Best external drives 2023: Reviews and buying advice

Exterior USB/Thunderbolt drives are a super-convenient strategy to rapidly again up your essential recordsdata, in addition to retailer any knowledge that you just don’t want in your laptop’s inner storage. They’re additionally an especially helpful strategy to transport knowledge between areas and gadgets.

Whereas any of those could be an awesome cause to select up an exterior drive, the benefits of having dependable backup is the number-one cause your setup isn’t full with out one. Why? Likelihood is you might have essential knowledge in your PC that you could’t afford to lose. To guard that knowledge you’ll wish to do two issues: retailer it off-site on the cloud if doable and again it as much as an exterior drive. This fashion you guarantee your knowledge is totally protected ought to something go mistaken together with your laptop.

Whereas we extremely suggest that you just think about cloud storage as a backup possibility, restoring from native storage is usually far, far sooner than pulling your knowledge down from the cloud. Subsequently, an exterior drive must be your main hedge in opposition to catastrophe.

Why you need to belief us: We’re PCWorld. We’ve been placing laptop {hardware} by means of its paces for many years. We’ve seen all of it and we all know methods to root out a drive’s strengths and weaknesses, utilizing a mix of rigorous benchmark testing and real-world hands-on use. Beneath we provide our skilled suggestions on the very best exterior drives for every little thing from blazing-fast efficiency, to price range choices, to portability, and extra.

Essential X9 Professional – Finest exterior SSD total

Professionals

Tremendous small type issue

Nice 10Gbps efficiency

Good-looking design

Cons

Not the least costly 10Gbps SSD obtainable

Worth When Reviewed:

1TB:$79.99 I 2TB:$129.99 I 4TB:$239.99

Not everybody desires and even wants 20Gbps USB drive efficiency, which comes at a value premium anyway. The Essential X9 strikes a compelling stability between top-shelf efficiency and affordability that ought to please the vast majority of customers. In our benchmark assessments, it traded prime scores with the SK Hynix Beetle (or runner-up selection under), however at a considerably decrease value. Making it an indeniable win-win for shoppers.

It’s additionally good-looking, described by our reviewer as “a svelte object of need.” Extra importantly, it feels nicely made, and is rated for IP55 mud and spray resistance, so that you don’t must child this moveable drive while you take it out.

Learn our full

Essential X9 Professional evaluate

SK Hynix Beetle X31 – Finest exterior SSD runner-up

Professionals

Prime 10Gbps performer

Compact, rounded design

Cons

Obtainable solely in pale gold

Pricier than the competitors

Worth When Reviewed:

512GB: $71.06 I 1TB: $92.69

As said above, the SK Hynix Beetle X31 is each bit the performer as our prime decide within the 10Gbps realm, with the 2 having fun with an equal variety of wins in our benchmarks and handily besting the competitors. However the place the SK Hynix loses its edge is on value. Proper now, it’s about $13 extra for 1TB than the Essential X9.

It’s additionally extra blinged out. Peep that gold scarab-inspired exterior. It’s going to sit proudly on any desk, and for some patrons which may make the additional value value it.

Samsung T7 Defend 4TB – Finest high-capacity efficiency drive

Professionals

Quick 1GBps sustained transfers

Wonderful actual world efficiency

Huge 4TB capability

Svelte and good-looking

Cons

Not low cost

Small 4K efficiency glitch underneath CrystalDiskMark 8 writing 4K recordsdata

Worth When Reviewed:

$469

As soon as our prime decide total, the Samsung T7 Defend has been overtake in uncooked speeds by the 2 newcomers above. But when the 2TB restrict of the drives above has you feeling too confined, the T7 Defend 4TB is an efficient possibility.

The T7 Defend additionally leans into bodily safety, with an IP65 scores in opposition to particulate matter and water spray. Going mountain climbing together with your knowledge? A T7 Defend is an efficient selection, and you’ll safe it with software-based password safety in lieu of a fingerprint.

With its top-tier speeds and enormous capability, the T7 4TB mannequin is able to dealing with the biggest end-user knowledge units on the go.

Learn our full

Samsung T7 4TB evaluate

Essential X6 Transportable SSD (2TB) – Finest price range exterior SSD

Professionals

Ergonomic design

Good on a regular basis efficiency

Very reasonably priced for an exterior SSD

Cons

Efficiency tanks when cache runs out

Worth When Reviewed:

500GB: $69.99 I 1TB: $109.99 I 2TB: $99.99 I 4TB: $179.99

The Essential X6 Transportable SSD is sq. to be hip (search Huey Lewis). Or positioned in your hip pocket, at any price. In a sea of moveable SSDs whose form and typically sharp edges makes them a literal ache when located in your shirt or trousers, the skinny, rounded-edge X6 is a sigh of reduction. It’s not state-of-the-art quick, nevertheless it’s quick sufficient for many customers and very reasonably priced.

