GParted

GParted is a free partition editor that runs as a bootable live environment from a USB drive or CD. It gives you full control over your hard drive layout: creating, resizing, moving, and deleting partitions across all major file systems including ext4, NTFS, FAT32, Btrfs, and XFS.

What it does

GParted presents your disk as a visual map where each partition appears as a colored block with its file system, size, and usage displayed. To resize a partition, click on it, choose Resize/Move, then drag the edge or type an exact size in MiB. To create a new partition, click on unallocated space, pick your file system, and set the size. All changes are queued as pending operations. Nothing touches the disk until you click Apply All Operations, which lets you review everything before committing.

The tool handles operations that Windows Disk Management simply cannot do, like shrinking a partition from the left side, moving a partition across the disk, or converting between file systems. It also checks and repairs file systems, copies entire partitions between drives, and lets you create fresh partition tables (GPT or MBR) on new disks.

Because GParted runs from its own bootable environment, no partition is locked by the operating system. You can resize your Windows system partition without any restrictions, something that is impossible from within Windows itself.

Who it is for

I reach for GParted every time I need to repartition a drive before or after installing an operating system. It is the go-to tool for Linux users and dual-booters who need reliable, no-cost partition management. If you are comfortable booting from a USB drive, GParted does everything you need without paying for commercial software.