One of the advantages offered by Macs is the possibility of not only accessing the macOS system, but also having Windows installed on a partition thanks to Boot Camp. But what happens when you want to delete that partition? It’s possible? Well yes, it is and in this article we will tell you how you can erase it.
If you just want macOS to start
If your position is that you want to always start the Mac, but that it does not start automatically in Windows, you will not need to delete it. In fact you can continue to have it available for when you need it and the rest of the time use macOS as normal. All you have to do is change the computer’s startup disk .
For this purpose, you must be logged in to a macOS user who is also an administrator. Then you must open System Preferences and go to Startup Disk. Once here you must click on the padlock at the bottom to obtain permissions, for which you will be asked for the administrator password. Once this is done, you will only have to select the disk that contains macOS so that every time you turn on the Mac, this is the operating system that appears.
When you want to start Windows you will only have to press the ‘Alt / Option’ key when you turn on the Mac. At that moment you will see a black screen with the available boot disks and this is where you must choose the Boot Camp with Windows to be start the Microsoft operating system.
Remove Windows 10 from Mac completely
Having a partition with another operating system can offer many advantages that you probably already know, but it also brings disadvantages such as the space it occupies. If this is the case of your partition with Windows, which you also do not take advantage of, you can erase it completely to free up that space. Of course, we recommend previously making a backup of Windows using the methods that this system offers, so that you can recover your data and files in the future if you decide to reinstall it.
The steps to follow later to erase the Boot Camp partition from the Mac are as follows:
- Start your computer in macOS.
- Close all the applications and windows that you have open and if you have external storage devices, disconnect them.
- Open Boot Camp Assistant.
- Click on “Continue”.
- If you have a single disk you must click on “Restore” when the option to delete Windows 10 appears. If you have several disks you must first select the disk that contains this operating system and then click on “Restore the disk to a single partition with macOS”.
- Click on “Continue”.
If you wish, there is another option to delete Windows using the classic method to delete partitions from a disk on Mac. You can do this from macOS itself or by restarting the Mac, we recommend the second.
- With the Mac off, press the power button and instantly hold down the Command + R keys.
- Release the keys when you see the Apple logo appear on the screen or a spinning globe.
- When macOS Utilities appears, click on “Disk Utility”.
- In the menu bar go to View> Show all devices in the menu bar.
- Select the Boot Camp disk that contains Windows 10.
- Click on “Delete” and choose the name, format and scheme that you want to give to this partition.
If after this you want to completely delete the partition and make it add to the one you have with macOS, you must follow these steps and after having formatted the Windows partition you can go to “Create partition”, click on it in the scheme that appears and click on the “-” button to join the other.
Goodbye to Windows forever on the Mac?
Many things in life have turned back and this is one of them. Just because you delete a Windows partition from your Mac doesn’t mean that you can’t get it back later. If you made a backup copy of this operating system as we mentioned in previous sections, you can even have it the same way you had it. If this is not the case or you want to have the system completely from scratch, you can at any time follow the steps that we indicate in the tutorial in which we indicate how to install Windows 10 on a Mac.