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In Ubuntu 13.04 there was an option to use the PPA by Relan in order to get ExFat functionality. Seeing that in Ubuntu this functionality is now available from the repositories without the PPA I tried this but failed to make it work.

So my question is how do I enable exfat support?

Seth
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davorao
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  • Odly enough, when searching the term exfat in the software center I can still find the fuse-utils (after showing technical items) but after clicking on it, it says "Not found - There isn’t a software package called “fuse-exfat” in your current software sources." – davorao Nov 03 '13 at 10:49

5 Answers5

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Turns out the packages from the official repositories do the trick. Just install exfat-utils and exfat-fuse packages using the package manager of your choice, or just using apt-get from the command line:

sudo apt-get install exfat-utils exfat-fuse

This should delivery a working exfat file system (read and write support, but not formatting the drives with exfat via Gnome Disks and GParted).

From 13.04+ it hasn't been necessary but if you're using 12.04 you might need to reboot your computer before you can mount your exfat partition. If it isn't working for you after installing the packages, try rebooting.

Oli
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davorao
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    For me, this now works even without a reboot. Using Ubuntu 13.10 x64. – Andrew Ensley Jan 10 '14 at 16:50
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    Worked perfectly without reboot to get Ubuntu to recognize a Samsung T1 external SSD. Thanks! – friederbluemle Feb 04 '15 at 08:53
  • Works perfectly! No reboot required! If it doesn't want to work directly after the installation, then just unplug the drive and plug it back in... – ntninja May 09 '15 at 21:09
  • I had to reboot, for 15.04. but It works great. – Mateo Jul 09 '15 at 04:32
  • Didn't have to reboot with Ubuntu 15.04. – Nathan Osman Jul 29 '15 at 17:32
  • exfat-fuse alone was enough on my Ubuntu 15. No reboot required, – rptb1 Feb 03 '16 at 01:06
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    Worked perfectly in Ubuntu 16.04 with a WD drive formatted with exfat. Thanks! – Jorge Arévalo May 04 '16 at 09:08
  • I'm trying to access a microSD card. After installing exfat-utils and exfat-fuse on 16.04 and plugging the card reader I get the error message : "Can't open a folder for " and "No application is registered to manage this file". I have no idea how to solve this one. – chmike Aug 23 '16 at 08:12
  • I found out that in my case /media/ was created with ownership set to root:root. Once I changed it to : I could access the data and navigate in it using the file navigator. – chmike Aug 23 '16 at 08:32
  • I know, this is very late, but... OMG! Thank you! You're a life saver :D –  Oct 03 '16 at 12:31
  • Works perfect for 16.04 - no reboot needed just unplugged the thumbdrive and plugged it back in – Josh Mar 23 '18 at 21:49
  • Ubuntu 18.04 LTS only requires sudo apt install exfat-utils exfat-fuse – pzrq May 01 '18 at 00:39
  • What to do on 14.04? – Trect Oct 28 '18 at 14:09
  • UbuntuStudio 19.04 only needs exfat-utils explicitly. That also grabs exfat-fuse automatically as a dependency. I can read my camera now. – AaronD Sep 16 '19 at 04:27
  • In Ubuntu 23.04, I get this error: "E: Package 'exfat-utils' has no installation candidate" – Flimm Oct 06 '23 at 18:45
21

Finally get it to work on my 13.10.

I did:

sudo apt-add-repository ppa:relan/exfat
sudo apt-get install fuse  # (only fuse)

and lastly

sudo apt-get install exfat-fuse   # (instead of fuse-exfat)

Plugged my External HD and it's working read/write.

Xen2050
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Ivoreali
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    I'm not sure what's changed, but this seems to be no longer necessary as the official packages, exfat-utils and exfat-fuse work just fine for me. – Andrew Ensley Jan 10 '14 at 16:51
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    if you are formatting your own exfat volume, make sure to set the partition id to ntfs, not fat---otherwise, OSX will not recognize it. at least, this is what it took on my system. – user1539216 Sep 01 '14 at 16:18
6

I just did a successful install on 4/3/2014 with Ubuntu 13.10, fully updated, using only this command:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install exfat-utils

No restart required, and the drive auto-mounted with full read/write support.

user264999
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5

fuse-utils moved to fuse. fuse-utils has been a trasitionary metapackage (something that just depends on the new package name) since 12.04.

That doesn't help you much if you have something that has a package dependency on fuse-utils because you're right, the metapackage has been removed now. The simplest thing to do might be to just download the Raring version and install that. It shouldn't hurt anything as it makes no demands on which version of fuse to install, just that there's one installed.

Oli
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  • Hi @Oli I will try that. Thanks for the tip. Will write how it worked. – davorao Nov 03 '13 at 10:55
  • @davorao If it's any consolation, it might be mainline (and not need fuse) by the next Ubuntu release. There already is a kernel driver but it's not quite ready yet, from what I can see. – Oli Nov 03 '13 at 11:04
  • It is actually. The Raring version wouldn't quite want to work, so I will wait and see how it evolves over time. Thanks. :) – davorao Nov 03 '13 at 11:05
0

In Ubuntu 23.04, here's how to install support for the exFAT filesystem:

sudo apt install exfat-fuse exfatprogs
Flimm
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