Create a bootable USB drive for OSX El Capitan

Everytime when Apple releases new software, I can’t help it to format my computer. I just don’t seem to trust an update of a operating system. I like to create a bootable USB drive because it’s blazing fast to install the OS. For El Capitan, it took me +- 15 minutes with a USB3 stick.

Luckily it is fairly easy to create a bootable USB drive for OSX El Capitan!

Create a bootable USB drive

• Have a USB stick ready (USB3 is really fast! :-))
• Format it with the Disk Utility tool (Mac OSX extended format, give the drive the name Untitled)
• Download OSX El Capitan from the Mac App Store, but quit the update application when it is downloaded.
• Open Terminal
• Use the following command

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ El\ Capitan.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/Untitled --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ El\ Capitan.app/ --nointeraction

• Type in your password when asked
• Wait a little while the files are being copied to your USB stick
• TAKE A FULL BACKUP OF YOUR IMPORTANT FILES
• Reboot your computer and hold the alt key
• You’ll see a menu where you can choose to run the installer from the USB drive

Done 🙂