Increase D drive free space in Windows Server 2016

This article introduces how to increase D drive space in Windows Server 2016, 3 ways to increase size of D drive with Disk Management, Diskpart and NIUBI Partition Editor.

System partition C is very likely getting full if you install everything into it. If you install programs and some Windows services to D drive, it also runs out of space. In that case, you can increase D drive free space from other volumes. There are several way to increase D drive size with Windows native and 3rd-party tool. However, Windows native tools cannot increase partition size in most cases.

Increase D drive space with Server 2016 Disk Management

From Windows Server 2008, there is built-in Extend Volume function in Disk Management tool, which can help extend part of partitions without losing data and on the fly.

However, only when your disk partition configuration meet all following requirements, you can increase D drive space with Server 2016 Disk Management:

1. There is another partition (such as E:) on the right side of D drive.
2. You can delete the right contiguous partition E.
3. There's enough free space in another volume to save all files in drive E.
4. Both drive D and E are on the same disk.
5. Drive D must be formatted with NTFS file system.

Steps to increase D drive free space in Windows Server 2016 Disk Management:

1. Transfer all files in the right contiguous partition E to other place.
2. Press Windows and X together on the keyboard, then click Disk Management in the list.
3. Right click drive E and select Delete Volume.
4. Right click drive D and select Extend Volume.
5. Simply click Next till Finish in the pop-up Extend Volume Wizard window.

If D and E are different type of partitions in MBR style disk, there are additional restrictions while extending D drive.

Although there's another Shrink Volume function, Disk Management cannot expand D drive by shrinking any volumes. (Learn why)

How to increase D drive size with diskpart command line

Diskpart runs from command prompt and it has many commands. In some ways Disk Management is the GUI version of Diskpart.

But better than Disk Management, the type of partition D is not an issue to Diskpart. That means, as long as the right contiguous drive E is Primary, you can delete it to expand D drive with diskpart, no matter D is Primary or Logical partition.

Steps to increase D drive space with diskpart in Windows Server 2016:

1. Transfer all files in drive E to other partition manually.
2. Press Windows and R together on the keyboard, type diskpart and press Enter.
3. Type list volume and press Enter in diskpart command prompt window.
4. Type select volume E and press Enter.
5. Type delete volume and press Enter.
6. Type select volume D and press Enter.
7. Type extend and press Enter.

However, if D is Primary and E is Logical partition, there are 2 additional steps before 6th step:

1. Type select partition 0 and press Enter.
2. Type delete partition and press Enter.

Diskpart command is a little better than Disk Management while increasing D drive by deleting E, but other restrictions are the same. That means, your disk partition configuration must meet the 5 requirements listed on the top, too.

Better way to increase size of D drive with partition editor

With NIUBI Partition Editor, there are no such limitations and it is extremely easy to increase D: drive space in Windows Server 2016. The most important, you can increase size of D without deleting other volume.

Download NIUBI Partition Editor and follow the steps to increase D drive size by shrinking C or E:

More detailed info about extending D drive in Windows Server 2016.