exFAT is a proprietary, patent-pending file system

File system

A file system is a means to organize data expected to be retained after a program terminates by providing procedures to store, retrieve and update data, as well as manage the available space on the device which contain it. A file system organizes data in an efficient manner and is tuned to the...

 designed especially for USB flash drive

USB flash drive

A flash drive is a data storage device that consists of flash memory with an integrated Universal Serial Bus interface. flash drives are typically removable and rewritable, and physically much smaller than a floppy disk. Most weigh less than 30 g...

s. Developed by Microsoft

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

, it is supported in Windows XP

Windows XP

Windows XP is an operating system produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops and media centers. First released to computer manufacturers on August 24, 2001, it is the second most popular version of Windows, based on installed user base...

 and Windows Server 2003

Windows Server 2003

Windows Server 2003 is a server operating system produced by Microsoft, introduced on 24 April 2003. An updated version, Windows Server 2003 R2, was released to manufacturing on 6 December 2005...

 with update KB955704, Windows Embedded CE 6.0, Windows Vista with Service Pack 1, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2

Windows Server 2008 R2

Windows Server 2008 R2 is a server operating system produced by Microsoft. It was released to manufacturing on July 22, 2009 and launched on October 22, 2009. According to the Windows Server Team blog, the retail availability was September 14, 2009. It is built on Windows NT 6.1, the same core...

 (except Windows Server 2008 Server Core), Mac OS X Snow Leopard starting from 10.6.5, and Mac OS X Lion

Mac OS X Lion

Mac OS X Lion is the eighth and current major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers....

.

exFAT can be used where the NTFS

NTFS

NTFS is the standard file system of Windows NT, including its later versions Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista, and Windows 7....

 file system is not a feasible solution, due to data structure overhead, or where the file size limit of previous versions of the FAT

File Allocation Table

File Allocation Table is a computer file system architecture now widely used on many computer systems and most memory cards, such as those used with digital cameras. FAT file systems are commonly found on floppy disks, flash memory cards, digital cameras, and many other portable devices because of...

 file system is unacceptable.
The advantages over previous File Allocation Table

File Allocation Table

File Allocation Table is a computer file system architecture now widely used on many computer systems and most memory cards, such as those used with digital cameras. FAT file systems are commonly found on floppy disks, flash memory cards, digital cameras, and many other portable devices because of...

 (FAT) file system versions include:

• Scalability to large disk sizes: 64 ZiB
  Zebibyte
  The zebibyte is a standards-based binary multiple of the byte, a unit of digital information storage. The zebibyte unit symbol is ZiB.1 zebibyte = 270 bytes = = 1,024 exbibytes...
  
   theoretical max, 512 TiB
  Tebibyte
  The tebibyte is a standards-based binary multiple of the byte, a unit of digital information storage. The tebibyte unit symbol is TiB....
  
   recommended max, raised from the 2 TiB limit of FAT32 partitions.