Make windows bootable on ubuntu

Update for 2023 using Ubuntu 22.04LTS desktop and creating a Windows 10 installation bootable USB; I doubt very much the 17 other answers missed this, so I think it must be much easier in 22.04 than it was in previous Ubuntu versions. Please note that this approach requires that your system (Bios) can boot into a NTFS formatted drive. If that’s not the case, look at the other answers below. You may be able to find out if your hardware can boot into NTFS by looking at its documentation. Older hardware will likely not be able to boot into NTFS, and even some newer ones as the comments show.

I couldn’t get WoeUSB to work in 22.04 and judging by the recent review scores, it’s probably not working for most people now.

It seems you can now do it without any special tools. You do need to install gparted which isn’t installed by default in Ubuntu, but in my view it’s a useful tool to have anyway.

Note that I have done this for Windows 10 and confirm it works; I’ve included the Windows 11 download link in this answer but haven’t tested that.

1. Download the Windows iso from Microsoft

Download at:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/windows10ISO (Windows 10)

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/windows11 (Windows 11)

Save the iso file somewhere sensible (eg Downloads). Note (in case your internet is metered, limited or slow), that it is about 5-6GB.

2. install gparted from the software store

Just search for gparted and it’s a simple installation from Ubuntu Software.

3. Format your USB drive using gparted:

Be very careful to select the correct device at the top — whatever you format will lose any data on it.

Click ‘Device’ then ‘Create Partition Table’.

In the drop-down menu, use ‘gpt’ for the partition type, note the warning and click ‘Apply’.

Click on the ‘Partition’ menu, then select ‘New’.

In the dialog box, chose ‘NTFS’ as the filesystem. (You can’t use FAT32 as that only supports files up to 4GB and one of the files is over 5GB.)

Click the green tick at the top to enact your changes — and your USB should be formatted and ready to go.

4. Open the iso to see the files and copy across

Navigate to your .iso download.

Right-click on the file and a pop-up should give you the option ‘Open With Disk Image Mounter’ — select that (in fact it is usually the default option if you double-click).

Your iso should now open as if it were a separate drive, and appear in the dock like a hard drive.

Double-click on the iso drive in the dock — it should open with a bunch of files and folders.

Copy the entire contents of that drive to your USB.

5. Set a boot flag for the USB

In gparted, select the USB device

Click on the graphical display of the partition you created.

Click on the ‘Partition’ menu at the top and select ‘Manage Flags’

Place a tick in the ‘boot’ box

That’s it!

This tutorial is going to show you an easy way to create a Windows 10 bootable USB on Linux. I use Ubuntu 20.04 as an example. The method applies to any Linux distribution. I use Windows to do online banking because my bank doesn’t support Linux and sometimes play games that can’t run on Linux.

What you need

• A computer running Linux
• A USB flash drive at least 8GB
• Windows 10 ISO

Download Windows 10 ISO

First, you should download Windows 10 ISO from Microsoft official download link. Note that you might not be able to download the ISO from this link on a Windows computer. This download link is visible to users on Linux computer. Once downloaded, follow the instructions below.

Note: It’s recommended to download the Windows 10 April 2018 update ISO, because the October Update ISO contains a file that is larger than 4GB, which can not be copied to a FAT32 partition.

Update: Microsoft doesn’t allow you to download the Windows 10 April 2018 Update ISO from their website anymore. You can download the ISO via this link: Win10 1803 English x64 ISO

Creating a Windows 10 Bootable USB for UEFI Firmware

This method works for UEFI firmware and is very simple. You create a GUID partition table on your USB stick, create a FAT32 file system on it, and then mount Windows 10 ISO image and copy those Windows 10 files to your USB stick and you are done. The following is a step-by-step guide.

First, install GParted partition editor on your Linux distribution. Ubuntu users run the following command.

sudo apt install gparted

Then insert your USB stick to your computer. Make sure you back up important files in your USB stick if there’s any. Next, launch Gparted. You will need to enter your password in order to use GParted.

Select your USB stick from the drop-down menu on the upper-right corner. My USB stick is /dev/sdb. Yours may be different.

If there’s a key icon after the partition name, that means the partition is mounted. Make sure all partitions on your USB stick are unmounted. To unmount a partition, simply right-click on it and select unmount.

Next, on the menu bar, select Device > Create partition table.

Choose GPT as the partition table type and click Apply.

