Guide to Taking a Drive Offline or Bringing a Disk Online in Windows 11

This tutorial will guide you on how to take a disk drive Offline or bring a disk Online in a Windows 11/10 environment. Once a disk is taken offline, it becomes inaccessible and cannot be mounted. An offline disk is not visible in the This PC section or the navigation pane of File Explorer. Additionally, you cannot initialize the disk until it is brought back online. We will cover the built-in tools you can use in this post.

Before you begin, note that you cannot take a system disk offline. You can take other connected hard disks, portable disks, or USB drives offline. Also, be aware that there is no warning or confirmation box (which would be helpful) when taking a disk offline or bringing it online, as the action is executed directly. These options are not applicable to removable media such as Blu-rays, memory cards, DVDs, etc.

The most crucial point is that the data stored on your disk is not deleted or erased during this process. Therefore, all your files and folders will remain intact when you bring a disk online or take it offline.

How to Take a Disk Drive Offline or Bring a Disk Online in Windows 11

There are four native methods to take a disk drive offline or bring a disk online in Windows 11. Ensure you are signed in as an administrator on your Windows 11/10 PC or laptop to utilize the options listed below:

1. Take a disk drive Offline or bring a disk Online using the Settings app
2. Take a disk Offline or bring it Online using the Command Prompt window
3. Turn off a hard disk or bring a hard disk Online using the Disk Management tool
4. Take a hard disk Offline or bring a disk Online using Windows Terminal.

Let’s explore these options with step-by-step instructions.

1] Take a Disk Drive Offline or Bring a Disk Online Using the Settings App

Follow these steps to take a disk drive offline using the Settings app of Windows 11:

1. Right-click on the Start button and select Settings.
2. Navigate to System > Storage > Advanced storage settings > Disks & volumes.
3. You will see all connected disks.
4. Click on the Properties button of the desired disk (excluding the system disk).
5. Press the Take offline button in the Status section.

This action will successfully take the disk offline, and the Settings app will automatically close after a brief moment.

To bring a disk online, access the Properties of that disk in the Settings app and press the Bring online button available under the Status section.

2] Take a Disk Offline or Bring It Online Using the Command Prompt Window

To take a disk offline using the Command Prompt window on a Windows 11 computer, follow these steps:

• Run the Command Prompt as an administrator via the Search box or other methods.
• Execute the diskpart command to manage disks and create partitions.
• Run the list disk command. This will display a list of hard disks connected to your Windows 11 PC along with their Status (Online or Offline).
• Note the Disk ### (such as Disk 0, Disk 1, Disk 2, etc.) for the disk you wish to take offline.
• Execute the select disk DiskNumber command to select the disk for further action, replacing DiskNumber with the actual number.
• Run the offline disk command.

You will receive the message “DiskPart successfully offlined the selected disk,” indicating success.

To bring the disk online again, follow the steps above to select the disk number and execute the online disk command. DiskPart will successfully bring the disk online immediately.

3] Turn Off a Hard Disk or Bring a Disk Online Using the Disk Management Tool

To turn off a hard disk using the Disk Management tool in Windows 11, follow these steps:

1. Open the Disk Management tool using the Win+X menu, the Search box, or another preferred method.
2. On the bottom left of this tool, you will see the connected disks.
3. Right-click on a hard disk and select the Offline option.
4. The disk will be taken offline instantly. You may see a message indicating “The disk is offline because of a policy set by an administrator,”confirming the disk is now inaccessible.
5. To bring the hard disk online again, right-click on that disk and select the Online option. The disk will be ready for use and visible in the This PC section.

4] Take a Hard Disk Offline or Bring a Disk Online Using Windows Terminal

Here’s how to do it:

1. Open Windows Terminal as an administrator on your Windows PC.
2. Open a Windows PowerShell profile in a new tab.
3. Type Get-Disk and execute it to list the available hard disks.
4. You will see the disk number, Health Status, Operational Status (Offline or Online), and other details. Note the disk number (0, 1, etc.) of the disk you want to manage.
5. Next, execute the command set-disk DiskNumber -isOffline $true for the disk you want to take offline, replacing DiskNumber with the actual number (0, 1, 2, etc.) and run the command.

To bring the disk online later, repeat steps 1 to 4. In the last step, execute:

Set-disk DiskNumber -isOffline $false

Replace DiskNumber with the actual disk number, and your disk will again be accessible.

That’s all! We hope this information proves helpful.

What Does It Mean to Bring a Disk Online?

Bringing a disk online means that the disk is visible to the operating system with read and write access. This allows you to access existing volumes, create new volumes, and retrieve data stored on that disk. By default, newly discovered disks are automatically set online with read and write permissions. However, if a disk is offline, you must first bring it online to access it, create new volumes, and more.

How to Make a Disk Partition Online?

If you want to create a new partition or volume on a hard disk in your Windows 11/10 PC, access the Disk Management tool. Right-click on an unallocated region and choose the New Simple Volume option. Follow the wizard to select the size of the new volume, assign a drive letter, and continue to the next step. In the Format Partition box, format the volume with the default settings, and click the Finish button.

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