Select Seagate drives include Paragon software, which allows a drive to work with both Windows and macOS without reformatting the external drive.
Officially supported operating systems can be found at www.seagate.com/os, but we do make older versions of the NTFS driver for Mac available on the Paragon support page for customers. While the software may function on other operating systems the following is officially supported.
| Paragon Operating System Compatibility List | Supported | ||||
| Windows 11 | √ | ||||
| Windows 10 | √ | ||||
| macOS 11 (Big Sur) and later | √ | ||||
| OS X 10.14 (Mojave) to 10.15 (Catalina) | √ |
Seagate is no longer shipping drives that include Paragon software. Drives are either formatted exFAT for compatiblity between Windows and macOS no longer require Paragon or formatting before use or formatted NTFS, but without Pargon software. If the drive will only be used with Windows or Mac it is best practice to format the external drive NTFS for Windows or HFS+/APFS for macOS. If the drive will be used with Time Machine, then it will require formatting to either Mac OS Extended Journal (HFS+) or APFS depending on the version of macOS. See how to format your drive for instructions.
| Paragon Drive Family Compatbility List | No | Yes |
| FreeAgent | √ | |
| Replica | √ | |
| Expansion | √ | |
| Backup Plus* | √ | |
| FreeAgent GoFlex | √ | |
| Wireless | √ | |
| Wireless Plus | √ |
*Backup Plus Drives with model numbers starting STHP and STHN are formatted exFAT and did not include Paragon.
