Score:0

Extending root partition to the left with Gparted

br flag

I wanted to extend my root partition with Gparted live USB, my partitions looks like this:

|-----------------sda4(Windows)-----------------|-----------sda6-----------|------sda7(root)------|

Now I took some space from sda6 and got the next result:

|-----------------sda4(Windows)-----------------|------sda6------|-----unallocated-----|------sda7(root)------|

Then I wanted to extend sda7 which is my root but I got a very scary warning about its better NOT to extend my root partition to the left, and to be honest every time I allocated space with Gparted it always was to my right.

My question is, what is the safest way to extend my root partition?

Edit: sda6 is mounted on / and I don't really know what is stored there.

Score:0
us flag

There's no safe way to do it.

Moving an entire partition and its contents has always the risk of data loss and with system partitions as in this question it may result in an unbootable OS.

That said, many have done it without consequences.

Having proper backups is a must.

ImSo3K avatar
br flag
Thank you for the clarification!
ph flag
Despite the risks (I did a backup beforehand) I can confirm that it is indeed possible to extend the partition to the left with Gparted, as long as it is running from a live USB and not from the mounted drive. Gparted will present a scary warning but if your /boot directory is in the UEFI partition and not in /, it will just work (I did exactly what you're trying to do and I had no issues). If you move the partition containing /boot to the left then you'll probably encounter boot issues. They are solvable but annoying and unnerving. Some people will prefer to reinstall everything from scratch.
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