[How-to Collections] Windows 11 BitLocker: Everything You Need to Know

About Bitlocker

BitLocker is a method to secure your data by encrypting everything on your hard drive. This stops unauthorized access, like from malware or if your device is lost. It uses a strong encryption method called AES with either 128-bit or 256-bit keys. You can encrypt the whole drive or just the used parts. If your computer has TPM 1.2 or a higher version, your data is even better protected. To unlock or decrypt the encrypted part, you need a BitLocker password or Recovery Key.

Does Windows 11 have BitLokcer? As of now, the Windows 11 Pro and higher Edition are equipped with this utility, while Windows 11 Home Edition does not. If you want to keep your data safe, the bonus reading part in this passage shares a way for you. More information about Windows 11 BitLocker will be introduced in this "How-to" collection. Let's read it together.

Common Windows 11 BitLocker issues troubleshooting guide

Based on the most frequently searched issues related to Windows 11 BitLocker, we have compiled a list of prevalent problems that users are most concerned about. In this section, you will learn how to enable, resize, and unlock a BitLocker partition on Windows 11. If your Windows 11 version does not support BitLocker, the provided tips will also be helpful.

1. How to enable BitLocker Windows 11

▌Case 1. Enable Windows 11 Home BitLocker 

If you're a Windows 11 Home user hoping to enable BitLocker without spending at least $99 for upgrading to the Pro or Enterprise edition, here's a helpful workaround. AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional offers a BitLocker function for Windows Home users, allowing them to easily access the magic encryption feature.

It not only allows Home users to enable this function, but also supports effective BitLocker management for higher edition users, such as backup recovery key, unlock, turn off, or change the BitLocker password. You can free download the demo version to have a try for Windows 11 Home BitLocker.

Step 1. Install and launch AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. Go to the "Tools" section and select "BitLocker."

Step 2. Choose the drive partition you want to encrypt and click on "Turn on BitLocker."

Step 3. Generate a password, confirm it, and click "Next" to continue.

Step 4. Determine how to backup your recovery key by either selecting "Save to a file" or "Print the recovery key." Then, proceed by clicking Next to initiate the encryption procedure.

▌Case 2. Enable Windows 11 BitLocker in Pro or higher edition

To enable BitLocker in Windows 11 Pro or higher edition, we can configure them all in the “Settings” program. Once you enable BitLocker Windows 11, please keep the password in mind. You will be asked for authentication if you need to disable it or make any changes. You can also disable BitLocker on Windows 11 in Settings.

Step 1. Enter “Settings” and click “Storage”. Under the “Storage management” menu, select the “Advanced storage settings” option.

Step 2. Choose the volume to enable BitLocker. Click “Properties”.

Step 3. Choose “Turn on BitLocker” and set the password.

Step 4. You can choose an option to back up the recovery key like choosing “Sava to your Microsoft account”.

Step 5. Select the “Next” button. In the next interface, tick “Encrypt used disk space only”.

Step 6. After choosing “Next”, check the “New encryption mode” option to continue.

Step 7. You can choose check “Run BitLocker system check” option or not according to your own needs.

Step 8. Then, hit the “Restart now” button to finish all the processes. Now, you have successfully enable Windows 11 BitLocker.

2. How to resize Windows 11 BitLocker partition

We've noticed that some Windows 11 BitLocker users are facing an issue. When trying to use free space from a BitLocker-encrypted partition to extend another drive, resizing encounters restrictions if the partition isn't decrypted.

In such cases, it's best to decrypt the partition before resizing. Here is how to unlock BitLocker Windows 11 and resize it easily.

▌Case 1. Unlock BitLocker Windows 11 via Settings
Step 1. Enter “Settings” and input “encryption” in the search box, and then click “Manage BitLocker” option.

Step 2. When the window pops up, select the “Turn off BitLocker” button.

Step 3. Choose “Turn off BitLocker” to confirm the operation. Now, the drive is unlocked.

▌Case 2. Resize Windows 11 BitLocker partition

Upon unlocking, resizing your hard drive becomes the next step. While online searches might share ways to resize BitLocker partition on Windows 11 through CMD, learning complex command lines can be cumbersome and risky. Errors and mistakes will cause unexpected data loss or even system crashes.

