How to Delete a Windows Recovery Partition

Remove your recovery partition to free up more space on Windows

This article explains how to delete a recovery partition in Windows. It also explains how to format and expand a partition to use the unallocated space.

Because recovery partitions are protected, the steps for removing them differ from deleting a normal partition.

1. Right-click the Start menu and select Windows PowerShell (Admin) or Command Prompt (Admin).

2. Type diskpart and press Enter, then type list disk and press Enter.

3. A list of disks displays. Type select disk # (where # is the number of the disk with the recovery partition) and press Enter.

   If you’re unsure which one it’s on, find out by opening the Disk Management tool.

   

4. Type list partition and press Enter. A list of partitions displays. Type select partition # (where # is the number of the recovery partition) and press Enter.

   

5. Type delete partition override and press Enter.
6. After you see a confirmation message, you can close the PowerShell/Command Prompt.

How to Format a Partition

Deleting a recovery partition will create a section of unallocated space on your drive. To use the unallocated space, you must format the partition:

1. Right-click the Start menu and select Disk Management.

   If using Windows or earlier, click the Start menu and type diskmgmt.msc in the search box to find the Disk Management tool.

2. Beside the disk number for your hard drive, you’ll see several partitions, including one named Unallocated. Right-click the Unallocated partition and select New Simple Volume.

   

3. Select Next to continue the wizard.

4. Enter how much data the new partition should use out of the unallocated space, then select Next.

   

5. Choose a letter from the drop-down menu to assign to the partition, then select Next.

   

6. Enter a name for the partition in the Volume label field, then select Next.

   The default file system is NTFS, but you can change it to FAT32 or another file system if you wish.

   

7. Select Finish to close the wizard.

How to Expand a Partition to Use the Unallocated Space

If you want to expand another partition to use the extra space, then the unallocated space must appear to the immediate right of that partition in the Disk Management tool. To extend a partition:

1. Right-click the partition you want to expand and select Extend Volume.

   

2. Select Next to continue the wizard.

3. Enter how much of the unallocated space you want to use, then select Next.

   

4. Select Finish to terminate the wizard. The Windows partition will be resized to include the extra space.