Fix 'File Too Large' Error: Bypass 4GB Limitation on FAT32

FAT32 is a file system used to organize data on disk drives such as USB flash drives, SD cards, microSD cards, etc. It's an advanced version of the FAT file system with more efficient space allocation. However, it is now losing its edge due to file size limitations. While the maximum partition size for FAT32 is 2TB (32GB for Windows), the file size limit for a single file is 4GB (actually smaller), which means you can't transfer files larger than 4GB to a FAT32 device.

(See the error "The File is Too Large for Destination File System")

1. Plug your USB flash drive into a Windows PC.
2. Open the File Explorer.
3. Right-click on your disk drive and select Properties. It will show you the file system the selected drive is using.

Note that the file size limit of FAT32 cannot be changed, so we need to look for workarounds.

The primary solution is to change FAT32 to larger file systems like NTFS or exFAT to bypass the 4GB file size limit. But if the new file system is not compatible with your device, you can compress or split large files into smaller files (less than 4GB) for storage on a FAT32 drive. Let's see the details of each method.

Here is a brief overview of FAT32, exFAT, and NTFS to help you decide which file system is best for your needs (and check if your device supports the file system you choose):

1️⃣ Reformat FAT32 on Windows using File Explorer:

Important: This method will delete everything in your drive, so back up your files first. This conversion cannot be reversed.

Step 1: On Windows, right-click your FAT32 disk drive and select Format option.

Step 2: Select NTFS or exFAT in the File system drop-down box.

Step 3: Click Start.

2️⃣ Change FAT32 to NTFS using CMD

This method is recommended if you don't want to erase data from your drive.

Step 1: Type in "CMD" in your Windows search bar. Right-click Command Prompt and run it as administrator.

Step 2: In the Command Prompt, type convert drive letter: /fs:ntfs. Then press Enter.

🔔 Replace drive letter with your actual drive letter. For example, if you want to convert your D drive to NTFS, you can type convert D: /fs:ntfs.

3️⃣ Reformat FAT32 to exFAT on Mac using Disk Utility:

Important: This method will delete everything in your drive. So back up your files first.

Step 1: On Mac, launch Disk Utility.

Step 2: Select the drive you want to reformat, then click the Erase button at the top.

Step 3: Give a name to the drive and then select exFAT from the Format drop-down options. Then you can choose a partition scheme or leave it as default.

Step 4: Click Erase.

If your device only supports FAT32, then you have only one option, which is to reduce the file size below 4GB.

For video files, it's recommended that you use a video compressor. This way, you can still play the compressed video files directly on your device.

We can easily handle the video compression using a free video compressor like WonderFox Free HD Video Converter Factory. Without further ado, let's download download this software to convert a video file.

Step 1: Launch the software and select the Converter.

Step 2: Click Add Files or the center + button to import a video file into the conversion list.

Step 3: Click the format image on the right to expand the output format list. Then, go to the Video section and select your preferred video format.

💡 It's recommended that you choose H264, which is a universal video format and very efficient. If your device supports the HEVC/H265 codec, you can select H265 for MP4 or H265 for MKV, which can significantly reduce file size while maintaining high quality.

Step 4: After selecting the output format, you can see the estimated output file size on the right side of the video. If the size is less than 4GB, you can hit the Run button to start the compression immediately (you won't lose much quality this way).

Otherwise, you need open Parameter settings and change the video resolution, bitrate, and frame rate to a lower value to further shrink the video size.

💡 Click the information icon ⓘ in the video task to see the original video parameters.

Step 5: When you get the desired output file size, click the ▼ button at the bottom to set the output folder and press Run to start the process.

👉 If you have multiple video files, you can upgrade the program to the Pro version and use the batch compression button to batch compress the files at once.

For large document files, software, games, etc., you can use file archivers to split them into multiple small chunks and then transfer them to your FAT32 device. Free file archivers like WinRAR and 7-Zip can compress and split large files into several small files effectively.

Steps to Use WinRAR:

Step 1: Download the latest version of WinRAR to your computer.

Step 2: Right-click on the large file you wish to split and select Add to archive.

Step 3: In the new window, set the archive format as RAR and then choose a compression method. Next, in the "Split to volumes, size" section, set the size you want to split the file into. For example, you can split the file into 2 GB chunks.

Step 4: Click OK to start the splitting process. The split files should be able to be moved to your FAT32 drive without a problem.

Steps to Use 7-zip:

Step 1: Download and install the latest version of 7-Zip.

Step 2: Right-click the large file you wish to split and select 7-Zip > Add to archive.

Step 3: In the popup window, choose the Archive format as zip. Then in the Split to volumes, bytes section, enter a size you want or choose a size from the drop-down options. In the test, we entered 1G as the split size.

Step 4: Now, click OK to begin the compression and splitting process.

After the splitting, you should have no problems transferring the files to your USB flash drive.

We've just covered three ways to overcome the size limitations of FAT32. In short, you can convert FAT32 to NTFS or exFAT to bypass the FAT32 maximum file size limit. But if you can't convert the file system, then the only way is to reduce the file size. You can use a file archiver for all your files. But if you want to play video files directly, it is recommended that you compress these videos instead of splitting them into unplayable RAR files.

That's all I want to share. I hope this article is helpful to you. Thanks for reading. Have a wonderful day!

The FAT32 file system uses a 32-bit field to store file size in bytes. 2^32 bytes is approximately 4 GB (4 GB minus 1 byte to be precise). Therefore the largest file on FAT32 cannot exceed 4GB.

Choose exFAT if you need to use the drive frequently between Mac and Windows, and NTFS if you only need it on Windows and require greater stability. Also, ensure that your devices support the chosen format.

Open File Explorer on Windows. Next, right-click on the FAT32 drive and select the Format option. In the pop-up window, change the file system from FAT32 to exFAT. Then click Start.

With the above three methods, you can copy files larger than 4GB to FAT32 without any problem.