GPT disks were introduced as a part of the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) initiative. GPT disks support disk sizes up to 18 Exabytes (EB), greatly surpassing the 2-TB limit of MBR disks. GUID partition tables use error-checking (CRC32) and primary and backup partition tables. This means that the data is more secure, redundant, and has increased integrity compared to MBR partition tables. If one entry is corrupted, GPT can attempt recovery using backup tables or checksum data.

Theoretically, GUID partition tables can have an unlimited number of partitions. However, GPT disks support up to 128 partitions, in contrast to MBR disks, which support only four partitions. The limit is imposed by the amount of space that is reserved for storing partition entries.

To support booting from GPT disks, a computer needs to support the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) standard. In addition, the Windows operating system needs to be a 64-bit edition that is newer than Windows Server 2003 or Windows XP.