How to create a Windows 11 (or 10) bootable USB from macOS

To create a Windows 11 USB installer from macOS, you’ll have to download the official ISO file, format a USB flash drive using the “diskutil” tool, split the “install.wim” file with the “wimlib” tool, and transfer the files to the bootable USB drive.
Alternatively, you can also use the WinDiskWriter app, which makes it easier to create a Windows USB installer similar to the Rufus tool.

UPDATED 7/12/2024: If you have to install Windows 11 (or 10) on a computer but only have a Mac running Apple’s macOS, you can create a bootable USB flash drive using a non-Windows machine in the same way you can use a Windows computer to create a macOS bootable USB installer.

Although you have multiple methods to create an installation media for Windows 11, they are only available for Windows devices. However, it’s also possible to use macOS. The only issue is that the operating system only lets you format the USB storage using the FAT32 file system that can only store files less than 4GB when the “install.wim” file (containing the installation files) is usually larger than 4GB (usually 5.6GB). As a result, we have to resource third-party tools to split the image into two smaller files to complete the process.

In addition, you can also use WinDiskWriter, which is a third-party app available through GitHub as a free download and streamlines the USB flash drive creation to process to only a few clicks without the need to use the Terminal command console.

In this guide, I will outline the steps to create a bootable USB using macOS to install Windows 11 as well as Windows 10 using the macOS Terminal command console and the WinDiskWrinter app.

Create Windows 11 (or 10) bootable USB on macOS using Terminal
Create Windows 11 (or 10) bootable USB on macOS using WinDiskWriter

Create Windows 11 (or 10) bootable USB on macOS using Terminal

To create a bootable USB to clean install Windows 11 using macOS, use these steps:

Open the Windows 11 ISO download page.

Quick tip: You can download the Windows 10 ISO file from this Microsoft support website.
Choose the Windows 11 option under the “Download Windows 11 Disk Image (ISO) for x64 devices” setting.
Click the Download Now button.
Select the installation language.
Click the Confirm button.
Click the “64-bit Download” button to save the ISO file on your macOS device, more specifically in the “Downloads” folder.
Connect a USB flash drive of at least 8GB of storage.

Quick note: This process erases everything on the drive. As such, it’s recommended that any important data be backed up in the storage.
Open Launchpad.
Search for Terminal and click on the top result to open the command console.
Type the following command to identify the USB flash drive storage and press Return:
```
diskutil list
```
Quick note: In my case, the USB is identified as “disk4.”
Type the following command to clean and format the USB flash drive to make it bootable, and press Return:
```
diskutil eraseDisk MS-DOS "Windows_USB" MBR disk4
```
Quick tip: You can change “Windows_USB” to any name you want, but to avoid issues while running typing commands, make sure the name doesn’t include any space. I made that mistake and had to retype some of the commands because names with spaces have to be specified with quotation marks. Also, change “disk4” for the identifier of your USB flash drive.
Type the following command to open the “Downloads” folder where the ISO file is located and press Return:
```
cd Downloads
```
Type the following command to mount the Windows 11 ISO file to macOS and press Return:
```
hdiutil mount Win11_2xH2_English_x64vx.iso
```
Type the following command to transfer the installation files from the ISO file to the USB flash drive (excluding the install.wim file because it’s too large a FAT32 partition) and press Return:
```
rsync -avh --progress --exclude=sources/install.wim /Volumes/CCCOMA_X64FRE_EN-US_DV9/ /Volumes/Windows_USB
```
Type the following command to install the Homebrew tool on macOS and press Return:
```
/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"
```
Quick note: Homebrew is a package manager that will allow you to install the “wimlib” command tool to split the “install.wim” file and transfer it to the USB flash drive.
Confirm your macOS account password and press Return to continue.
Type the following command two commands to add Homebrew to your “PATH” and press Return on each line:
```
(echo; echo 'eval "$(/opt/homebrew/bin/brew sheval "$(/opt/homebrew/bin/brew shellenv)"ellenv)"') >> /Users/YOUR-ACCOUNT/.zprofile
eval "$(/opt/homebrew/bin/brew shellenv)"
```
In the command, update “YOUR-ACCOUNT” to match the name of your macOS account.
Type the following command to install the wimlib tool and press Return:
```
brew install wimlib
```
Type the following command to split the “install.wim” image and transfer the packages to the USB flash drive, and press Return:
```
wimlib-imagex split /Volumes/CCCOMA_X64FRE_EN-US_DV9/sources/install.wim /Volumes/Windows_USB/sources/install.swm 3500
```
Quick note: The “3500” number is the size in MiB of the file split. You can specify any number as long as it’s less than 4GB.

Once you complete the steps, you will end up with a bootable USB flash drive that you can connect to a computer to perform a clean install of the operating system.

Create Windows 11 (or 10) bootable USB on macOS using WinDiskWriter

To create a Windows 11 bootable USB with the WinDiskWriter tool, use these steps:

Open the Windows 11 ISO download page.

Quick tip: You can download the Windows 10 ISO file from this Microsoft support website.
Choose the Windows 11 option under the “Download Windows 11 Disk Image (ISO) for x64 devices” setting.
Click the Download Now button.
Select the installation language.
Click the Confirm button.
Click the “64-bit Download” button to save the ISO file on your macOS device, more specifically in the “Downloads” folder.
Connect a USB flash drive of at least 8GB of storage.

Quick note: This process erases everything on the drive. As such, it’s recommended that any important data be backed up in the storage.
Open the WinDiskWrinter download page.
Click the WinDiskWriter.x.x.zip option to download the file on your Mac.
Press the Control key + click the WinDiskWriter Zip file, and choose the Open option to extract the tool.
Press the Control key + click the extracted WinDiskWriter tool file, and choose the Open option.

Quick note: Since this is not an official app, you will receive the “WinDiskWriter.app can’t be opened because Apple cannot check it for malicious software” message, which is an expected behavior for this app.
Press the Control key + click the extracted WinDiskWriter tool file again, and choose the Open option.
Click the Open button.
Click the Choose button in the “Windows Image” setting.
Select the Windows 11 (or 10) ISO image.
Click the Open button.
(Optional) Check the “Patch Installer Requirements” option to install Windows on unsupported hardware.
(Optional) Check the “Install Legacy BIOS Boot Sector” option to install the operating system on a device without UEFI firmware. (This option will require to reopen the app.)
Click the Start button.
Click the Start button again.
Click the Allow button.

After you complete the steps, you will have a bootable USB flash drive to install the operating system.

Update July 12, 2024: This guide has been updated to ensure accuracy and reflect changes to the process.