Therefore, it is recommended to choose a simpler alternative. AOMEI Partition Assistant can help you easily shrink or extend the partition no matter whether it is encrypted or not. Furthermore, this multifunctional tool can not only resize encrypted hard drives, but it can also fix variable computer issues. We will display how it works for resizing BitLocker Windows 11 partitions and dealing with different problems in the following part.

▷Shrink BitLocker partition
Step 1. Right-click the encrypted partition and choose the“Resize/Move Partition” option.

Step 2. Drag the bar to shrink the partition and select “OK”> “Yes” to move on.

Step 3. Choose the“Apply” > “Proceed” option in turn to commit the operations.

Step 4. Wait for the process patiently.

After shrinking the BitLocker partition, you can use the unallocated space from the BitLocker partition to create a new partition or extend the C drive.

▷Extend BitLocker encrypted partition
Please notice that there must be unallocated space adjacently before or behind the encrypted partition. Also, you can choose “Resize/Move Partition” to achieve that.

Step 1. Choose a partition near the BitLocker partition and click “Resize/Move Partition".

Step 2. Drag the size to create the unallocated space.

Note:

If the BitLocker partition is on the right of the selected partition you need to drag towards the left to create unallocated space before the BitLocker space.

If the BitLocker partition is on the left of the selected partition, please drag towards the right to make unallocated space behind the BitLocker space.

Step 3. You can choose the BitLocker partition and the “Resize/Move Partition” option again after creating the unallocated space.

Step 4. Drag it to extend the partition size and select the “Yes” button.

Step 5. Back to the interface and click “Apply” > “Proceed” to commit the operations. When all the processes are finished, the BitLocker partition is extended successfully.

3. How to unlock BitLocker Windows 11 when losing the password

From the above case, we can easily make the change like resizing the partition if you can remember the BitLocker password or back up the BitLocker recovery key when enabling it. However, we cannot exclude the users who lose it for some reason. Once you forget or lose that for various reasons, you are naturally rejected for modifying the encrypted hard drive.

Alongside resizing the partition, the versatile software AOMEI Partition Assistant can easily unlock BitLocker Windows 11 as well. It can share 2 methods to address that: formatting the encrypted drive or creating a new partition after deletion. Please choose the option that best suits your requirements.

▌Way 1. Format encrypted partition
Step 1. Launch the installed software. Right-click the encrypted partition and select the“Format Partition"

Step 2. Select the file system for the BitLocker encrypted hard drive.

Step 3. Choose “Apply” to format the hard drive.

Step 4. Then you can restart your computer, and you can find the BitLocker is unlocked successfully.

▌Way 2. Delete Partition
To unlock Bitlocker Windows 11, here is an alternative to format BitLocker encrypted partition. You can delete it and then create a new one. The specific steps are as below.

Step 1. Launch the program and choose the encrypted partition. Click the “Delete Partition” button in the left pane.

Step 2. Choose the way to delete the partition with clicking the “OK” button.

Step 3. Hit “Apply” to commit the operations.

Step 4. Then, back to the main Tab and right-click the target hard drive. Choose “Create Partition”.

Step 5. After choosing the needed file system, click “OK”.

Step 6. Press the “Apply” button again to create the new partition.

Bonus reading: How to clone BitLocker drive to another disk in Windows 11?

Have you experienced the convenience and efficiency brought by AOMEI Partition Assistant? About BitLocker Windows 11, it can further play a significant part in another stage.

Firstly, if you are a Windows 11 Home user, your computer will not support BitLocker by default. For data safe, you can clone the entire disks for backup with upgrading to AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. Besides, it shares 2 cloning methods for your different needs:

Two disk cloning methods

The "Clone Disk Quickly” option allows you to partially and fast clone.

The “Sector-by-Sector Clone” function can clone all sectors, which even supports coping disks with bad sectors.

You can read this clear guidance on how to use it to clone BitLocker drive via this all-in-one software.

Conclusion

About Windows 11 BitLocker, we discuss the common issues with providing corresponding fixes. As we can see, the multifunctional tool, AOMEI Partition Assistant can troubleshoot many common issues relating to your daily computer use.

Its Professional edition can provide more solutions for computer users, such as converting MBR/GPT, migrating OS to SSD, extending C drive space, and so on. In addition, if Windows Server users expect to use this robust software to effectively manage their devices, the Server Edition can work for Server 2022/2019/2016/2012(R2)/2008(R2)/2003.