A brief history of Mac native file systems

a year ago

MFS (Macintosh File System) was the first file system for Macintosh computers, introduced in 1984 with System 1, supporting 400 KB floppy disks and featuring forks (data and resource forks).
MFS allowed file names up to 255 characters but had no directory hierarchy; it was discontinued in 1997.
HFS (Hierarchical File System) replaced MFS in 1985, introducing a hierarchical directory structure and supporting hard disks, with support ending in 2019.
HFS+ (Mac OS Extended) was introduced in 1998 to address HFS limitations, supporting larger files, Unicode, and journalling for error recovery.
APFS (Apple File System) was developed for modern storage needs, introduced in 2016, supporting features like snapshots, encryption, and optimized performance for SSDs.
APFS faced initial challenges with Fusion Drives and Unicode normalization but became the standard for macOS and iOS.
Key milestones include MFS (1984-1997), HFS (1985-2019), HFS+ (1998-present), and APFS (2016-present).

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