If you have noticed, Mac OS X doesn’t support writing onto NTFS disks. But not to worry, you don’t have to install any third party drivers to enable this. Mountain Lion 10.8.3 already has native write support for the NTFS. OSX Mountain Lion does have built-in support for NTFS, and it can read and write. However, Apple does not enable it by default.
Here is what you should do:
- Uninstall other 3rd-party NTFS software, like Paragon, Tuxera or NTFS-3G.
- Edit /etc/fstab (you can do this with “sudo vi /etc/fstab”)
- Add the following line:
LABEL=”VOLUME_NAME_WITHOUT_QUOTES” none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse - Quit your editor
- Add the following line:
- Now, just unmount and re-mount the disk
- And we are done! You now have read-write support for this disk in OSX
Wait a minute, I don’t see my disk listed in the Finder window!
As of Mountain Lion, the “nobrowse” mount option is required for this to work. This means that the partition will not show up on your desktop. However, you can access it normally through Finder by doing the following:
- Open Terminal and type “open /Volumes/THE_NAME_OF_YOUR_VOLUME” (without the quotes)
- The Finder pops up automatically and you can see your disk listed there.
This implementation is definitely better than any 3rd party implementation available.
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Perpetual Enigma 
Wow, well done mate
Thanks Anil
The issue I am having is that the only file which exists is /etc/fstab.hd (/etc/fstab is non-existent). Additionally, the Volume I am concerned with has a space in the name “My Book.” So, I am confused which file I save the relevant line in and having difficulty troubleshooting it due to the fact the volume name is not supposed to have quotes. Do I use a slash (“\”) to indicate a space character?:
LABEL=”VOLUME_NAME_WITHOUT_QUOTES” none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
becomes
LABEL=”My\ Book” none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
or should it be (since according to your text it should be without quotes?:
LABEL=My\ Book none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
Sorry if this message could have been made more comprehensible. I wrote it as verbosely and concisely as possible.
Thank you ahead of time
Thank you very much! I finally got it to work well without any 3rd party software :-).
@That One: I noticed that \etc\fstab was missing as well, but I created a new file and that worked fine. To solve the problem with a space in the name you can replace the space with 40. I had the same problem, but with this solution it works.
LABEL=My40Book none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
All the best,
Arnoud Roeland
Thank you for this.
Hi, I had same problem also, and your solution not work for me. My disk name is “My Passport”, so my fstab file will look like this :
LABEL=My40Passport none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
Can help ? Thanks
Mountain Lion seems to have replaced fstab with vifs, hence why the file /etc/fstab doesn’t already exist. Creating /etc/fstab, or /private/etc/fstab, or using vifs to do it (beware of issues with Vim plugins though) should work though.
Once you remount your volume and access it through
open /Volume/BOOTCAMP
You can simply re-add it to your sidebar by using cmd+T or using the add to sidebar function in the file menu while your volume is open.
the cmd+T seems not to be persitent. I prefer to make a symlink in the Terminal by using the comand ln -s /Volumes/BOOTCAMP /Users/YourName/Desktop/BOOTCAMP
GRADIOS!!
Wait, I have a 500G external drive formatted for NTFS. I have always been able to copy files to it from my Mac…….???
Hi, thanks for sharing this tip however please forgive my noob question:
what exactly is the command you used to mount the disk?
I’ve tried:
sudo mount -w -t ntfs /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/mydisk
but this still mounts my drive read only
thanks for any help
I’ve also tried using Disk Utility and same, can only mount read only
Add the following line to /etc/fstab:
LABEL=myDisk none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
Then, just try the following from your command line:
>> open /Volumes/mydisk
sudo mount -oremount,rw -t ntfs /Volumes/somediskname
Rather than the open command, or having to manually browse, do the following:
1) Open Finder
2) Click on the “Go” menu
3) Choose “Go to Folder”
4) Type in “/Volumes” and press OK
5) Press Control-T or drag “Volumes” to the Sidebar (Favorites)
Now “Volumes” is always listed there. Anytime you mount a volume you can just click there to get to it without adding things over and over.
So what do you do if you have more than one external drive you utilize? Can we concatenate this to one line in fstab or do we need separate lines for each drive?
I have tried, but nothing changed, i still cant write my NTFS hard drive.
Any suggestion? I am using osx 10.8.4 and both fstab and vfis dont exist, I have to create new file.
Sorry but It doesn´t work for me on 10.8.4, the ntfs drive remains read-only
any suggestion ?
also did not work here.
Same here. 10.8.4 and I’m unable to cpy file to it. When I connect my ex drive it pops up in finder, but I don’t see on desktop.
Is the volume called Untitled? (Perhaps you didn’t use a usb with Boot Camp Support Software?) That means the true name is an empty string, which seems to be problematic. Change it in Windows to something else.
It works on 10.8.4! Try to remove a space in volume name.
