Before installing the latest Windows 11, you must know what’s the recommended partition size of this Windows operating system. If the partition is too small to hold Windows 11, you’ll learn to extend or free up it.
Windows 11 is the latest major release of Microsoft’s Windows NT operating system that was announced on June 24, 2021, as the successor to Windows 10. Microsoft made a truckload of big changes and new features to Windows 11. For example, the ability to download and run Android apps on your PC and updates to Microsoft Teams, the Start menu, and the overall look of the software. It’s said that there’re 0.52% of devices are running Windows 11.
As Windows 11 has so many new features and functions, more and more people tend to upgrade Windows 10 to Windows 11. However, before the upgrade, they must ensure their PCs meet the minimum system requirements, for example, the recommended partition size for Windows 11 should be at least 64GB. Thus, if your partition storage is below it, the OS installation won’t be successful and you must extend or free up the partition to make room for Windows 11.
If Windows 11 installation fails due to insufficient partition storage, here, 3 different ways to extend or free up partitions are listed. Pick up any of them and have a try.
Disk Management is a built-in Windows program that’s able to manage your disks by performing various operations including partition format, partition shrinking, and of course, partition extension. Usually, the C drive is where Windows is installed, and to extend the C drive from Disk Management, you must ensure there is unallocated space right next to it or you'll encounter "Extend Volume greyed out".
1. Right-click on "This PC" from the desktop and select "Manage".
2. Go to "Storage > Disk Management" to open the program.
3. Make sure there’s unallocated space right next to the C drive as the screenshot shows.
4. Right-click on the C drive and select "Extend Volume".
5. Follow the onscreen guide to finish the rest steps.
As mentioned above, there must be unallocated space right next to the system drive if you want to extend from Disk Management. If you don’t meet this requirement, the "Extend Volume" option will be greyed out. In this case, another more powerful third-party disk manager – AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional – is recommended. With it, you can allocate free space to the system drive from other drives with sufficient storage regardless of the drive's location.
Now, download the demo of the disk manager to fix it if the recommended partition size for Windows 11 is not met.
Step 1. Install and launch AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional, right-click on any drive with sufficient storage – here we take the D drive for example – and select "Allocate Free Space".
Step 2. Set the amount of space to allocate and choose the C drive as the destination. Then, hit "OK".
Step 3. Hit "Apply" on the upper left to commit the operation.
How big is Windows 11? If you find your partition – usually the C drive - isn’t able to hold the 64GB operating system, besides partition extension, you can also try moving some large apps from the current system drive to another drive to free up space. But how? Luckily, the AOMEI product has its latest feature – app mover – to move apps including Microsoft Office and video games between drives without data loss.
Step 1. Run AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. Right-click the drive you need to move the apps and select "App Mover".
Step 2. Select the C drive where the apps are and hit "Next".
Step 3. Tick the apps you want to move and choose the destination drive.
Step 4. Hit "OK" for confirmation and the transfer will start.
Step 5. After it completes, click on "Finish" to put an end.
What is the recommended partition size for Windows 11? This is what you need to know before Windows 11 installation. In this post, you can easily find the answer – 64GB. If you don’t have sufficient storage for the Windows 11 installation, then, you can try extending or freeing up the partition with Disk Management or third-party software AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. The latter one is more convenient as it doesn’t ask for unallocated space behind the system drive. Moreover, other features including partition moving, partition merging, and hard disk clone are included in this AOMEI product as well. Plus, if you want to use this software on Servers, you can try the Server edition.