Best Software to Make PenDrive Bootable (with 3 Steps Guide)

The pen drive, also known as USB flash drive, is a portable data storage device. It replaces the old storage device, such as CD/DVD, floppy drive and becomes the most popular device among users. You can take it everywhere and use it saving your files, folders, photos, and more. In addition, you can make pendrive bootable for your purpose.

What can bootable pen drive do for you?

Bootable pen drive allows you to save your own operating system and boot it on any compatible devices when needed. And your personal files and folders will come along with this bootable media. You can use it everywhere as long as there is a computer.

Another purpose is used to boot non-system computer or system corrupted machine and then troubleshoot the computer having problems. Besides, you can resize system partition without restarting, delete system partition in Window PE, install or reinstall the operating system.

Software to make pendrive bootable for Windows 8/10/11

To create bootable USB for Windows 8/10/11, you need proper software. I highly recommend you free bootable pen drive software AOMEI Partition Assistant. With it, you can create a bootable USB flash drive without extra effort.

In this software, it offers you two useful features, including Windows To Go Creator and Make Bootable Media. The first one can help you create a portable version of Windows, which contains the operating system of your customized computer and can be used to boot from any compatible device.

The second one can assist you in creating a bootable media, booting the non-OS computer or damaged machine and repairing your computer. Besides, you can run all kinds of operations related to operating system, including resizing partition without restarting, copying operating system without booting into Windows.

How to make pen drive bootable using software?

Create bootable media for a portable Windows

If you want to save the operating system and use it to boot from any compatible device, you can follow the detailed steps below and learn how to make pendrive bootable through software.

Step 1. Download bootable pen drive software AOMEI Partition Assistant, install and launch it. Connect the pen drive to your PC and make sure it is detected.

Step 2. Click “Tools” in the top toolbar, and choose “Windows To Go Creator”.

Step 3. Choose the first option "Create Windows To Go with system disc/ISO". Click the folder icon to select ISO manually. After that, click "Next" to continue.

Step 4. Please select the location of the Windows 11 ISO file and click “Next”.

Step 5. Select the target USB drive here and click “Proceed”.

Software to make pendrive bootable for Windows 8/10/11

If your computer cannot boot as normal, you can create a bootable pen drive and use it to repair your computer. Besides, you still use it to copy operating system without booting into Windows, install or reinstall the operating system, and so on.

Start with the detailed steps.

Step 1. Launch AOMEI Partition Assistant.

Step 2. Click “Tools” in the top toolbar, and choose “Make Bootable Media”.

Step 3. Choose a way to create bootable media based on your specific situation. Here USB Boot Device is selected.

Step 4. You’ll be prompted that the USB will be formatted. Click Yes to continue.

How to make pendrive bootable without third-party software?

If you have ISO files or system image backup, you can use CMD to make pendrive bootable. With this way, you do not need extra software.

Step 1. Connect the pen drive to your computer and make sure it can be detected.

Step 2. Typecmdin the search box and run as administrator.

Step 3. Type diskpart in the command prompt and press Enter.

Step 4. Type the following commands in order and Hit Enter after each command.

• list disk

• select disk n (n is the number of the pen drive)

• clean

• create partition primary

• select partition 1

• format fs= ntfs quick (If your computer is in UEFI boot mode, you can type format fs=fat32)

• active

• exit

Step 5. Save the prepared ISO files to the root of your pen drive.

The way forward

AOMEI Partition Assistant is free software to make pendrive bootable. According to your purpose, you can decide to use Windows To Go Creator or Make Bootable Media. In addition, if you have ISO files, you can use CMD to make pendrive bootable.

I prefer to free bootable pen drive software AOMEI Partition Assistant. This software makes all things easier. You can create bootable USB in 3 steps. Besides, it’s still a partition manager. You can use it to do more things, such as, resize partition with restarting, disk management combine partitions, convert MBR to GPT disk and so on.

AOMEI Partition Professional is the advanced version of this freeware, which contains all features on the free version and offers more features, such as migrate OS from MBR disk to GPT, convert primary partition to logical partition, convert system disk between MBR and GPT partition style and more.