Sometimes you may experience a problem with Disk Management in that all the options for a drive are greyed out. This renders them unusable and unable to be properly managed.

Why are the options greyed out in Disk Management?

Before going into the fixes, it’s important to understand what causes options to get greyed out. That way, you’ll know exactly what to do if it happens again.

Your computer’s data is corrupt – Corruption on your system can either be found in the system files or disk drive. Either way, you should run a clean-up scan to clear it up. The disk drive hasn’t been properly formatted – Disk drives that aren’t properly formatted can result in capability errors. You can format the drive using DiskPart via the Command Prompt. Your machine is infected with malware – Drives that can be formatted correctly are usually victims of a computer virus. Be sure to download some antivirus software to clean it up.

How can I fix greyed-out options in Disk Management?

Before going into the more complicated solutions, there are a handful of quick fixes that you should try out:

We recommend restarting your computer as the first thing you should do. A simple reboot is often all you need to fix Windows 11 errors. As stated earlier, run a clean-up scan on your computer like an SFC/DISM scan via Command Prompt. Doing so will also repair any messed-up files on your drive. Run the Hardware and Devices troubleshooter, which you can find in the Settings menu. You also have multiple options for configuring the tool, like having it run automatically. Use some disk management software to maintain your hard drive’s partitions. You have multiple apps to choose from, like AOMEI, Paragon, and MiniTool. And before you do anything else, it’s recommended that you create a recovery disk, also known as a recovery drive, to restore your computer’s settings to a previous state in case you want a do-over.

1. Expand volume via DiskPart

If the Extend Volume option in the Disk Management context menu is greyed out, this solution works best for that error.

2. Reformat partition vis DiskPart

You should do this solution if the Format option is greyed out in Disk Management. SPONSORED

3. Perform Startup Repair

4. Change partition style

5. Run the repair disk command

How can I recover unallocated disk partitions?

Like the greyed-out options, unallocated partitions can be caused by malware and corrupt files, although running an SFC scan will not work. Instead, you must go into the Disk Management tool and format the partition or use third-party software like AOMEI Partition Assistant. While we have you, we recommend learning how to perform a dual boot-up on separate hard drives. Doing so will allow you to boot two operating systems on a single computer simultaneously. This is particularly useful if you need to work on separate systems but don’t have an extra computer. The process is pretty involved as it will require you to set a new partition for the new OS. Feel free to comment below if you have questions about other partition tools. And please tell us if there’s a specific guide for any native Windows 11 software you’d like to see.

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