_.DriveLetter}).DriveLetter
Mount-DiskImage -ImagePath C:\ISO\Windows10-2004x64.iso
$ISO = (Compare-Object -ReferenceObject $Volumes -DifferenceObject (Get-Volume).Where({$_.DriveLetter}).DriveLetter).InputObject
Because in PowerShell, I could not detect which drive letter was assigned to the mounted ISO image; I had to compare the list of disks before and after mounting using Compare-Object.
Now you need to go to the Boot directory and copy the contents to a USB flash drive using Copy-Item cmdlet:
Set-Location -Path "$($ISO):\boot"
bootsect.exe /nt60 "$($Results.DriveLetter):"
Copy-Item -Path "$($ISO):\*" -Destination "$($Results.DriveLetter):" -Recurse -Verbose
Please note that in order to install the Windows operating system in UEFI mode, you must use the GUID Partition Table (GPT) for your computer’s hard disk. To convert an MBR disk to a GPT partition table without data loss, you can use the mbr2gpt tool).
After the described procedures, you have a bootable USB flash drive to install Windows on a UEFI computer in the native mode. More detailed procedure of Windows installation on computer with UEFI interface will be considered in one of the next article.
FAQs
How can I make my USB UEFI bootable? ›
- Press F10 and ESC (or Delete) keys when booting your computer to open the BIOS Setup utility.
- Go to the Boot tab and select the UEFI/BIOS Boot Mode by using the arrow keys, and press Enter.
- Select the UEFI Boot Mode by pressing the up and down arrow keys and press Enter.
- Press F10 keys to save the changes.
- Format a 16GB (or higher) USB flash device.
- Download the Windows 10 media creation tool from Microsoft.
- Run the media creation wizard to download the Windows 10 installation files.
- Create the installation media.
- Eject the USB flash device.
To create a Windows 10 bootable USB, download the Media Creation Tool. Then run the tool and select Create installation for another PC. Finally, select USB flash drive and wait for the installer to finish.
Does Windows 7 support boot in UEFI? ›You can boot Win7 in UEFI mode if a partial CSM is in place (enabled) providing Int10 support. If firmware defaults to UEFI boot mode leaving Int10 CSM enabled, then Win7 will install successfully in UEFI mode. Microsoft has also backported TPM 2.0 support to Windows 7 for when it is installed in UEFI mode.
Can you install Windows 7 in UEFI mode Why? ›Windows 7 runs just fine on a UEFI machine. However, your problem may be that if the machine is old enough to have come with Win 7, then the UEFI firmware (it's not called a BIOS) may be quite poor. Try and update the firmware in the machine to the very latest.
Can Rufus make UEFI bootable USB? ›Rufus is a utility that helps format and create bootable USB flash drives, such as USB keys/pendrives, memory sticks, etc. It can be especially useful for cases where: you need to create USB installation media from bootable ISOs (Windows, Linux, UEFI, etc.) you need to work on a system that doesn't have an OS installed.
How do I make Windows 10 UEFI bootable? ›- Double-click the Rufus-x. ...
- Under the "Device" section, select the USB flash drive.
- Under the "Boot selection" section, click the Select button on the right.
- Select the Windows 10 ISO file from the folder location.
- Click the Open button.
For example, you might see UEFI USB Drive and BIOS USB Drive. Each command uses the same device and media, but boots the PC in a different firmware mode. Some devices only support one mode (either UEFI or BIOS). Other devices will only allow you to boot to BIOS mode by manually disabling the UEFI security features.
How do I create both UEFI and legacy bootable USB? ›- Set Language, Windows Edition, and Architecture. ...
- Select the removable drive from the list, and click Next to continue. ...
- Select Windows PE and created disc will support booting from both legacy/MBR and UEFI/GPT. ...
- Tip:
To create a bootable USB flash drive
Insert a USB flash drive into a running computer. Open a Command Prompt window as an administrator. Type diskpart . In the new command line window that opens, to determine the USB flash drive number or drive letter, at the command prompt, type list disk , and then click ENTER.
Can you install BIOS from USB? ›
Plug the USB flash drive into the computer that you want to flash the BIOS to. Turn that computer on and enter the boot menu by tapping the F12 key at the Splash screen as the computer starts up. Under OTHER OPTIONS, select BIOS Flash Update.
How do I create a bootable Rufus drive? ›Step 1: Open up Rufus and plug your clean USB stick into your computer. Step 2: Rufus will automatically detect your USB. Click on Device and choose the USB you want to use from the drop-down menu. Step 3: Make sure the Boot Selection option is set to Disk or ISO image then click Select.
How do I create a bootable operating system? ›- Open the program with a double-click.
- Select your USB drive in “Device”
- Select “Create a bootable disk using” and the option “ISO Image”
- Right-click on the CD-ROM symbol and select the ISO file.
