You may find your WD My Passport for Mac not showing up on Mac after a month or two of use. This means you can’t access the files on your WD My Passport for Mac hard drive, which can be a problem.
So how can you make My Passport for Mac appear on the Desktop, Finder, or in Disk Utility? We have the answers
Basic checks before fixing WD My Passport for Mac not showing up
Before proceeding, do the following basic checks.
1. Check to see if the file system of your WD My Passport for Mac was reformatted to APFS. APFS can’t be recognized on macOS 10.12 and before.
2. Safely disconnect the My Passport for Mac and reconnect it to the USB port slowly. This sometimes works.
3. Check whether the USB cable or USB port is broken by connecting other hard drives to this USB port or cable and see if that makes a difference.
4. Reboot your Mac to see if your My Passport for Mac drive is showing up in Disk Utility/Finder or not.
5. Connect the My Passport for Mac to another Mac or Windows PC to see if it works normally.
If the My Passport for Mac still doesn’t appear on Mac after the basic checks, go ahead to try out the solutions as below to fix it.
Five ways to fix WD My Passport for Mac not showing up on Mac
Solution 1: Modify Finder Preferences
If you’ve incorrectly set your Finder Preferences, it can result in the WD My Passport for Mac not showing up in the Finder or on the Desktop. Follow the guide below to reset Finder Preferences:
1. Go to Finder > Preferences > General tab.
2. Select the “External disks” to show My Passport for Mac on the desktop.
3.Go to the Sidebar tab, tick “External disks” under “Locations”.
4. Go to Desktop or Finder and check if your WD My Passport for Mac is showing up.
Solution 2: Force Mount the WD hard drive
Sometimes you’ll see the WD My Passport for Mac drive not mounting in Disk Utility. That’s because hard drives may not be automatically mounted in Disk Utility. To manually mount the hard drive, do the following:
1. Go to Finder>Applications>Utilities>Disk Utility.
2. Click Show All Devices in View option at the left corner of Disk Utility.
3. Select your My Passport for Mac drive from the left sidebar and click the Mount button on the top of the Disk Utility window.
Solution 3: Run First Aid in Disk Utility
If you can’t force mount the WD My Passport for Mac, there could be some file system problems in this drive. Try First Aid in Disk Utility to repair your disk and enable WD drive to show up:
1. Go to Launchpad > Other Folder > Disk Utility.
2. Select the WD hard drive.
3. Click First Aid on the top of the Disk Utility window and then click Run.
Solution 4: Recover data and erase the drive
If running First Aid fails to fix your WD hard drive, the last resort is to reformat the hard drive. However, reformatting will erase all data on this drive. Hence, you should recover data from unmounted hard drive first by using software provided by a third-party developer, like iBoysoft.
Now, follow the below steps to erase your drive:
1. Go to Finder > Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.
2. Select the WD My Passport for Mac drive in the left sidebar.
3. Click Erase on the top of the Disk Utility window.
4. Complete the information for your WD drive and click Erase. You’d better erase it to Mac OS Extended – the default file system for most WD My Passport for Mac.
Bonus tips to maintain WD My Passport for Mac
As mentioned, either broken hardware components or a corrupted file system can lead to WD My Passport for Mac not showing up on Mac. Thus, to make your WD My Passport for Mac last longer, try these neat tricks:
1. Keep the WD My Passport for Mac away from water or fire to avoid physical damage.
2. Eject the WD My Passport for Mac drive safely.
3. Don’t install unknown programs that may contain viruses on your WD drive.
Verdict
I hope all the above-mentioned solutions have fixed the WD My Passport for Mac not showing up on Mac issue for you. And it’s worth mentioning again that if you have to reformat the drive, remember to recover files from your My Passport for Mac drive first with the help of professional data recovery developer like iBoysoft. You are also welcome to leave a message below to share your thoughts on how to fix hard drive not showing up on Mac.