Then right-click on the unallocated space and select New to create a new partition.

Change file system type from ext4 to fat32 and click Add.

Note: The install.wim file in Windows 10 October 2018 update ISO is 4.1G, so if you downloaded this ISO image, you need to change ext4 to ntfs. If you downloaded Windows 10 April 2018 Update ISO, which contains a 3.9G size install.wim file, you can change ext4 to fat32

Update: It is my observation that my NTFS formatted USB stick isn’t bootable on my old laptop, which was bought in 2012. However, it is bootable on my desktop computer, which was bought in 2017. It has a graphical UEFI firware (I can use my mouse to configure firmware settings).

Next, click the green check button on the toolbar to apply this operation. Once that’s done, close GParted (This is important), then find your Windows 10 ISO in file manager. Open it with disk image mounter.

Open the mounted file system. Select all files and folders and copy them to your USB stick.

Sometimes the file manager on Ubuntu hangs and it seems that the copy operation has stopped. Actually it’s working, just be patient. When you see a check mark, it means the copy operation has finished.

If your file manager doesn’t have the Disk image mounter in the context menu, then you can use the following commands to mount. The first command will create a mount point for Windows 10 ISO and the second command will mount Windows 10 ISO under that mount point.

sudo mkdir /mnt/windows10/

sudo mount -t auto -o loop /path/to/window-10-iso /mnt/windows10/

Now in your file manager, go to /mnt/windows10/ and copy all files and folders to your USB stick.

Once the file and folders are copied, your windows 10 bootable USB is created! You can shut down your computer, boot it from this USB stick and install Windows 10 in UEFI mode. Keep in mind that you may need to disable compatibility support module (CSM) in the firmware in order to boot in UEFI mode. You may also need to remove USB stick from your computer and insert it back in order for the firmware to detect the boot loader on your USB stick.

Boot Windows 10 ISO Installer without USB (BIOS & UEFI)

Ever wondered if you can boot Windows 10 ISO installer without a USB flash drive? Yes, you can do it with GRUB2, which is the standard boot loader on Linux.

GRUB2 can not boot Windows 10 ISO directly. You need to create a separate NTFS partition on your hard disk or SSD with a partition editor like GParted and extract the Windows 10 ISO to that partition. Download the Windows 10 ISO file. The latest Windows 10 ISO file is 5.8G. The new NTFS partition should be at least 7G and it should not be used to store any other files.

Then find your Windows 10 ISO in file manager. Open it with disk image mounter.

Open the mounted file system. Select all files and folders and copy them to the NTFS partition.

Sometimes the file manager on Ubuntu hangs and it seems that the copy operation has stopped. Actually, it’s working. Just be patient. When you see a checkmark, it means the copy operation has finished.

Next, open up a terminal window and edit the /etc/grub.d/40_custom file with a text editor such as Nano.

sudo nano /etc/grub.d/40_custom

In this file, we can add custom entries to the GRUB boot menu. In this case, we want to add an entry to boot the Windows 10 installer. If your computer still uses the traditional BIOS firmware, then add the following lines in this file.

menuentry "Windows-10-Installer.iso" {
  set root=(hd0,6)
  insmod part_msdos
  insmod ntfs
  insmod ntldr
  #uncomment the following line if your computer has multiple hard drives. 
  #drivemap -s (hd0) ${root}
  ntldr /bootmgr
}

My NTFS partition is the 6th partition on my first disk, so I use (hd0,6) as the root. You can run sudo parted -l command to check your NTFS partition number. If your computer has multiple hard drives, use the drivemap command to set the partition (hd0,6) as the first hard disk, so Windows will be able to boot.

If your computer uses UEFI firmware, then add the following text in this file.

menuentry "Windows-10-Installer.iso" {
  set root=(hd0,6)
  insmod part_gpt
  insmod ntfs
  insmod chain
  chainloader /efi/boot/bootx64.efi
}

Save and close the file. (Press Ctrl+O, then press Enter to save a file in Nano text editor. Press Ctrl+X to exit.)

Then update GRUB boot menu.

sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

or

sudo grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg

Next, set GRUB to boot the Windows 10 installer for the next boot with the following command.

sudo grub-reboot Windows-10-Installer.iso

or

sudo grub2-reboot Windows-10-Installer.iso

Unplug all your external USB storage devices, then reboot your computer. GRUB will choose the Windows 10 installer.