- Under “New volume label”, you can enter whatever name you like for your USB drive.
Navigate to https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download and click the version of Windows you wish to install. Under "Create Windows version installation media", click to download the tool, and then run the tool. The tool will create a USB drive with the operating system you selected.
How do I know if Windows 7 is UEFI? ›Click the Search icon on the Taskbar and type in msinfo32 , then press Enter. System Information window will open. Click on the System Summary item. Then locate BIOS Mode and check the type of BIOS, Legacy or UEFI.
How do I know if Windows 7 is UEFI enabled? ›- Press Windows + R keys together to launch the Run box. Type MSInfo32 and hit Enter.
- On the right pane, find the "BIOS Mode". If your PC uses BIOS, it will display Legacy. If it is using UEFI so it will display UEFI.
- Access the BIOS Setup Utility. ...
- From the BIOS Main menu screen, select Boot.
- From the Boot screen, select UEFI/BIOS Boot Mode, and press Enter. ...
- Use the up and down arrows to select Legacy BIOS Boot Mode or UEFI Boot Mode, and then press Enter.
Open Command Prompt with administrator privileges. Issue the following command: mbr2gpt.exe /convert /allowfullOS. Shut down and boot into your BIOS. Change your settings to UEFI mode.
Does boot mode need to be on UEFI? ›By default, the boot mode is set to UEFI Mode. The system must boot in UEFI Mode to use certain options, including: Secure Boot, UEFI Optimized Boot, Generic USB Boot, IPv6 PXE Boot, iSCSI Boot, and Boot from URL.
Can Windows 10 boot UEFI? ›Windows 10 utilizes the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) to support the handoff of system control from the SoC firmware boot loader to the OS.
How do I know if my USB is UEFI bootable? ›
The key to finding out if the installation USB drive is UEFI bootable is to check whether the disk's partition style is GPT, as it's required for booting Windows system in UEFI mode.
How do I create a Windows 7 boot disk? ›- Open Control Panel.
- Go to Recovery.
- Click on Create a recovery drive.
- Click Next.
- Click Create a system repair disc with a CD or DVD instead to create the disc as a CD or DVD and not as a USB flash drive, at the “Connect a USB flash drive” screen.
Navigate to Boot Maintenance Manager -> Advanced Boot Options -> Boot Mode. Select the desired mode: UEFI or Legacy. If UEFI option was selected, a new option named Video BIOS appears, select UEFI. Press F10 then press Y to Save Changes and Exit, the system will save the changes and reboot.
Is Windows 10 BIOS or UEFI? ›Under the “System Summary” section, find the BIOS Mode. If it says BIOS or Legacy, then your device is using BIOS. If it reads UEFI, then you're running UEFI.
How do I boot UEFI with Rufus? ›- Download and execute Rufus.
- Create UEFI USB flash drive.
- Download and install.
- Create UEFI USB flash drive.
- Preparing the USB Stick.
- Copy Windows installation files to the USB flash drive.
- Update & Security settings in Windows 10. ...
- Advanced startup recovery options in Windows 10. ...
- Choosing to use a device to start the PC. ...
- Selecting the USB flash drive from which the PC should boot. ...
- Access the Recovery settings in Windows 11.
UEFI provides faster boot time. UEFI has discrete driver support, while BIOS has drive support stored in its ROM, so updating BIOS firmware is a bit difficult. UEFI offers security like "Secure Boot", which prevents the computer from booting from unauthorized/unsigned applications.
How do I boot from Legacy mode on USB? ›On the target PC set USB to be the first boot device in the boot order (in BIOS). Connect the prepared bootable USB drive to the target PC and boot from it. Press F5 during boot until the One-Time-Boot menu appears. Choose the USB HDD option from the list of bootable devices.
Is Legacy and UEFI same? ›UEFI or Unified Extensible Firmware Interface is a modern way of handling the boot process. UEFI is similar to Legacy, however, it stores the boot data in a . efi file rather than the firmware. You will often find UEFI boot mode in modern motherboards with very intuitive and user-friendly Interfaces.
How do I change from Legacy to UEFI without formatting? ›- Convert MBR boot disk to GPT without data loss. To convert the system disk from MBR to GPT, you can enter the WinRE environment and use the Windows inbuilt DiskPart command line. ...
- Convert Windows 10 from Legacy BIOS to UEFI.
Can all USB be made bootable? ›
Yes, all USB flash drives can be made bootable. However, its the computers BIOS the provides the ability to boot from them. With this approach you can say one can boot from a card of paper -- if only BIOS provides the ability to communicate with a scanner and chainload the result.
Can I make a bootable Windows 7 USB? ›Using Rufus, you can create a bootable Windows 7 USB that you can insert to clean install the operating system. But if you want to copy your exact Windows 7 to USB, including all the apps, games, and files, Rufus can't do that for you.
