How to Fix USB Drives not showing up in Windows 10 [7 Ways for 2021]  

How to Fix USB Drives not showing up in Windows 10 [7 Ways for 2021]

Updated on Nov 11, 2023 | by Jeremy

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There are many reasons cause USB drives not showing up in Windows 10. You can try to update or reinstall the USB drivers, solve drive letter conflict, format USB drive, etc. No matter what way you're going to try, the most important thing is preventing data in the USB drive losing. You can try Qiling USB flash drive data recovery software to retrieve the important files, saving them on your computer. You can download the software by clicking the download button.

One common issue that is associated with external storage devices is USB drives not showing up in Windows 10. It is caused by various reasons. The causes of the issues will usually determine the specific solutions that will work to resolve them. Your USB drive may show up in Disk Management but not in Windows File Explorer and sometimes, it may be missing from both places. The symptoms determine the solutions are useful or not.

How to check whether your USB drive appears in Disk Management or not?

To check if your external drive is showing in Disk Management, navigate to "This PC" and then to "Manage" and "Disk Management". From here, you can check whether the USB drive is seen or not. If you can't see your USB drive in Disk Management, you don't have to worry. We will look at the various solutions to the different issues that are associated with USB won't show up on Windows 10.

Part 1: Fix USB Drives Not Showing up in Windows in File Explorer but in Disk Management

If you can see your USB drive in Disk Management, it can still be detected by Windows but for some reason, it is not showing up in File Explorer. Some reasons that may be responsible for this include file system errors, drive letter conflicts, or USB driver issues. We will look at the different solutions that apply to some of the issues of USB stick not showing up Windows 10.

Solution 1: Update USB Drive

If something is wrong with the USB drive, it may not show up in File Explorer. In this case, you may need to update the USB drive.

Solution 2: Reinstall Disk Driver

Another solution to resolving the question of why is my USB not showing up Windows 10 is to reinstall the disk driver.

Solution 3: Recover USB Data

If you are unable to resolve the issue with the USB flash drive now showing up in Windows 10 with the two solutions provided, you can recover data from the flash drive, preventing any risk for data losing from the USB drive. We recommend the Deep Data Recovery tool to get the recovery done.

Deep Data Recovery is a professional and advanced recovery software designed to help users recover files from USB after deleting, formatting, display as RAW, and more. It works effectively to recover any type of data without jeopardizing the safety of your data.

Guide on How to Recover Data from the USB Drive that is not showing up in Windows 10

Step 1. Download the Deep data recovery software for Mac or Windows from the official website and launch the app. All file types are selected by default. You can deselect everything and select the specific file types that you need to recover. Click "Next" to start the USB file recovery process.

Step 2. Select the USB drive that you want to recover data from in the next window and click "Scan".

Step 3. Preview the list of files and folders found and select the files and folder that you want to recover. Click "Recover" to recover the USB data.

If you need to find more files, you can use the "Deep Scan" feature to search for more data. However, you should know that this may take a longer time to complete.

Solution 4: Change Letter Conflicts

You will be unable to see your USB drive in Windows File Explorer if it shares the same drive letter with the computer hard disk partition. To resolve this issue of Windows 10 not showing USB, you have to assign another drive letter to the USB drive. To do this, follow the steps below:

Solution 5: Format USB Drive to Fix System Error (RAW Drive)

If your USB hard drive not showing up on Windows 10, it may be that the file system has errors. If this is the case, the device will show up as a RAW drive and the device will not be accessible. To repair the drive, you have to format the drive so you can convert the RAW drive to FAT32 or NTFS and assign a new file system to the device. However, this will lead to a total loss of data. To recover data from RAW USB drive, you should use Qiling file recovery software. After recovering the data, you can format the USB hard drive and convert the file system to any Windows-compatible file system like NTFS. To do this, follow the steps below:

Part 2: Fix USB Drive not showing up in Windows 10 File Explorer Nor Disk Management

Solution 1: Try Another USB Slot to Make Sure it is not Problem of USB Slot

Problems with the USB port can also make your USB hard drive inaccessible. Therefore, you should check the USB connection and move it around a bit. There are multiple USB ports on a PC. It is recommended that you try other ports to see if the USB will be detected.

Solution 2: Ask for Help from the Retailer

If after using all the solutions provided in this manual, the problem of the USB hard drives not showing up on Windows 10 persists, it may be that the USB hard drive is damaged or corrupt. If this is the case, you will need to seek the help of a retailer for manual repair.

This article detailed everything you need to know about resolving the issue of a USB memory stick not showing up in Windows 10. Once again, you need to pay more attention to your important files trapped in the USB drive, preventing them from losing.

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