Or check the volume name registry – first time I have tried to make this trick, my text editor was changed the volume name to uppercase (was Store, editor turn it to STORE – you need to return Store).
hi, using mountain lion and am a complete noob, can someone please explain the first step and where i enter this bit here :Edit /etc/fstab (you can do this with “sudo vi /etc/fstab”
please help? thanks
Vi is not for noobs, use nano instead. Run the application Terminal.app, write sudo nano /etc/fstab, enter your password, enter the line (LABEL=…), save (Ctrl-O), exit nano (Ctrl-X). Reboot. Oh and to find out the name of your volume you can, for example, check in disk utility, the name is probably BOOTCAMP.
No worky. Tried lots of times and ways. 10.8. Eventually used
No worky. Tried lots of times and ways. 10.8. Eventually used Paragon trial. Worked, despite having a scarily old website.
My external drive had been named as “My Book”;and I used
LABEL=My40Book none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
The disk still appears as read.Its NTFS.Any ideas pls???
It’s work… thanks
I don’t believe this method works in Mac OS X 10.8.4 anymore. The only luck I have had was to use FUSE for OSX and NTFS-3G. See: https://github.com/osxfuse/osxfuse/wiki/NTFS-3G
Works just fine on 10.8.4.
The only issue is that the disk does not appear in the finder, but mounts correctly. So you have to access it in fined with “Go > Folder”.
The disk still appeared as Read-Only for me. I was accessing it via the Terminal after re-mounting the volume. Perhaps it’s related to the type of disk / manufacturer / etc.? Either way – I’m going to use FUSE for OSX & NTFS-3G — if only for the consistent experience within Finder.
Make sure you reall yare editing “/etc/fstab” and not “/etc/fstab.hd”, also do not use quotes and make sure that you spelled the disk name right with correct capitalization. If all this is ok, you should be alright.
It was not working for me as well for 10.8.4. But once I changed the name from two words to one word. It picked it without any problem.
Thank you.
works great on 10.8.0, thanks
I’ve created an /etc/fstab file and when I run the mount -a command, it’s giving me an error about the mount point: “mount: realpath /dev/none: No such file or directory”. So if I edit /etc/fstab to make the second parameter disk1s1 (instead of “none”), then I get an error from mount_ntfs: “mount_ntfs: /dev/disk1s1: not a directory”.
Any ideas? I’m running 10.8.3. Thanks in advance.
Try My40Book instead of My40Book.
Try “My40Book” Instead of My40Book
Try M y \ 0 4 0 B o o k (no spaces)
This method finally worked for my WD with label Matts Passport. My /etc/fstab file now has:
LABEL=Matts40Passport none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
and as mentioned above the disk now doesn’t appear in Finder so I use Go > Go to Folder… then type “/Volumes/Matts Passport” without the quotes and he presto I can write to my NTFS disk!
Oops! the \ 0 4 0 (without spaces) got stripped out. So it should read:
‘LABEL=Matts40Passport none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse’
Without the single quotes.
Can someone explain the /etc/fstab entry?
Specifically, I need to better understand the second parameter “none” in the entry:
LABEL=”VOLUME_NAME_WITHOUT_QUOTES” none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
I’ve done the substitution for Volume_Name and that appears to be a non-issue (I removed spaces from my device’s name). But I get an error about not finding “none”.
Any suggestions/advice would be greatly appreciated.
Just for those who tried to connect to a Western Digital Elements disk: first connect it to a windows machine to see the drive label is “Elements” and possibly change this.
Then the line in /etc/fstab should be
LABEL=Elements none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
If you connect it in OSX, it shows as “My Passport” and all the suggestions mentioned above simply wont work. (I tried with underscores/40, 040 etc as spacer and with and without quotes, rebooting/mounting etc etc very frustrating!!!)
hope this helps…
Hello, how eject the ntfs volume for safely remove ?
works for me! OS X 10.8.4 (12E55) @ max mini ( Late 2013 2.4 Ghz Intel Core i7)
Great! I was tired of loading bootcamp and copying from Windows XP using HFSExplorer. This is much faster. (using Mountain Lion 10.8.4)
I used to boot into bootcamp (XP) and use HFSExplorer to copy to an external NTFS drive.
This works great and is much faster! (tried with Mountain Lion 10.8.4)
hi, i’m on a new macbook air with 10.8.4 and i’m trying to add ntfs write support to the “built in” BOOTCAMP drive. it all works fine, except that the drive is nowhere to be found after a reboot. not in /volumes, directly from terminal “open /volumes/BOOTCAMP” and not under the startup disks in system preferences. after going back and deleting the LABEL=BOOTCAMP line from fstab the bootcamp drive re-appeared (as expected)
anyone has an idea what it could be?
worked like a charm ! Thanks a lot !
