Some users find that their hard drive disappeared from Disk Management in Windows 11. In this post, we’ll show you some solutions to help you fix this issue.
As a new system of the Windows OS series, Windows 11 has always been a hot topic for discussion because this new system brings many new factors compared with its predecessor. Although there are various new creative features, some old problems still exist in this new OS. One of them is the hard drive disappeared from Disk Management in Windows 11, sometimes after an update sometimes an external hard drive not showing up.
Not only after an update the hard drive may not show up, but some users also confront:
Hard drive disappearing in Disk Management and File Explorer C drive or D drive missing Only C drive showing …
What causes these problems in your Windows 11? Here are some possible reasons：
▪ There is an issue with the hard drive port. ▪ The disk driver is out of date or corrupted. ▪ During Windows updates, the partition's drive letter is lost. ▪ The file system becomes corrupt or the partition becomes RAW.
Of course, there are other factors that may trigger hard drive or SSD not showing up in Windows 11 like corrupted system files, malware, and hardware issues… Thus, if you also meet this problem, don’t panic, it’s a common glitch in Windows OS, next we’ll show you how to fix it.
This method is quite important for users whose external hard drive not showing up in Windows 11.
The first thing you should do is check for a loose connection to the hard disk. Because of this, your external hard drive may be missing, or if you attach a USB drive to your computer during a system update operation, the drive may disappear once you complete updating. In this instance, just unplug your external hard drive and reconnect it to another port.
As we’ve mentioned that the disk disappeared after the system update, you may try uninstalling it to see if this resolves the issue and try to reinstall the update if you insist to update to that version.
Step 1. Launch Windows 11 Settings via the Win + X menu.
Step 2. Click Windows Update > Update history > Uninstall updates.
Step 3: Right-click on the recently installed update in the pop-up box and select Uninstall. Confirm the procedure.
Check to check if the hard disk returns to the PC after the uninstallation. If this is the case, it indicates that there is an issue in the most recent version and you should wait until Microsoft releases another update for it.
If your disk driver is the source of the problem. Most likely, your current driver is incompatible with your machine or is missing. To resolve the issue, you must either update your disk driver to the most recent version or reinstall it in Device Manager.
Step 1. Right-click on the Start button and choose Device Manager.
Step 2. Expand the Disk drivers option, right-click on the driver and choose Update driver.
If this does not resolve your problem, right-click on the disk driver and select Uninstall device. Then restart your computer to have Windows reinstall it.
Step 1. Right-click My Computer/This PC -> Manage -> Disk Management.
Step 2. Here you can see the hard drive that disappeared in My Computer shown as a partition without a drive letter. For this situation, you can right-click the partition, and select Change drive letter and paths... to assign a drive letter to this drive.
And sometimes, Windows OS might hide the hard drive when you inadvertently trigger some potential settings, thus your hard drive may disappear. The option “Change drive letter and paths...” can also help you unhide the hidden hard drive.
According to some responses, some users also find that after an update, the system automatically deletes a hard drive. In this case, Windows 11 can’t recognize your disk and it will show up as unallocated but the data is still on your disk, thus you can try the partition recovery tool to recover your disk.
Here, we recommend you AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional to do this job for you. It’s a disk and partition manager compatible with Windows 11/10/8/8.1/7/XP OS. The “Partition Recovery Wizard” is developed for users to find lost partitions or partitions that are deleted by mistake. What’s more, it also has other practical features like data recovery, converting to MBR/GPT without data loss, disk cloning, OS migration, moving folders and installed programs…
Step 1. Find the lost partition in Disk Management. Install and open AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional.
Step 2. Choose the disk you want to recover. Then click the "Recover" button at the top toolbar and select "Partition Recovery".
Step 3. When you get into the partition recovery wizard, select a disk that you want to recover. Click Next.
Step 4. Select Fast Search. It is recommended that you select this option the first time as it is faster than Full Search. If you are unable to recover the lost partition using Fast Search then I recommend you try the Full Search option.
Step 5. Then the software will search the lost partitions, when the searching is over, select the lost partition and click Proceed. Click Finish to exit this window after you see the congratulations message.
Then your hard drive should appear on your Windows 11 PC.
If you find your hard drive disappeared from Disk Management in Windows 11 or your SSD not showing up after Windows 11 22H2 update, these methods are quite worthy to have a try. If all solutions are failed, you may need to format your hard drive or SSD.
With AOMEI Partition Assistant, you can easily manage your Windows devices with multiple features. By the way, this tool also provides the Server Edition for Windows Server 2025/2022/2019/2016/2012(R2)/2008(R2)/2003.