Can you make a bootable USB without formatting? ›Luckily, there is a free (free for personal use only) tool out there to help you create a bootable Windows 7/8/8.1 USB drive without destroying the data on the USB. The tool you need is the very popular EasyBCD, it's the same tool that we use to edit boot menu and change various boot settings.
Is booting from USB legacy or UEFI? ›the USB flash drive is bootable. the USB flash drive is prioritized in the Boot devices menu of your BIOS/UEFI panel. For more information, go to To access BIOS/UEFI. on certain computer models (mostly ultrabooks) with a fast boot option, you'll need to disable fast boot before you can boot from a USB.
Can you update BIOS without CPU? ›BIOS Flashback is a feature found on certain motherboards that lets you update the BIOS without requiring a CPU, GPU, or memory installed.
Does a USB need to be bootable to update BIOS? ›To update your BIOS via DOS, you will need a bootable USB. Creating one is easy enough. We're using Rufus, but you can use any of the options listed above. Rufus formats your USB into a FAT32 file format by default, targeting UEFI or DOS system types.
How do I change from Legacy to UEFI in Windows 7? ›Power on system. Press F2 when prompted to enter BIOS menu. Navigate to Boot Maintenance Manager -> Advanced Boot Options -> Boot Mode. Select the desired mode: UEFI or Legacy.
How do I install Windows 7 on a UEFI partition? ›Step 1: Make a Windows 7 installation media. Step 2: Back up the important files. Step 3: Change the legacy boot mode to UEFI boot mode and boot your computer from the Windows 7 installation media and install Windows 7 directly. Step 4: Make a bootable disk of MiniTool Partition Wizard.
How do I force Windows 7 to boot into BIOS? ›Restart your computer, press"F2" to enter BIOS, and press"Alt+F" to restore CMOS.
Can I change Legacy to UEFI? ›Navigate to Boot Maintenance Manager -> Advanced Boot Options -> Boot Mode. Select the desired mode: UEFI or Legacy. If UEFI option was selected, a new option named Video BIOS appears, select UEFI. Press F10 then press Y to Save Changes and Exit, the system will save the changes and reboot.
Can Windows 7 boot in Legacy mode? ›
To boot to Legacy devices or systems configured with Microsoft Windows 7 (32-bit or 64-bit) or Windows 10: Restart the PC and press F1 to enter Setup. For ThinkPad: Navigate to the RESTART menu. Select OS Optimized Defaults and change the value to Disabled.
Is UEFI and Legacy same? ›UEFI runs in 32-bit and 64-bit, allowing support for mouse and touch navigation. Legacy runs in 16-bit mode that only supports keyboard navigation. It allows a secure boot that prevents the loading of unauthorized applications. It may also hinder dual boot because it treats operating systems (OS) as applications.
Does Windows 7 use GPT or MBR? ›Windows 7 can be installed on both MBR and GPT disks. MBR uses the legacy BIOS while GPT uses UEFI. The maximum addressable space MBR partition supports is 2TB, while for a GPT disk, it reaches up to 18EB. Based on your hard drive space, you can choose either partition scheme for Windows 7.
How do I enable UEFI booting? ›...
Enabling or disabling UEFI Optimized Boot
- From the System Utilities screen, select System Configuration > BIOS/Platform Configuration (RBSU) > Boot Options > UEFI Optimized Boot.
- Select an option. ...
- Save your setting.
- Reboot the server.
With a Windows 7 installation, the GPT partition has to be removed and UEFI BIOS needs to be configured in a Legacy boot configuration.
Is Windows 7 BIOS or UEFI? ›Press the Windows + R keys to open the Windows Run dialog, type msinfo32.exe, and then press Enter to open System Infomation window. 2. In the right pane of System Summary, you should see the BIOS MODE line. If the value of BIOS MODE is UEFI, then Windows is booted in UEFI BIOS mode.
What is GPT boot mode? ›GPT is an abbreviation of GUID Partition Table, and is a newer standard that's slowly replacing MBR. Unlike an MBR partition table, GPT stores the data about how all the partitions are organized and how to boot the OS throughout the drive.
How do I get into BIOS without UEFI firmware settings? ›- Go to PC Settings, press the Windows + I key.
- On the left side, select General.
- Under the Advanced startup section, click Restart now.
- The computer will reboot into the advanced startup menu.
The F7 BIOS update option allows you to update the system BIOS during the boot process and before the operating system loads. Download and save the Recovery BIOS (.
What do you do if UEFI firmware settings are not available? ›- Verify That Your PC Is Equipped With UEFI. ...
- Bypass the Fast Startup Function. ...
- Create a Boot-to-UEFI Firmware Settings Desktop Shortcut. ...
- Change the BIOS From Legacy to UEFI by Converting MBR Disk to GPT Disk.