Can't delete BOOTCAMP partition

Question

Bought a second hand iMac that had two partitions on the HDD. One for Mac, one for Windows. Using disk utility I erased the BOOTCAMP partition and formatted it to MacOS Extended (Journaled). All went well until I tried to remove the BOOTCAMP partition. The minus option is not enabled and I can't seem to fin any other way to delete it.

This is what I've tried:

• Reboot on recovery mode and try to delete using disk utility. (Same result)
• Use Bootcamp assistant to remove the partition. Didn't work as windows is gone from that partition.

How can delete it? I want to have just one partition.

Answer 1

I found the answer in this Apple Support Communities thread.

This is what I did:

In terminal executed diskutil list and the output was

#:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk0
1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            542.3 GB   disk0s2
3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s4
4:                  Apple_HFS BOOTCAMP                449.0 MB   disk0s4
5:                 Apple_Boot                         650.0 MB   disk0s5

Then I executed the following commands:

diskutil eraseVolume jhfs+ BC1 disk0s4
diskutil list

And the output was:

#:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk0
1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            542.3 GB   disk0s2
3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s4
4:                  Apple_HFS BC1                     449.0 MB   disk0s4

then:

diskutil eraseVolume fat32 BOOTCAMP disk0s4

After that I opened Boot Camp Assistant and I was able to restore the HD to a single partition.

Answer 2

I had the same problem using OSX Mojave and Apple tech support had me delete the 'OSXReserved" partition using disk utility which then allowed me to delete the bootcamp partition.

Answer 3

The macOS operating system includes a disk utility command called diskutil. Also included is a Disk Utility application which can preform a subset of the functions offered by the diskutil command. (These functions are technically referred to as verbs.) The Disk Utility application also does not necessarily display all the partitions that actually exist on a drive. Often, posting just what is viewed from the Disk Utility application is not sufficient to diagnose and repair a problem with a drive.

In your case, you can not delete the BOOTCAMP partition because the partition is preceded by a partition that can not be resized. Well, you have not identified, in your question, which partition this is. In fact, the Disk Utility application may not even be displaying this partition.

To delete the BOOTCAMP partition using the Disk Utility application, you will need to first remove or HFS format the preceding partition. This is usually the partition immediately preceding, but not always.

The basic steps given below.

1. Use either the Disk Utility application or diskutil command to identify the preceding partition that needs to be HFS formatted or removed. The diskutil command format is given below.

   diskutil  list
   

2. Use either the Disk Utility application or diskutil command to remove or HFS format the preceding partition.

3. Use the Disk Utility application to remove the BOOTCAMP partition.

Answer 4

How to re-partition a drive back to one partition:

• Log on to internet recovery for Mac
• Go to the partition and choose 100% partition.

Answer 5

I erased the disk from disk utility then opened boot camp assistant and it erased it properly and added the space to the existing volume.

Answer 6

In my case, I had to use 'eraseDisk' to erase the disk. That allowed me to use Disk Utility to create a single partition for installing Monterey.

diskutil eraseDisk jhfs+ internal disk1

Answer 7

Similar to @Carlos J's answer, here's what I found on a Apple forum thread:

Execute diskutil list in Terminal, then:

diskutil eraseVolume free free disk0s4
diskutil apfs ResizeContainer disk1 0g

Answer 8

The only way to do what you want with the Boot Camp partition is to do it with the Boot Camp Assistant!