GRUB2 can also boot Linux ISO files stored on the hard drive, so you don’t need to create Linux live USB.

• How to Boot ISO Files From GRUB2 Boot Loader

Creating a Windows 10 Bootable USB for Legacy BIOS Using WoeUSB

WoeUSB is a fork of WinUSB. Both of them are open-source software (licensed in GPL) for making Windows bootable USB sticks on Linux platform, but the latter hasn’t been updated since 2012. You may be wondering why it’s named WoeUSB. The author said it’s a GNU convention to abbreviate software that support Windows to “woe”.

To install WoeUSB on Ubuntu 14.04/16.04/17.04, you can use the following PPA. Simply open up a terminal window and run the following commands one by one. Other Linux distro users can compile this software by following the instructions on the Github project page.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8

sudo apt update

sudo apt install woeusb

This PPA contains many other software. If you don’t need them, you can now remove this PPA from your system.

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8

sudo apt update

You can launch WoeUSB from Unity Dash or your application menu.

You can also start it from command line with:

woeusbgui

It’s very easy to use the WoeUSB GUI. Select Windows ISO image and your target USB device. Make sure your data on the USB device is backed up before hitting the Install button.

Then wait for the installation to complete.

Once done, you can use the bootable USB to install Windows 10 on your computer.

How to Use WoeUSB From the Command Line

First, find the device name of your USB stick using the following command.

lsblk

Mine is /dev/sdb. Make sure your USB is unmounted with the following command. Replace /dev/sdb1 with your own partition name.

sudo umount /dev/sdb1

Then create a bootable Windows 10 USB like below. Red texts shoudl be adapted to your own ISO file name and USB device name. The -v (--verbose) option will give more detailed output.

sudo woeusb -v --device windows-10.iso /dev/sdb

In my test, the Windows 10 USB created with WoeUSB can boot in both legacy and UEFI mode on my old computer. On my new computer, it can boot in legacy mode but failed in UEFI mode. I don’t know the exact reason, but it’s probably because of bug in this software.

That’s it! I hope this tutorial helped you create windows 10 bootable USB on Ubuntu or any Linux distribution. As always, if you found this post useful, then subscribe to our free newsletter to get new tutorials.

Learn how to create a bootable Windows 10 USB on Ubuntu and Linux Mint using a free application called ‘WoeUSB’ in this guide.

While I don’t use Windows 10 as my primary OS I do know, every now and then, need to. And should I need to create a bootable Windows 10 USB to install the system from I like do it from my Ubuntu desktop.

There are several ways to perform this particular task, but the steps in this post walk through what I consider to be the easy way to create a bootable Windows 10 USB (one that actually boots).

Ready to learn more?

WoeUSB is the (oddly named) app to use to make a bootable Windows 10 USB stick on Ubuntu. A fork of an earlier tool called WinUSB, WoeUSB is free open source software and is available as a graphical app (GUI) and a command-line only (CLI) client.

In this tutorial we focus on using the WoeUSB GUI app.

So what does it do?

Related Guide

How to Install WSL 2 on Windows 10

Well, WoeUSB lets you make a bootable USB for various Windows releases, including Windows Vista, Windows 7, Window 8, and Windows 10. 

All languages and all variants of Windows, including Pro, Home, N, 32-bit, and more. are supported, and the tool works with both ‘legacy’ and ‘UEFI’ bootmodes, too.

For advanced use cases I recommend using the WoeUSB CLI as it has all sorts of flags and switches to curate custom installs with specialist needs.

But for everyone else the WoeUSB GUI client is all that’s needed.

Before we begin make sure you have all of the following to handy, as all are required to create a bootable Windows 10 USB on Ubuntu:

• WoeUSB app
• USB flash drive (4GB minimum)
• Windows 10 .iso file

Remember: you can download Windows 10 disc images from the Microsoft website. If you don’t currently have one you should go there to grab one. You do need a valid Windows license to activate and use most versions of Windows, but you don’t need one to create an installable USB of Windows or perform the install.

1. Install WoeUSB on Ubuntu

First the drawback: WoeUSB is not longer actively maintained upstream, meaning you can no longer download the tool direct from its original GitHub page.

However, since the tool is so useful the community has stepped in to fork the app and continue development. They have also created personal package archive (PPA) for users to install WoebUSB on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS through 20.04 LTS.