Learn our full

Essential X6 Transportable SSD evaluate

Essential X10 Professional – Finest exterior SSD for gaming

Professionals

Near Thunderbolt 3 SSD efficiency in real-world transfers

Tremendous-svelte type issue

IP55 rated to withstand mud and spray

Cons

Pricier than 10Gbps SSDs

No Kind-A adapter included

Worth When Reviewed:

1TB: $119.99 I 2TB: $169.99

In the event you’ve obtained a 20Gbps USB port, you possibly can’t get higher efficiency than this drive (in need of a a lot pricier Thunderbolt possibility). This makes it good for gaming—the place as of late a single sport can absorb 50GB or 100GB—or actually any job involving massive quantities of knowledge that must be transferred quick.

The Essential X10 was most spectacular in our real-world benchmarks, doing exceptionally nicely in 48GB and 450GB reads and writes, the place it beat all 20Gbps contenders and was surprisingly neck-and-neck with a Thunderbolt 3 competitor. (Study extra about how we consider the very best exterior SSD for gaming.)

Learn our full

Essential X10 Professional evaluate

Samsung T5 EVO – Finest exterior SSD for giant backups

Professionals

As much as 8TB of capability

Small and rugged

Far sooner than laborious drives

Cons

Solely 5Gbps USB (400MBps)

Silicon-like jacket attracts small particulate matter

Worth When Reviewed:

2TB: $190 I 4TB: $350 I 8TB: $650

Typically you simply want house, plenty of house. Perhaps you’re a video editor or artistic skilled who must retailer huge media recordsdata. Or perhaps you simply have the world’s largest library of cat movies. No judgment. Both manner, you want the Samsung T5 EVO. This rugged dangerous boy comes with a whopping 8TB of cupboard space. You learn that proper — 8 terabytes. That must be sufficient regardless of your wants, feline or in any other case.

The T5 EVO has a pretty design with a rugged silicon-like exterior that’s rated as much as a formidable 1500Gs. It isn’t the quickest drive because it makes use of USB 3.2 (Gen 1), which suggests knowledge switch charges will probably be capped at 550MBps. However the T5 EVO is all about capability quite than stellar efficiency anyhow. For reasonably priced capability from a reliable model, the Samsung T5 EVO must be your go-to.

Teamgroup M200 – Finest price range 20Gbps drive

Professionals

Quick on a regular basis efficiency

Obtainable in as much as 8TB (ultimately) capability

Attractively styled

Cons

No TBW score

Firm will change elements if shortages demand

Writes sluggish to 200MBps off cache

Worth When Reviewed:

$40 for 256GB | $58 for 512GB | $260 for 2TB | $300 for 4TB

Rated for 20Gbps and promoting for $90 with 1TB of storage, the Teamgroup M200 is a pretty (in a army vogue) exterior drive for the budget-conscious efficiency fanatic.

It won’t be as low cost because the Essential X6, however for the additional outlay you get excellent on a regular basis efficiency — in lots of assessments, it’s the quickest 20Gbps drive we’ve ever examined. At simply 4.13-inches lengthy and a couple of.18-inches extensive and weighing underneath 3 ounces, it’s additionally extraordinarily moveable and its slick styling will enchantment to players.

Learn our full

Teamgroup T-Drive M200 20Gbps USB SSD evaluate

Adata Elite SE880 SSD – Most moveable exterior drive

Professionals

Very quick, over-20Gbps USB connection

Extraordinarily small type issue

5-year guarantee

Cons

Slows significantly throughout lengthy contiguous writes

Considerably low TBW score

Worth When Reviewed:

$79.99 for 500GB I $129.99 for 1TB

No exterior SSD we’ve seen can match Adata’s Elite SE880 for portability. Certainly, measuring solely 2.55 inches lengthy, 1.38 inches extensive, and 0.48 inches thick, it reminds you extra of a USB thumb drive than your normal exterior SSD. It additionally weighs a mere 1.1 ounces, so it vanishes out of your consciousness within the pocket.

In real-world 48GB switch assessments, the Elite SD880 beat out fairly just a few of its rivals, although it misplaced vital floor within the longer 450GB write take a look at. Picture and video professionals with massive recordsdata to switch would possibly wish to think about speedier choices.

