You’ll find the Seagate Expansion external USB drive a great Mac backup drive.
Or use it as an external storage drive to keep all your files safe.
It’s slim, good-looking, and readily available in a wide range of storage capacities.
You can buy it now as a portable hard drive, or SSD (Solid State Drive). Or desktop hard drive for larger capacities.
Back up your files today with the Seagate Expansion external drive!
*Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links. And at no extra cost to you, this site earns a commission through image links. And Amazon button and text links should you buy.
Seagate Expansion Verdict for Mac
With 1TB, 2TB, 4TB and 5TB in its portable hard drive guise to expand your Mac’s internal storage. 500GB, 1TB and 2TB SSD drives are now available. And between 4TB and 20TB capacity on the desktop Expansion versions.
You’ll find the Seagate Expansion has plenty of storage options.
OK. So, it’s a basic drive but don’t let that hold you back.
I loved its attractive price per TB. And you’ll find that most users admire its reliable performance and speed.
Over 40 thousand people took the time to rate this drive on Amazon. And that’s saying something.
Plug into your Mac’s USB port and you can easily have your Expansion drive working in no time.
Take A Look At The Seagate Expansion Portable
You can choose a USB drive with 1TB all the way up to 5TB. There’s something for everyone.
Check the price now on Amazon.
Reasons To Buy The Seagate Expansion For Mac
Reasons Not To Buy The Seagate Expansion For Mac
The Seagate Expansion Portable is very much an external hard drive you should check out.
Portable Seagate Expansion Drive Unboxing Video
You may want to take a look at what comes in your Seagate Expansion Portable’s box.
Watch this 3 minute 28 seconds video. It shows you exactly what you’re going to get when this goodie arrives at your door.
Seagate Expansion Portable Hard Drive Unboxing
Video Credit: MacTakeAwayData
Seagate Expansion Review: Is it Worth It For Your Mac?
The Seagate Expansion is a drive where you can store your files, videos music and movies. And what’s better is that it’s reliable and pretty affordable.
Buy Yourself A Seagate Expansion HDD When You Just Need A Drive
What do I mean by this?
You’ll find this hard drive has no frills and is a basic drive.
Realize that you’ll get no fancy colors. It’s in black but the look is finished with an interesting surface pattern that is smart to look at.
You’ll get no software or hardware based password protection. Or hardware encryption offered on the Seagate Expansion.
But not to worry.
The beauty of your Mac’s operating system is that. Mac OS can password protect your precious documents. And encrypt your Expansion external hard drive.
Check out the Seagate Expansion Portable On Amazon Now
All The Seagate Expansion External Drives Now Come ExFAT Formatted
Previous Expansion drives were NTFS formatted. And you might inherit one.
NTFS is a file system a Windows PC uses.
Your Mac can read an NTFS drive. But when you want to put your files on there. It’ll appear like it’s somehow blocked.
To use it fully on your Mac you need to format it first. You can find how here. Take 5 minutes or less and format your Expansion for your Mac. Click on the link text.
Now the latest drives come ExFAT formatted.
ExFAT is compatible with Mac and Windows. And this means you can share your drive.
But, I’ve noticed some drives come formatted with a Master Boot Record partition map. A Mac needs a GUID partition Map. And those drives will need to be formatted so they work consistently on your Mac.
One thing. You can’t use an ExFAT formatted drive for a Time Machine backup on your Mac. For a Time Machine Seagate backup you’ll have to format to an APFS file system or to Mac OS Extended.
Connecting Your Seagate Expansion Up To Your Mac
Your Mac powers your Portable Expansion external hard drive. And the Expansion SSD (Solid State Drive) through its USB port. The desktop Expansion drives need a power outlet.
Your portable Expansion hard disk drive is a USB 3.0 drive.
It comes with a USB cable with a USB type A connection at the end you plug into your Mac.
Your modern MacBook Pro, MacBook Air models have USB C ports.
You just order yourself a USB C to MicroB cable. Or a USB C to USB type A adaptor cable and plug right in.
The Expansion SSD drives come with a type C USB cable in the box. So you can plug right in and expand the storage of your Mac’s internal drive.
Check Out The Seagate Expansion SSD On Amazon Now
File Formats And Using Your Seagate Expansion On Your Mac
Let’s review how the format of your Seagate Expansion relates to how you can use your drive.
You’ve a few options in formatting your Seagate hard drive for Mac.
Format Your Expansion Drive To Mac OS Extended File System
And you can:
- Drag and Drop any files to your Expansion storage space.
- Copy and Paste your photos, music, documents. All your files.
- Use your Seagate Expansion to backup to with Time Machine.
Format Your Seagate Expansion To APFS
APFS (Apple File system) is the latest file system format from Apple. Originally designed for SSD drives. APFS improves the security and resilience of the Mac Extended Journaled file system.
You can use APFS on your Expansion SSD drive and use a file system tailored for SSDs. Or run on your hard drive Expansion. As it runs on hard drives as well.
