What’s The Best Cross-Platform File System for external SSD/HD

[osculum_est_mortis]

I use linux/windows/Mac OS and its very annoying having encrypted drives that don't work with each other unless I use veracrypt or boot into a VM to unlock one another ... time consuming and just a pain .
wondering if there is a way so solve this ? can I unlock LUKS on Mac ? or unlock APFS encrypted Mac on linux ? vice versa
is there a file system that will work with encryption for cross platform without having to use veracrypt ??

found this from 2012 not sure if its still relevent

FAT32 Cross-Platform File System​

Advantages:

• Works natively and perfectly in all three operating systems.

Disadvantages:

• No journalling.
• Relatively low maximum partition size (2 Terabytes – not attainable yet but will be).
• Inefficient at large partition sizes.
• Maximum file size limited at 4GB.

NTFS​

Advantages:

• Works natively and perfectly in Windows.
• Other operating systems support read support natively.
• Robust and journalled.
• Very high limits on maximum partition size
• Very high limits on maximum file size.
• Generally efficient at large partition sizes.

Disadvantages:

• Requires third party software to allow for write support on Linux and Mac OS X.
• Slower on Linux and Mac OS X because of the use of FUSE.
• Proprietary filesystem patented, and at the whim of, Microsoft.

Ext3 – Cross-Platform File System​

Advantages:

• Works natively and perfectly on Linux.
• Generally fast, journalled filesystem.
• High file and partition size limits.

Disadvantages:

• Requires third party software to allow for any access under Windows or Mac OS X.
• Third party software tends only to support ext2 resulting in extra file system checks (and these are slow).

HFS+​

Advantages:

• Works natively and perfectly on Mac OS X.
• Works natively and perfectly on Linux (without journalling)
• Generally fast, journalled file system (but journalling must be disabled for Linux)
• High file and partition size limit

Disadvantages:

• Requires third party software to allow for any access under Windows.
• Linux access requires disabling journalling.
• Free HFSExplorer is not integrated into the Windows explorer.
• Commercial MacDrive (with full Windows explorer integration) is not free of charge.

 

[velocityg4]

I’d say use ExFAT. I suppose you could use VeraCrypt for encryption.

 

[chscag]

ExFat would be my choice also. The only disadvantage with exFAT is that like all other FAT files systems it's non journaled.

 

[robd003]

Paragon will sell you read/write APFS support for about $80 for both Linux and Windows. Check it out here: https://www.paragon-software.com/us/home/apfs-linux/

 

[robd003]

Paragon will sell you read/write APFS support for about $80 for both Linux and Windows. Check it out here: https://www.paragon-software.com/us/home/apfs-linux/

Unfortunately it looks like they don't support writing to encrypted APFS volumes.

 

[osculum_est_mortis]

its unusual that this file system doesn't exist. when it should. 🤔🤔

 

[Rimmsi]

You can use Paragon to write to NTFS on Mac OS. I'm not sure if it's encrypted.