Extend C Drive in Windows Server 2022 Without Data Loss

The same with previous versions, C drive is getting full in Windows 2022 server. When it happens, it costs such a long time to back up everything, recreate partitions, restore and verify data. To solve this problem faster and more easily, you can extend C drive without losing data and programs. To accomplish this task, you may try Windows native Disk Management if your disk partition layout meet the requirements. The best way is running safe partition software. This article introduces how to extend C drive in Windows Server 2022 with native and the safest tools.

Expand C drive in Windows Server 2022 without software

From old Server 2008, there's "Extend Volume" functions in Disk Management tool. Windows Server 2022 has the same function without improvement. To enlarge C drive in Server 2022 with Disk Management, there must be adjacent Unallocated space on the right.

If you decrease D drive or other NTFS partition with "Shrink Volume", you'll get unallocated space. But this unallocated space is nonadjacent to C drive, therefore, "Extend Volume" is grayed out.

If you don't want to use third party software, the only way is deleting D drive to get contiguous unallocated space behind C drive. Furthermore, D drive must be the same Primary partition. If it is a Logical drive, "Extend Volume" is still grayed out after deleting.

How to extend C drive in Windows Server 2022 without software:

1. Press Windows + X and click Disk Management in the list.
2. Right click D: drive and select "Delete Volume" in the list, then its space will be changed to "Unallocated".
3. Right click C: drive and select "Extend Volume", you just need to click Next till Finish.

If there's no file system error or other issue, you can expand C drive in a short time. If you don't want to delete any partition or if D drive is Logical, run server partition software instead. There are many choices in the market, but you'd better run the safest software, because there's potential system and partition damage risk while resizing partitions.

Better than other tools, NIUBI Partition Editor has advanced technology to protect system and data in the server:

1. Virtual Mode - operations will be listed as pending and disk partitions won't be changed until click "Apply" to confirm.
2. Cancel-at-will - you can cancel ongoing wrong operations without destroying partitions.
3. 1-Second Rollback - if the program detected any error while changing disk partitions, it reverts server to original status in a flash automatically.
4. Hot Clone - clone disk/partition without server interruption. You can clone system disk regularly and boot from the clone disk immediately if system disk is down.

Three ways to extend C drive in Server 2022 without data loss

There are 3 ways to extend C drive in Windows 2022 Server with NIUBI Partition Editor. Select the corresponding method according to your down disk partiton configuration.

1. Increase C drive with free space in adjacent D drive

Download the Server Edition, you'll see all all storage devices with partition layout and other information in the main window. In my test server, except the small reserved partitions, there are drive C, D and E on Disk 0.

There's plenty of free space in the adjacent D drive, we can shrink this partition to get unallocated space on the left, then add the Unallocated space to C drive.

2. Enlarge C drive with nonadjacent partition E

If there's not plenty of free space in the adjacent partition in your server, you can shrink a nonadjacent volume on the same disk. The method is similar but there's an additional step to move partition D.

How to extend C drive in Windows Server 2022 with nonadjacent E drive:

1. Right click E: drive and select "Resize/Move Volume", drag the left border  towards right or enter an amount to shrink it and make Unallocated space on the left.
2. Right click D: drive and select "Resize/Move Volume", drag the middle of this partition towards right in the pop-up window.
3. Right click C: drive and select "Resize/Move Volume", drag the right border towards right to combine Unallocated space.

Remember to click "Apply" to take effect. Watch the video how to extend C drive in Windows 2022 server without losing data.

3. Extend C drive in Server 2022 with a larger disk

In some servers, there's no other partition or not enough free space on the same disk. In that case, no software can increase C drive by moving free space from a different disk, because the size of a SSD/HDD is fixed. A 500GB physical disk can't be decreased to 400GB or increased to 600GB. Follow the steps to extend partition with extra disk space.

How to increase C drive space in Server 2022 with a larger disk:

1. Connect a larger disk to this server.
2. Right click the front of Disk 0 (in most cases) and select "Clone Disk".
3. Select the larger disk and click Next.
4. Edit partition size and location. Drag the middle of this partition, you can move it. If you drag the border, you can shrink or extend this partition. Remember to start from the last partition.

Tips: this method is also shown in the video above.

If you want to extend C drive in Server 2022 running in VMware/Hyper-V VM, there's no difference when there's available free space on system disk. If there's no available free space, you can expand the virtual disk with VMware/Hyper-v own tool. After expanding disk, extra space is shown as "Unallocated" at the end of disk. You can extend C drive and other partitions with the extra space.

Besides shrinking, moving and extending partitions in Windows Server 2022/2019/2016/2012/2008/2003, NIUBI Partition Editor helps you do many other disk partition management operations.

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