I turned off BitLocker encryption on my 5TB drive and now it continues to decrypt for days!

I am worried I will lose my data while the drive decrypts. It is now at 23.2% encrypted and continues dropping to 23.1 etc.

Do I have to wait until it reaches 0% encryped before I can turn my PC off? What will happen if there is a power failure during decryption? Will it take several days to re-encrypt the portable drive if I turn BitLocker back on?

I just wanted to see if I could turn BitLocker off temporarily as an experiment. I did not expect it to take this long, and although I can access files on this drive I am worried the files that still have to be decrypted may be lost if I lose power.


According to the FAQs, you should be fine to turn off your computer during the decryption process, including a power failure.

What happens if the computer is turned off during encryption or decryption?

If the computer is turned off or goes into hibernation, the BitLocker encryption and decryption process will resume where it stopped the next time Windows starts. This is true even if the power is suddenly unavailable