How to Create a Windows 11 Bootable USB Drive with Media Creation Tool

Some users, from time to time, install or reinstall the Windows 11 operating system on their computers. This happens for various reasons, for example, to install the system on a new PC, or to reinstall Windows in case of problems and failures.

There are several ways to clean install Windows. One of the most popular is to use an installation bootable USB flash drive with a burnt ISO image of the operating system.

The user needs to create a bootable Windows 11 flash drive in order to install the OS on a PC. During system installation, you will first need to boot your computer from the installation media, and then proceed to install Windows on the device.

This article provides instructions on how to create a bootable USB flash drive using the free Media Creation Tool developed by Microsoft. You will have a bootable Windows 11 UEFI flash drive with which you can install the system on your computer.

Create a bootable Windows 11 flash drive

Before you start burning a bootable USB flash drive with the Windows 11 operating system, there are a few things to consider. Take this information into account, because your next steps depend on it.

After the release of the Windows 11 operating system, the system requirements for computer hardware became tougher. During an upgrade or a clean install, the PC hardware is checked for compatibility with the requirements.

If your device doesn’t meet the criteria, a system update or installation of Windows 11 stops. You can get information about the characteristics of your device in advance with the help of specially created programs, which you can read about at the link below.

Before proceeding with the steps to create a flash drive, please note the following:

• You will need an 8 GB USB drive or higher.
• All data on your flash drive will be deleted. Before you begin, it is recommended that you back up all important files somewhere else.
• You can use the same flash drive to install Windows 11 on multiple computers.
• The device where Windows 11 will be installed uses a 64-bit architecture.
• A 64-bit version of Windows 11 downloaded from the official site will be installed on the computer.
• You will need an Internet connection to download the files to create an ISO image on a flash drive.

If your device meets the conditions put forward by Microsoft, then using the Media Creation Tool Windows 11 application, you can burn bootable media from which you can install the operating system on your computer without any problems.

If there are some non-compliance requirements, you will have to perform some steps during the installation of Windows 11 to bypass these restrictions. Use other software to create bootable flash drives, with which you can burn a modified ISO image of the operating system in which the compatibility check is disabled.

How to Make a Windows 11 Bootable USB Drive with Media Creation Tool

The Media Creation Tool is designed to create a bootable USB flash drive for Windows 11; you can also use the utility to download and save an ISO image of the operating system on your computer without creating installation media.

The Media Creation Tool application creates an installation flash drive in two steps:

1. First, the ISO image files are downloaded to a temporary folder on your computer.
2. The ISO image is then written to a USB drive.

To use the utility, you need to download the Media Creation Tool from the official Microsoft website.

Follow these steps step by step:

1. Insert the flash drive into the computer’s USB port.
2. Download the Media Creation Tool from the Microsoft website from the “Download Windows 11” page at the link: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows11 .
3. On the Windows 11 Download page, go to the Create Windows 11 installation media section, and then click the Download button.
4. Run the “MediaCreationToolW11” file on the computer.
5. The Preparing in Progress window will open on the screen.
6. In the “Applicable notices and license terms” window, click the “Accept” button.
7. After preparation, in the “Select language and edition” window, the operating system language and version are selected by default – Windows

If you clear the check box next to Use the recommended settings for this computer, you can choose a different language for the system image you create.

8. Click on the “Next” button.

The Select Media window offers two options:

• USB flash drive;
• ISO file.

If you select an ISO file, then you can save the system image on your PC to later burn it to a DVD, or create a bootable USB flash drive in another program.

9. Leave the “USB flash drive” option active, click on the “Next” button.
10. In the Select USB Flash Drive window, select the removable media.

Check carefully whether the drive letter of the connected USB drive is selected correctly, especially if other devices of this type are connected to the PC. Check the selected drive letter in Explorer.

All files from the flash drive will be deleted.

11. The Windows 11 Download window displays the progress of downloading files.
12. Once the boot has been verified, the Windows 11 Media Creation window shows the progress of this operation.
13. In the USB Flash Drive Ready window, click the Finish button.
14. The program will delete unnecessary files and complete its work.

The application file “Media Creation Tool W11” can be deleted from the computer.

Open File Explorer to see the installation flash drive. It is designated under the name “ESD-USB”.

Windows 11 64-bit bootable flash drive is ready to use. Reboot your PC to start installing the system, or do it at any other convenient time.

The bootable flash drive created in the Media Creation Tool is suitable for installation on PCs that meet the Windows 11 system requirements without additional manipulations.

Article Conclusions

Many users are interested in the question of how to burn a bootable Windows 11 flash drive. To solve this problem, you need a utility to create a bootable Windows 11 flash drive. The free Media Creation Tool will download the official ISO image of the operating system from the Microsoft website, and then write it to the installation USB drive.