If your external hard drive is empty and you do not have a specific file on it, you can open it on a Mac and run the Disk Utility application and select the Erase option after selecting your hard drive. If your hard drive was empty: Fix 1: Format the drive into Mac-compatible file system There are several ways to fix a read-only error on an NTFS-formatted external hard drive on Mac, but you should first check the condition of the hard drive. What is the solution now? Read more to fix the NTFS read-only on Mac error. Fix external hard drive read-only in macOS However, the point is that the format of the Windows operating system is completely different from the format of Mac or Linux, so it is possible that if you formatted a hard drive into NTFS on Windows, it will be read-only in macOS. If you own an external hard drive and use it on a Windows operating system, it means the format of the disk is NTFS. Sometimes it is possible that when connecting your external hard drive to macOS, the hard drive will be in read-only mode and you will not be able to write the disk.