How to Fix an External Drive That Won’t Eject on Mac

What Causes This?

An external drive usually won’t eject on macOS because something is still using it. Finder, Photos, Music, backup apps, Spotlight indexing, or a file you opened from the drive can all keep a background connection active. In some cases, the drive may also appear stuck because of temporary system slowdown, unfinished file transfers, or minor disk errors.

Common Symptoms

• You see a message saying the disk is “in use” and can’t be ejected
• The Eject option does nothing, or the drive stays on the desktop
• Finder becomes slow or unresponsive when you try to remove the drive
• The drive light keeps blinking even after you close open files
• macOS warns that the disk was not ejected properly

How to Fix It Manually

1. Close any files and apps using the drive

   • Save and close documents opened from the external drive.
   • Quit apps that may be accessing it, such as Finder preview windows, Photos, Music, VLC, backup tools, or editing software.
   • If you copied files recently, wait a minute to make sure the transfer has fully finished.

2. Try ejecting the drive from Finder

   • Open Finder.
   • In the sidebar, find the external drive under Locations.
   • Click the Eject icon next to the drive name.
   • You can also drag the drive from the desktop to the Trash, which changes to an eject symbol.

3. Force-close stuck apps with Activity Monitor

   • Open Activity Monitor from Applications > Utilities.
   • In the search box, look for apps that may be using the drive.
   • Select the app, then click the X button at the top and choose Quit or Force Quit.
   • After closing suspicious apps, try ejecting the drive again.

4. Use Disk Utility to unmount the drive

   • Open Disk Utility from Applications > Utilities.
   • Select the external drive in the left pane.
   • Click Unmount. If that works, the drive should disconnect safely.
   • If the button is unavailable or fails, continue to the next step.

5. Find and stop the process in Terminal

   • Open Terminal from Applications > Utilities.
   • Type:

     diskutil list

   • Identify your external drive, then type:

     diskutil unmountDisk force /dev/diskX

     Replace diskX with the correct disk number, such as disk2.
   • If you want to see what is using the drive first, you can run:

     lsof | grep /Volumes/DriveName

     Replace DriveName with the actual name of the drive.

6. Restart Finder or your Mac if the drive still won’t eject

   • Press Option + Command + Esc, select Finder, and click Relaunch.
   • Then try ejecting the drive again.
   • If that still fails, restart your Mac and eject the drive before reopening your usual apps.

7. Check the drive for errors

   • Open Disk Utility.
   • Select the external drive and click First Aid.
   • Let macOS scan and repair the disk if needed.
   • Once complete, try ejecting it again.

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