NTFS Mounter for macOS

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NTFS read/write support for macOS on Apple Silicon — no kernel extensions, no Reduced Security mode. Pairs the user-space FUSE-T with the macos-fuse-t/ntfs-3g fork, and wraps them with:

• a CLI (ntfs-mount list / mount / unmount / eject / auto),
• a LaunchDaemon that automatically mounts every NTFS drive in read/write as soon as it's plugged in,
• a dark menu-bar app — a capacity gauge ring for the active disk and a list of all NTFS drives with fill bars, RW/RO status and Eject buttons,
• automatic defence against Apple's built-in FSKit NTFS driver (which silently re-mounts the same disk read-only in parallel on macOS Tahoe).

Tested on macOS 26 Tahoe / Apple Silicon.

🇷🇺 По-русски

Полная документация на русском языке: README.ru.md

Кратко: утилита даёт macOS на Apple Silicon полноценную запись на NTFS-диски — без kernel extensions и без понижения защиты системы. Диск автоматически монтируется в режиме чтения-записи через несколько секунд после подключения; в строке меню появляется значок со статусом дисков и кнопками Eject. Установка в три шага:

bash install.sh && bash install-gui.sh && bash grant-permissions.sh

Why

macOS reads NTFS but can't write to it. Standard solutions either cost money (Paragon, Tuxera) or require disabling SIP / installing kernel extensions (classic macFUSE). FUSE-T runs entirely in user space (it talks to the kernel through a tiny NFS shim), so:

• no kext to install,
• no need to lower System Integrity Protection,
• no need to reboot into Recovery mode.

Architecture

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│   Menu-bar app (Swift)            macOS GUI                 │
│   - builds menu on open from `ntfs-mount list --porcelain`  │
│   - "● RW" / "○ RO" indicator per drive                     │
│   - Eject per disk / Eject All / Open in Finder             │
│   - privileged ops via sudo -n, fallback to admin prompt    │
└──────────────────────┬──────────────────────────────────────┘
                       │ calls `ntfs-mount eject / mount`
┌──────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────┐
│   ntfs-mount (bash CLI)                                     │
│   - parses `diskutil list` + `mount`                        │
│   - hot-replaces zombie mounts from old device IDs          │
│   - kills Apple's parallel FSKit-NTFS mounts                │
│   - label-scoped eject: unmount FUSE-T mount + SIGTERM      │
│     ntfs-3g, then `diskutil eject`                          │
└──────────────────────┬──────────────────────────────────────┘
                       │ uses
┌──────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────┐
│   ntfs-3g (binary, built from macos-fuse-t/ntfs-3g)         │
│   ← talks to FUSE-T via libfuse-t                           │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│   automount-daemon (LaunchDaemon, root)                     │
│   - polls every 3s via `ntfs-mount list --porcelain`        │
│   - new NTFS drive → mounts RW                              │
│   - Apple FSKit parasite re-appears → unmounts it           │
│   - resolves owner uid via /dev/console (the GUI user)      │
│   - respects eject markers in /var/run/ntfs-mount           │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Install

git clone https://github.com/ArrivaRUS/ntfs-mounter-macos.git
cd ntfs-mounter-macos

# 1. The driver (FUSE-T + ntfs-3g) + CLI
bash install.sh

# 2. The GUI (menu-bar app) + auto-mount daemon
bash install-gui.sh

# 3. Full-Disk Access for the daemon (required since macOS Sequoia)
bash grant-permissions.sh

A prebuilt .dmg of the menu-bar app is attached to each release. It's ad-hoc signed (no Apple Developer ID), so on first launch use right-click → Open. The DMG only contains the GUI — the driver and daemon still come from install.sh + install-gui.sh. Rebuild it yourself anytime with bash build-dmg.sh.

The third step is the only non-obvious one. Even running as root, a LaunchDaemon cannot open /dev/diskX raw devices unless you've explicitly given Full Disk Access to both:

• /usr/local/bin/ntfs-3g (the binary that does the raw read/write)
• /bin/bash (the daemon's interpreter)

grant-permissions.sh opens the right System Settings page and walks you through it.

Note: FDA grants are tied to the binary's hash. If you rebuild/reinstall ntfs-3g, re-add it in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Full Disk Access.

Usage

After install, just plug in an NTFS drive. Within ~5–10 seconds it appears mounted read/write at /Volumes/<label>, and the menu-bar icon shows it with a ● RW tag.

For manual control:

ntfs-mount list                 # all NTFS volumes with their RO/RW status
ntfs-mount list --porcelain     # machine-readable: device|label|fs|mountpoint|state
ntfs-mount mount disk4s1        # remount this disk as RW (by id or label)
ntfs-mount mount all
ntfs-mount unmount disk4s1
ntfs-mount eject disk4s1        # unmount + gracefully stop ntfs-3g + diskutil eject
ntfs-mount auto                 # remount all NTFS as RW

NTFS_MOUNT_DEBUG=1 ntfs-mount mount disk4s1   # per-step trace for diagnostics

To re-format a drive whose NTFS got corrupted beyond repair (erases everything, asks for confirmation):

LABEL="MyDrive" bash format-ntfs.sh

Known sharp edges this project solves

These are real problems we hit while building this, and the workarounds are baked into the scripts:

Problem	What the scripts do
Homebrew cask fuse-t sometimes registers as installed but never runs the .pkg	install.sh runs installer directly if /usr/local/lib/libfuse-t.dylib is missing
autoreconf on macos-fuse-t/ntfs-3g puts ltmain.sh in .. instead of . (LT_INIT hidden behind m4_ifdef)	install.sh copies it back and re-runs autoreconf
macOS bash is 3.2 — no associative arrays, no printf '%(...)T', UTF-8 ellipsis breaks $VAR… parsing	All scripts are bash-3.2-compatible (no declare -A, ASCII only near variables)
LaunchDaemon gets Operation not permitted on /dev/diskX even as root	grant-permissions.sh opens System Settings → Full Disk Access page
macOS Tahoe FSKit silently re-mounts every NTFS read-only in parallel, blocking writes	Daemon detects parasitic fskit/read-only mounts and unmounts them every cycle
Zombie ntfs-3g processes survive a USB unplug and keep holding /Volumes/<label> with stale data	mount_one inspects ps -o args= and kills ntfs-3g processes whose /dev/diskX no longer matches the current device
When daemon runs as root, $(id -un) returns root and the mount ends up with uid=0 (nobody but root can write)	resolve_owner first reads NTFS_OWNER_USER env, then falls back to stat -f '%Su' /dev/console, then to first uid≥501 from dscl — and refuses to mount if it still gets 0
diskutil info doesn't report mount points for FUSE-T NFS-based mounts	Parser falls back to /sbin/mount matching by /dev/diskX, then by fuse-t:/<label>, then by guessing /Volumes/<label>
diskutil eject always fails with "Volume failed to eject" while a FUSE-T mount is alive — DiskArbitration simply doesn't see NFS-style mounts	eject explicitly unmounts the FUSE-T mount (scoped to this disk's label, so a second NTFS drive is untouched), SIGTERMs ntfs-3g, then runs diskutil eject
set -e + command substitution of tools that return non-zero on success (ntfsfix journal replay, diskutil unmount of unmounted path) silently killed the script mid-function	Scripts run with set -uo pipefail only; critical exit codes are checked explicitly
Apple's Spotlight and fseventsd hold files open on NTFS volumes, breaking Finder's move-to-Trash with "object is in use"	After every mount the utility runs mdutil -i off on the volume and touches .fseventsd/no_log
NTFS volumes silently accumulate journal/MFT damage on macOS (no native chkdsk) and start refusing rmdir	ntfs-3g mounts with the recover option (journal replay); for real MFT damage use chkdsk /f on Windows — or format-ntfs.sh if the data is expendable

Components

File	What it is
install.sh	Installs FUSE-T pkg, builds ntfs-3g from source, installs CLI
install-gui.sh	Compiles NTFSMounter.swift into ~/Applications/NTFSMounter.app, sets up LaunchDaemon + LaunchAgent
grant-permissions.sh	Walks user through giving Full Disk Access to ntfs-3g and /bin/bash
uninstall-gui.sh	Removes the GUI layer (keeps driver/CLI)
format-ntfs.sh	Safe re-format of a drive to fresh NTFS (asks for YES confirmation)
ntfs-mount	bash CLI — mount/unmount/eject/list logic, FSKit-killing, zombie cleanup, owner resolution
automount-daemon.sh	Polling loop (bash 3.2 compatible) — calls ntfs-mount on state changes
NTFSMounter.swift	Menu-bar app using NSStatusBar + externaldrive.fill SF Symbol
com.user.ntfs-automount.plist	LaunchDaemon plist (root, KeepAlive)
com.user.ntfsmounter.plist	LaunchAgent plist (user, KeepAlive, log to ~/Library/Logs/NTFSMounter.log)

Performance

FUSE-T routes I/O through a user-space NFS server, so throughput is noticeably below kernel-mode drivers like macFUSE or Paragon. Expect roughly 20–60 MB/s for sequential I/O on USB 3 SSDs — fine for browsing, editing documents, copying medium files. For 100GB+ disk-to-disk transfers, commercial drivers will be faster.

Caveats

• Don't pull the plug. Always Eject through the menu-bar (or ntfs-mount eject). FUSE-T caches writes; physical disconnect without sync risks NTFS journal damage.
• After the first write to a drive that was last touched by Windows with Fast Startup enabled, macOS may pop up "Disk needs to be checked" — this is the NTFS journal flag flipping. Press Skip / Ignore.
• The Apple FSKit NTFS driver on macOS Tahoe will keep trying to mount your drive in parallel. The daemon keeps killing it. If you stop the daemon (sudo launchctl bootout system/com.user.ntfs-automount), you'll be back to read-only mode within seconds.
• macOS has no full NTFS repair tool. ntfsfix shipped with this project only replays the journal — it can't fix MFT-level corruption. If you see phantom directories that refuse to rmdir with Directory not empty, plug the disk into a Windows machine and run chkdsk D: /f /r — or, if the data is expendable, re-format with format-ntfs.sh.
• Never kill -9 ntfs-3g manually. Hard-killing it tears down the FUSE-T NFS channel mid-flight, and macOS ejects the entire USB device. The eject command unmounts first and stops ntfs-3g with SIGTERM (graceful) — it only escalates if the process ignores it.

Uninstall

bash uninstall-gui.sh                                # GUI + daemon
sudo rm -f /usr/local/bin/ntfs-mount \
           /usr/local/bin/ntfs-3g \
           /usr/local/bin/ntfsfix \
           /usr/local/sbin/mount.ntfs-3g
brew uninstall --cask macos-fuse-t/homebrew-cask/fuse-t

License

MIT. The bundled ntfs-3g build is built from macos-fuse-t/ntfs-3g (GPL-2.0 + LGPL-2.0). FUSE-T is its own license — see its repo.