Format as APFS and you can:
- Drag and Drop your files to the Expansion hard drive or SSD.
- Or copy and paste.
- And with Mac OS Big Sur, Monterey or Ventura you can use for a Time Machine backup.
But you can’t use APFS for a Time Machine Backup on a Mac running Mac OS Catalina or earlier.
Go Over To Amazon And Check Out The Seagate Expansion Desktop Drive
An ExFAT Formatted Seagate Expansion
With ExFAT you can:
- Share your drive between your Mac and a Windows PC.
- Drag and Drop your files to the Expansion.
- Copy and paste.
But you can’t use ExFAT for a Time Machine Backup. For that you have to reformat.
Learn here how you can set up your Seagate Expansion for Time Machine in this article on the site.
Speed Of Your Expansion Seagate HDD
In my USB 3.0 testing of the portable Seagate Expansion I saw I saw a peak of. 121.1 MB/s write speed and 126.1 MB/s read speed.
The testing was done on a MacBook Pro 2020 using the Black Magic Disk Speed Test.
Not the fastest portable hard drive on the block. But certainly, reasonable for its class.
And unless you’re doing heavy Photo Shop work. Or video editing then you’ll find the speed of this Seagate Expansion Portable just fine.
And when you’re looking to put your music collection, movies or videos. Or use your Expansion for a Seagate backup of your Mac. You’ll be thrilled with its price versus performance.
What Do Users Of The Portable Seagate Expansion Think?
You’ll like that over 42 thousand people have given their ratings on the drive.
It just shows how popular this drive is and how long it’s been around in the marketplace.
And the majority of the reviews are positive.
You can take a look at what users of the Expansion Seagate drive have to say on Amazon.
Click on the button to go through to the sales page. (Commissions Earned)
Scroll down to the bottom and change the view from ‘Top Rated’ reviews to the ‘Recent Reviews’.
You’ll find it more useful to see what the buyers over the last couple of months have to say. Rather than a view of a shipped drive from years ago.
Your Seagate Storage Capacity, Size and Weight
The portable Seagate Expansion and Expansion SSD’s are great companions. Whether you’re out and about in the city or at home.
The Seagate SSD comes in 500GB, 1TB and 2TB
Your portable Seagate Expansion comes in 1TB, 2TB, 4TB and 5TB storage options.
It’s not too heavy to bring with you – about the weight of an eating Apple or two for the larger drives.
Here are its vital statistics.
Seagate Expansion Portable
| Capacity | Size | Weight |
| 1TB, 2TB | 4.6” x 3.2” x 0.6” | .351 lb. |
| 4TB, 5TB | 4.6″ x 3.2″ x 0.8″ | .567 lb. |
Your Seagate Expansion Portable gives you plenty of storage options. No matter whether you’re a student. Or a professional using your Mac.
What’s In The Seagate Expansion Box When You Buy?
When shipped to you you’ll find:
- With your portable Seagate Expansion external hard drive: An around 18-inch USB 3.0 cable. It has a type A connection at the end that goes into your Mac. It’s also compatible with USB 2.0.
- With your Seagate Expansion SSD external drive: An 18 inch USB C cable ready to plug right into your modern Mac. And a USB 3.0 cable with a type A cable end.
- With your Seagate Expansion Desktop external drive: An 18 inch USB 3.0 cable with a type A cable end. Plus, a power adaptor as it’s powered from a power outlet.
- With all the Expansion external drives you’ll get a Quick Start Guide. And Seagate Rescue Data Recovery Services
You’ll find the Quick Start Guide is brief. Pretty much only a picture of plugging in your Seagate Expansion.
But there is a more detailed on-line guide.
You can take a look at the Portable Seagate Expansion User Manual online here.
About The Seagate Rescue Data Recovery Services
It’s included within the price of your drive.
And depending on the deal around when you buy. It’s either offered within the warranty period. Or for longer than that.
In the Data Recovery services you get a single at Seagate’s premises only, data recovery attempt.
To take advantage you’ll need to register your request on Seagate’s site. And they’ll send you a pre-paid envelope to send your drive back in.
They publish a 15 day business day turnaround time frame.
If successful you get an encrypted device with your recovered files on it.
They say they’ve a 95% recovery success rate.
You can read all about it here.
It means should you have a disaster with your drive. You can breathe easier knowing you’ve a chance of getting all your important files back.
The Warranty On Your Seagate Expansion
Your Seagate Expansion has a 1 year warranty.
It’s a little short in my view but then you’re not buying a high end drive. Although your Seagate Expansion Portable drive is generally reliable.
You can take a look at the high level warranty conditions at this link.
In Closing
And there you have it. All the reasons to buy yourself a Seagate Expansion drive for your Mac.
It’s a great external hard drive for a Seagate backup your Mac.
You can store all of your files, videos, music and movies. And then enjoy them on your Mac at home, work or while traveling.
And now it comes ExFAT formatted and ready to share with a Windows PC too.
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