According to an official support document published by Apple, the upcoming macOS 28 release will abandon encrypted HFS+ support. Consequently, users must decrypt their legacy external storage devices before upgrading next year. Alternatively, they can reformat these drives to the modern APFS format to preserve data protection.
Impact on Legacy External Drives
This structural shift primarily impacts external drives that rely on the classic Mac OS Extended formatting. Since 2017, Apple has progressively transitioned its desktop ecosystem toward the advanced APFS standard. Furthermore, APFS natively accommodates robust cryptographic features and serves as the contemporary system baseline.
The decision to sever support for encrypted HFS+ volumes signals a definitive retirement of older storage architectures. Although the documentation omits specific technical reasons for this change, the system will provide early warnings.
Proactive Migration Notifications in macOS 26
Specifically, beginning with macOS 26, the operating system will trigger warning dialogs for legacy volumes. These alerts will flag any encrypted Mac OS Extended disks that cannot migrate to newer platforms. Therefore, users will gain ample time to reconfigure their storage setups before macOS 28 arrives.
Meanwhile, unencrypted HFS+ drives remain entirely unaffected by this upcoming operating system update. The new platform can still seamlessly mount and read legacy unencrypted external media normally. As a result, those requiring ongoing data confidentiality must migrate their files to APFS soon.
How to Reformat Using Disk Utility
To ensure continuous data protection, Apple outlines a clear migration path through older systems. First, users should connect their storage to a machine running macOS 27 or earlier. Subsequently, they must decrypt the drive fully and copy all essential files to the Mac.
Next, operators can open the native Disk Utility application to erase the external medium safely. They should choose either standard APFS or Encrypted APFS as the new target format. Because this process permanently deletes all underlying data, a verifiable backup remains completely critical.
Finally, users can safely move their files back onto the newly updated APFS drive. Naturally, environments choosing to skip the macOS 28 lifecycle can use encrypted HFS+ indefinitely.
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