To add the WoeUSB PPA to your software sources run the following two commands from a terminal emulator of your choice:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tomtomtom/woeusb

sudo apt update && sudo apt install woeusb-frontend-wxgtk

If you use a 32-bit version of Ubuntu 16.04 LTS you can download a Ubuntu 32-bit WoeUSB installer.

2. Run WoeUSB

With WoeUSB installed on your system the next step is to open it. Go to your preferred application menu (on Ubuntu press the Super key) and find ‘WoeUSB’.

The app is quick to open and is easy to use.

First, select a valid Windows 10 .ISO image using the file selector button, then select the USB drive you want to install it to from the ‘Target device’ section.

If you don’t see your USB device listed in the ‘Target device’ section first make sure it’s plugged in correctly and then click the ‘refresh’ button to update the list of attached devices.

3. Create Windows 10 Bootable USB

Before you go ahead and hit ‘install’ to create your bootable Windows USB please, please double-check that you’ve selected the correct drive first. The install process will wipe the contents of the selected USB drive. You will lose any data stored on it.

Other than that, the tool does the rest so just let it run its course

Once flashing is complete you’ll see a small notification. Close WoeUSB, safely eject the USB drive you’ve created, and use it as a boot device elsewhere to install Windows 10.

Бывают случаи, когда вам нужно записать Windows на флешку в Linux, например, когда вы хотите поставить эту систему второй для использования специализированных программ, или вам нужно переустановить операционку своим знакомым. Или же есть пользователи Linux, которые решили вернуться на Windows, но единственную флешку уже перезаписали под Linux LiveUSB.

Загрузочная флешка Windows в Linux создается достаточно просто. Я предлагаю несколько способов решения этой проблемы. Все их я перечислил ниже.

Загрузочную флешку можно создать с помощью терминала или специальных графических утилит. Настоятельно рекомендую отформатировать флешку в Fat32 (или Exfat) перед использованием любого из предложенных методов. Форматирование можно выполнить через Gparted, сfdisk+mkfs или через usb stick formatter (форматирование USB флеш накопителя).

Способ 1. Утилита USB Image Write

Для создания флешки можно воспользоваться утилитой Запись образа на USB. В некоторых дистрибутивах она уже предустановленна (Ubuntu, Mint и др.):

Выбрать образ в графе Write image образ и в поле to выбрать флешку. Далее нажимаем Write.

Способ 2. Утилита WoeUSB

Пожалуй, это самый простой способ создания. Установка в Ubuntu выполняется с помощью таких команд:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8

sudo apt update

sudo apt install woeusb

Откройте утилиту в меню приложений:

Интерфейс простой. Нажмите на кнопку Обзор со значком папки и выберите образ. Target device это флешка, на которую будет идти запись, если у вас их несколько выберите нужную. Ещё есть поле File system, где нужно выбрать какую файловую систему будете использовать. Рекомендую FAT. Затем нажмите Install и дождитесь окончания.

При появлении ошибки с кодом 256 Source media is currently mounted, размонтируйте образ ISO с Windows, если вы его смонтировали. При ошибке Target device is currently busy, извлеките флешку, затем снова подключите её. Если не сработало, попробуйте отформатировать её.

Способ 3. Терминал и Gparted

Положите образ в домашнюю папку и переименуйте его в windows.iso во избежание проблем с пробелами. Затем перейдите в терминале в домашнюю папку

cd ~

Запустите терминал через главное меню или с помощью сочетания клавиш Ctrl + Alt + T затем используйте команду dd для записи образа на флешку:

dd if=/windows.iso of=/dev/sdX

Замените X на букву вашей флешки! Узнать её можно через Gparted. В правом верхнем углу есть кнопка переключения дисков:

Тот диск который соответствует размеру вашей флешки и есть ваша флешка. В моем случае флешка на 32 гб это /dev/sdb. Значит команда будет иметь вид:

dd if=/windows.iso of=/dev/sdb

Дождитесь окончания записи и извлеките флешку.

Выводы

Как видите, создание загрузочной флешки Windows в Linux не представляет сложности. Это были все способы, которые я знаю. Если они вам помогли, напишите об этом. Если вы знаете еще способы, обязательно напишите о них в комментариях!

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Об авторе

Здравствуйте, я изучаю Linux и обладаю хорошими знаниями английского.