The Best Programs for Cloning Hard Drives

Create, edit and clone partitions are tasks that many users consider “risky.” But once you understand the basics, it’s quite easy to move complete installations from one disk to another without losing a single byte of information. With the rise of solid-state drives, disk cloning has become very relevant, so let’s take a quick look at the tools we consider the best for this job.

Let’s assume you’ve acquired a solid-state drive but want to keep your Windows installation exactly as it is now, rather than setting everything up “from scratch.” That desire takes shape through cloning, a process used not only to transfer entire operating systems but also to configure several computers at once with identical hardware. Many technicians (including me) got their start in the cloning world thanks to the legendary Norton Ghost. As MS-DOS was gradually displaced by Windows, cloning tools increased in complexity, becoming general solutions that manage partitions as well. What can we use today? Let’s see…

Macrium Reflect Free

Macrium Reflect Free is great, no doubt. The free version remains one of the most robust and safe options for cloning disks. In fact, I used it to clone the Windows 10 partition on which I’m writing these very words without any issue. If you need help using it, use this guide we wrote years ago.

GParted

Turning GParted into a Live USB has been one of the most brilliant decisions we’ve seen, since besides being easy to use, it guarantees broad compatibility. In GParted’s case, disk cloning is essentially “copy and paste partitions.” First you create a partition table on the new disk, then you select “copy” on the partition you want to duplicate, and finally you “paste” it into unallocated space. That’s it.

EaseUS Partition Master

If the idea of a Linux distro turned into a disk editor-partitioner-cloner is too intimidating, then all roads lead back to a Windows alternative, and by that I mean EaseUS Partition Master. As with GParted, cloning mostly involves copying and pasting partitions, but working from within Windows should feel much more intuitive for the user.

AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard

A direct alternative to Macrium’s offering comes from AOMEI with its Partition Assistant Standard. The company also offers AOMEI Backupper, but whichever you choose, both allow simple, hassle-free disk cloning. Among its features are support for cloning Ext2/3/4 partitions (yes, from Windows) and BitLocker-encrypted partitions.

Clonezilla

So we come to the “tough guy” of the group, the one many see as the true heir to Norton Ghost. Clonezilla comes in two versions: a “live” edition recommended for individual cases, and the SE edition that can clone more than 40 disks simultaneously, assuming the computers are correctly configured on the network to boot via PXE. The most flexible of all, but it demands respect.

Yes, I admit it: all these recommendations are “known territory.” The point is they’ve reached a very high level of maturity, and when doing something as delicate as moving the entire structure of a disk to another, we want security and robustness. Any other program to suggest? Leave a comment. Good luck!