How To Remove USB Flash Drives From Chromebook Safely

Table of Contents

• This is why it is important to “eject” the drive before disconnecting it
• How to eject a USB drive from a Chromebook

This is why it is important to “eject” the drive before disconnecting it

Before we tell you how to safely remove a USB drive from your Chromebook, we need to understand because it’s important to carry out this operation in total safety.

First things first: when you extract a USB drive without following the “safety” procedure, you risk losing all data contained therein. Furthermore, if the system is still writing data on the drive, simply removing the USB could also interrupt the writing process. Asking the operating system to “eject” the drive before physically removing it ensures that all processes are terminated.

If you know that the unit is not active, there is nothing wrong with pulling it out immediately. Inactivity of the USB drive is indicated, in some cases, by the LED on the drive itself: the light will flash while reading or writing data.

The conclusion? You should never remove a USB drive when it is in the middle of a process! The “eject” option simply ensures that nothing happens data loss e that all data writing processes themselves are safely stopped.

How to eject a USB drive from a Chromebook

The procedure that allows you to safely eject your USB drive is very different on a Chromebook than on a Windows PC or a Mac. Let’s see how!

First, click on the icon of launching apps located in the lower-left corner: in this way you will be able to view all the apps installed on your Chromebook. From this menu, open the “File” app: you will see your USB drive in the left sidebar. All you have to do is do click the eject icon. Alternatively, you can right-click on the drive and select “Eject device”.

If your USB drive has a LED status indicator built-in, it will flash a few times and then go out. At this point, you can physically remove the USB drive safely. If, on the other hand, your unit is not equipped with LED light, we advise you to wait only a few seconds before extracting it.

That’s it - you’ve removed your USB drive from the Chromebook in total safety and without the risk of losing data or interrupting ongoing processes!