How to Clone and Backup your SD Card for Android and Windows

If you have recently purchased a bigger and faster SD card and looking to upgrade your existing SD Card on your Android (Or Windows) phone, then you have come to the right place. SD Cards are a life saver for many. It’s comparatively cheaper and helps you to expand your disk space. Be it Windows or an Android phone, a lot of these devices comes with an SD Card slot for expandability. So how to clone and backup your SD card for Android and Windows? Here are your options:

Backup using a Card Reader on a Windows PC

1. Connect your micro-SD Card to a Windows PC using a card reader.
2. Ensure that your card is visible in Windows Explorer.
3. Ensure that all files including hidden items are selected.
4. Select all files and copy all the contents from the card to a new folder directory on your Windows computer.
5. Remove the micro-sd card safely from the card reader.
6. Replace the original card with the new bigger card, and attach it to the same computer.
7. Copy all the contents of the copied directory from step 4 to the new SD card.
8. Again safely remove the card again and place it into your original Android device.

Backup and Clone your SD Card using the Windows Command Prompt

1. Open command prompt and run as Administrator (Elevated Privileges)
2. Ensure that the old SD Card is in the card slot
3. Type C:>Enter (Change Driver Letter Path as per your Installation and Preferences)
4.  Type cd / Enter (Change Directory)
5. md sd-cardbackup (Make Directory)
6. cd sd-cardbackup (Change to the new directory)
7. xcopy G:*.* /S /E /V (Copy All contents, time taken depends upon content size)
8. Eject the Old SD Card and replace with the new one.
9. Type C:
10. cd /
11. cd sd-cardbackup
12. xcopy *.* G: /S /E /V

Backup your SD-Card using a Linux PC

Sometimes, some of the files with hidden file attributes may not be copied properly. In these scenarios, you can use a Linux live CD in order complete the process.

1. Boot your PC with a Linux Live CD
2. Once booted up, Open the Linux console.
3. Ensure that your SD card is properly mounted in Linux.
4. Use the Linux Copy Command “cp -R /path/to/source/* /path/to/target” to copy files.
5. Replace the original SD Card with the new one and repeat step 4 to copy the contents.

Copy Command Example

Cloning an Android SD Card using  EaseUS Todo Backup Free Tool

Using this tool is a 2 step process to copy the SD Card contents from the source to the destination. The Free tool can help you to complete the job in most scenarios. Here is a quick comparison sheet:

See their video to learn more.

I hope this was helpful. If you have any feedback or suggestions, feel free to comment below.