I had this working. For what ever reason the drive is now only seen read-only. Anyone have any ideas? I have unmounted and mounted many times. The only thing I can think of is that attaching the drive to a Windows 7 machine somehow touched a file that is now locking it read-only. Very frustrating.
10.8.4 SPLENDID & SIMPLE !!
My HD was in 3 partitions. Renamed each of them to remove the spaces.
So now my 3 names were coredrive, designdrive, personaldrive
Opened: Terminal
In Terminal: Changed to a directory of my choice
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “sudo nano fstab”
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “LABEL=coredrive none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse”
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “LABEL=personaldrive none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse”
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “LABEL=designdrive none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse”
In Terminal: Pressed ctrl+O to save, and entered filename(without quotes) “fstab”
In Terminal: Pressed ctrl+X to exit
Closed Terminal.
Copied created file
Opened Finder, In “Go” section of the menu selected Go to folder and eneterd “/etc”
Pasted File
Plugged in the Drive
Opened Finder, In “Go” section of the menu selected Go to folder and eneterd “/VOLUMES”
Dragged and Dropped my HD icons into the sidebar.
DONE!
10.8.4 SPLENDID & SIMPLE !!
My HD was in 3 partitions. Renamed each of them to remove the spaces.
So now my 3 names were coredrive, designdrive, personaldrive
Opened: Terminal
In Terminal: Changed to a directory of my choice
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “sudo nano fstab”
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “LABEL=coredrive none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse”
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “LABEL=personaldrive none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse”
In Terminal: Typed (without quotes) “LABEL=designdrive none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse”
In Terminal: Pressed ctrl+O to save, and entered filename(without quotes) “fstab”
In Terminal: Pressed ctrl+X to exit
Closed Terminal.
Copied created file
Opened Finder, In “Go” section of the menu selected Go to folder and eneterd “/etc”
Pasted File
Plugged in the Drive
Opened Finder, In “Go” section of the menu selected Go to folder and eneterd “/VOLUMES”
Dragged and Dropped my HD icons into the sidebar.
DONE!
Sounds awesome but not working for me on 10.8.5… the drive label in Finder is “Iomega HDD”, so I created fstab and tried this:
LABEL=Iomega40HDD none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
…but no joy, it just re-appears in finder and is still read only. So I tried this:
LABEL=IomegaHDD none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
and that didn’t work only…
Any other suggestions welcome!
I am a newbie to Mac, and have encountered this trouble (copy file to NTFS formatted external drive). I am using OS X 10.8.5. After reading all the comments above, I still cannot get it work. One thing not clear is that how to remount the drive again. I’ve tried many alternatives, all are failed. Finally, I am able to get it work by installing the following software:
NTFS-FREE: http://sourceforge.net/projects/ntfsfree/?source=pdlp
hey linc
unmount & mount means plugging your HD out of ur mac & plugging it back
Thats it!
if the label approach is not working for you and if you’re looking for a way to have the convenient access from Finder’s sidebar you could try a similar approach written here http://www.nachtfische.de/archives/5
you know what they can do in the new OS Mavericks? The file /etc/fstab file is called /etc/fstab.hd and can not be edited.
Dont working in Mavericks…
This trick died on Mavericks 😦
Im on Mavericks and this trick works Great! Thanks so much! 😀 anyway I have an idea for everyone… Istead LABEL=ECCECC you can try to use the UUID of your hdd!
UUID=NUMER none ntfs eccecc
Use utility disk to see your UUID 😉 try it! Hope work
hii
I am on mevrick… and i am a newbie to MAC
I tried the trick. Its working partially as i have a EHDD with 2 NTFS partitions
so What i wrote is
LABEL=Ma$ti none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
LABEL=Untitled none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
but what i see is 1st volume i.e. Ma$ti is working fine but no change with 2nd volume
2ndly when i removed 1st line.. still i cant see the 2nd volume working with write permissions…
3rdly i could not find UUID in Disk Utility…
Please Help me
hi guys,
It worked for me, I’m on 10.8.5.
mount & unmount in the sense, Just plug & unplug your HD from the SLOT.
so far as the /etc/fstab is concerned just use
sudo vi /etc/fstab and place the above entry like this
LABLE=Marlakunta none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse
save the file, unplug the HD & PLUG it back.
go to the finder, you will discover that the HD is in Read write mode.
Btw, i downloaded Mavericks, how do you feel about this new OS?
Thanks
Sai
Totally worked. I used the UUID=number format as I couldn’t get the LABEL=/Volume/Name Of Volume to work. Thank you
The first option worked for me on Mac 10.8.5 ,thanks much
What can be done for an elegant solution in MacOS Leopard?
Why is this “definitely better than any 3rd party implementation available”?
Apple knows Apple products better than anyone else. You don’t have to let a 3rd party mess around with your machine. Hence the statement!
Sir Prateek Joshi
after i did as you said, then my dual bootcamp window 7 can’t load anymore.
please help me everyone…