How to mount a drive as a folder on Windows

• To mount a drive as a folder on Windows 11, open Settings > System > Storage > Disks & volumes, click “Properties” for the drive, click “Add,” and choose the folder mount point.
• You can perform this configuration for a drive that is already formatted or through the partition wizard. 
• Alternatively, you can mount a drive to a folder from Disk Management or Command Prompt (the same steps will work on PowerShell). 

On Windows 11 (and 10, including older versions), it’s possible to mount a drive as a folder, and in this guide, I will explain how to complete this configuration.

If you have a computer with multiple drives or partitions, instead of assigning a drive letter to each storage, you can mount it as a folder within another location on your system. This approach can be useful for organizing your storage or accessing data in a specific way without using a lot of letter assignments.

Regardless of the reason, Windows offers different ways to mount a drive as a folder through the Disk Management tool and Command Prompt. On Windows 11, you can also use the “Disks & volumes” settings to perform this configuration.

In this guide, I will explain the different ways to mount a drive as a folder on Windows 11 as well as on Windows 10. You can also refer to these instructions on older versions of the operating system, including Windows 8.1, Windows 7, and older.

How to mount a drive as a folder from Settings app

On Windows 11 (and higher releases), you can mount a drive as a folder in at least two ways from the “Disks & volumes” experience from the Settings app.

From formatted drive

To mount a hard drive as a folder on Windows 11 from the Settings app, use these steps:

1. Open Settings.

2. Click on System.

3. Click the Storage page.

4. Click “Advanced storage settings” under the “Storage management” section.

5. Click the “Disks & volumes” setting.

   

6. Click on the hard drive with the partition to mount.

7. Click the Properties button.

   

8. Click the Add button for the “Paths” settings.

   

9. Click the Browse button.

   

10. Open the empty folder to mount the drive.

    Quick tip: Windows 11 offers multiple ways to create a new folder through File Explorer, Command Prompt, and PowerShell.

11. Click the Select Folder button.

12. Click the OK button.

From new drive

To mount a new partition as a folder from the Settings app, use these steps:

1. Open Settings.

2. Click on System.

3. Click the Storage page.

4. Click “Advanced storage settings” under the “Storage management” section.

5. Click the “Disks & volumes” setting.

   

6. Click on the hard drive with the partition to mount.

7. Choose the “Create Simple Volume” option for unallocated space.

   

8. (Optional) Choose the “None” option for the “Drive Letter” setting.

9. Select the appropriate settings for the new volume (as applicable).

10. Open the Advanced settings.

11. Click the Browse button.

    

12. Open the empty folder to mount the drive.

13. Click the Select Folder button.

14. Click the Format button.

Once you complete the steps, the storage will appear as another folder in File Explorer. Using this approach, you can still assign a drive letter to a partition, but it’s not required since you can access the storage from the mount point.

If you want to remove the folder mount point, open Settings > System > Storage > Disks & volumes, click “Properties” for the drive, click on the mount point, and click the “Remove” button.

How to mount a drive as a folder from Disk Management

The Disk Management tool is available for both Windows 11 and 10 (and even for older versions), and it allows you to mount a hard drive as a folder similar to the “Disks & volumes” settings.

From formatted drive

To mount a drive as a folder from the Disk Management tool, use these steps:

1. Open Start.

2. Search for Create and format hard disk and click on the top result to open the Disk Management tool.

3. Right-click the volume to mount as a folder and choose the “Change Drive Letter and Paths” option.

   

4. Select the current drive letter.

   Quick note: The Disk Management tool doesn’t allow the mounting of a drive as a folder when a drive letter has already been assigned. As a result, you will have to remove the drive letter before mounting the storage as a folder.

5. Click the Remove button.

   

6. Click the Yes button.

7. Right-click the volume to mount as a folder and choose the “Change Drive Letter and Paths” option.

8. Click the Add button.

9. Choose the “Mount in the following empty NTFS folder” option.

   

10. Click the Browse button.

11. Select the empty folder to mount the drive.

12. Click the OK button.

13. Click the OK button again.

From new drive

To mount a new partition as a folder from the Disk Management app, use these steps:

1. Open Start.

2. Search for Create and format hard disk and click on the top result to open the Disk Management tool.

3. Right-click the Unallocated space for the drive to mount as a folder and choose the “New Simple Volume” option.

   

4. Click the Next button.

5. Choose the volume size in megabytes.

   

6. Click the Next button.

7. Choose the “Mount in the following empty NTFS folder” option.

   

8. Click the Browse button.

9. Select the empty folder to mount the drive.

10. Click the OK button.

11. Click the Next button.

12. Select the appropriate settings for the new volume (as applicable).

    

13. Click the Next button.

14. Click the Finish button.

After you complete the steps, the storage should now be accessible from the folder location you specified in the wizard.

If you want to remove the folder mount point, open Disk Management, right-click the volume to mount as a folder, choose the “Change Drive Letter and Paths” option, select the current folder mount point, and click the “Remove” button.

How to mount a drive as a folder from Command Prompt

On Windows 11, 10, and older versions, you can also use Command Prompt to mount a hard drive as a folder.

From formatted drive

To mount a drive as a folder from Command Prompt, use these steps:

1. Open Start.

2. Search for Command Prompt, right-click the top result, and select the Run as administrator option.

3. Type the following command to start diskpart and press Enter:

   diskpart

4. Type the following command to view the available volumes and press Enter:

   list volume

5. Type the following command to select the volume to mount as a folder and press Enter:

   select volume 1

   In the command, change “1” for the number of volumes to mount.

6. Type the following command to mount a hard drive as a folder and press Enter:

   assign mount=C:\MyDriveFolder

   In the command, change C:\MyDriveFolder for the path to the folder mount point.

   

If you want to remove the mount point to a folder, you can use the same instructions, but in step 6, run the remove mount=C:\MyDriveFolder command. You can also assign a new drive letter to the partition on Windows 11 if you want to access the storage.

From new drive

To mount a new partition as a folder from Command Prompt, use these steps:

1. Open Start.

2. Search for Command Prompt, right-click the top result, and select the Run as administrator option.

3. Type the following command to start diskpart and press Enter:

   diskpart

4. Type the following command to view the available drives and press Enter:

   list disk

5. Type the following command to select a disk and press Enter:

   select disk 0

   In the command, change “0” to the disk number you want to partition.

6. Type the following command to create a primary partition and press Enter:

   create partition primary

   

7. (Optional) Type the following command to view the available volumes and press Enter:

   list volume

8. Type the following command to format the partition with the NTFS file system and press Enter:

   format fs=ntfs quick

9. Type the following command to mount a hard drive as a folder and press Enter:

   assign mount=C:\MyDriveFolder

   In the command, change C:\MyDriveFolder for the path to the folder mount point.

   

Once you complete the steps, the hard drive will be accessible from the folder mount point you assigned in Command Prompt.

If you want to remove the mount point to a folder, follow the “From formatted drive” instructions, but in step 6, run the remove mount=C:\MyDriveFolder command.

This process won’t delete the data already on the partition when assigning a mount point or changing the drive letter. However, it’ll break the connection to any app installation hosted in that particular storage, but usually, this is not the case as apps are typically installed on the main system hard drive.