Learn our full

Adata Elite SE880 SSD evaluate

Kingston XS200 USB SSD – Most moveable high-capacity drive

Professionals

Tremendous svelte

Good 20Gbps efficiency

Obtainable in as much as 4TB in capability

Cons

Slower than a lot of the competitors

Not a lot of a looker

Worth When Reviewed:

$75 for 500GB I $160 for 1TB I $285 for 2TB I $500 for 4TB

The Kingston XS2000 is an admirable mix of dimension, capability, pace, and affordability. With as much as 4TB in capability, it is likely one of the most capacious drives that also matches in smaller pockets.

The XS2000 is a 20Gbps USB drive, and whereas it lagged as a reader in comparison with a lot of the 20Gbps competitors, it beats the pants off of the 10Gbps drives in artificial benchmarks and our 48GB transfers. The 450GB write was very sluggish, however total, it’s a decently quick SSD and a stable product that gives a ton of storage in a really small type issue.

Observe: Kingston despatched us a up to date model that solved its sluggish learn efficiency in artificial benchmarks. The 450GB write remained sluggish.

Learn our full

Kingston XS2000 USB SSD evaluate

SanDisk Professional-G40 – Finest USB/Thunderbolt combo

Professionals

Each 10Gbps and Thunderbolt 3/4 connectivity

Quick, particularly over Thunderbolt

IP68 climate and dirt resistant

Worth When Reviewed:

1TB: $160 I 2TB: $240 I 4TB: $400

For anybody who desires Thunderbolt’s scintillating 40Gbps efficiency in addition to the power to attach by way of ubiquitous USB (10Gbps), the SanDisk Professional-G40 is the drive to purchase — it’s the quickest dual-bus drive that we’ve ever examined. The drive dominated the competitors when linked by way of Thunderbolt with excellent 48GB and 450GB transfers, and by way of USB was on par with the quickest 10Gbps drives.

The Professional-G40 can also be rated at IP68 for climate and dirt resistance, which means it ought to be capable of deal with outside adventures in the event you determine to journey with it in your backpack. It’s a quite dear drive, however Thunderbolt drives are by no means “low cost.” They’re, nevertheless, completely value it if pennies don’t matter as a lot as minutes. A incredible drive.

Learn our full

SanDisk Professional-G40 SSD evaluate

WD My Passport 5TB – Finest exterior laborious drive

Professionals

Wonderful value per gigabyte

Good styling

Complete software program suite

Cons

Slower than common with massive recordsdata

Worth When Reviewed:

$139.99

In case your main want from an exterior drive is knowledge backup, WD’s My Passport 5TB is for you. You wish to know why? It’s proper there within the title — that additional 1TB will be invaluable on this age of 4K/8K. Moreover, you don’t want the pace of an SSD to carry out upkeep backups, which will be scheduled for occasions that create the least doable disruption. And by going with a tough drive over SSD, it can save you a great deal of cash.

What you could know before you purchase

Capability versus value

For many shoppers, the first buying standards for exterior storage are capability and value. Nevertheless, when you would possibly suppose that the lowest-cost drives present essentially the most worth–they don’t. In reality, greenback for greenback, cheaper low-capacity drives have at all times been the worst deal when it comes to value per terabyte.

You may see the phenomena within the charts under the place we evaluate the favored WD Parts desktop laborious drive’s obtainable capacities and costs. You’re paying greater than twice as a lot per terabyte for the lowest-capacity drive versus the subsequent step up. It’s nearly as dangerous on the WD Parts Transportable drive.

IDG

The perfect “worth,” as you possibly can see, sometimes means essentially the most capacious laborious drives. Nevertheless it additionally means larger whole value, and never everybody wants most capability.

How a lot capability do you want?

So how a lot storage do you really need? For backup, we suggest a drive that’s no less than twice the capability of the entire quantity of knowledge residing in your PC’s inner storage.

When you’ve got 1TB of storage in your PC, a 2TB drive means that you can make a full backup whereas conserving earlier variations, in addition to further differential and incremental backups. I.e., the bigger the capability, the extra backups over an extended time period you possibly can maintain, or the extra PCs you possibly can again as much as the identical drive.

Whereas a desktop laborious drive (learn 3.5-inch) offers much more capability (as much as 26TB presently in the event you’re a knowledge heart), it additionally requires an influence cable, weighs extra, and usually received’t be as shock resistant as a conveyable 2.5-inch laborious drive. The latter is designed to take bumps in a laptop computer, even when powered up. Then once more, in the event you really need rugged–go the SSD route.

Interface

The overwhelming majority of exterior drives at this time are USB drives. Nevertheless, USB is available in many speeds: 5Gbps, 10Gbps, 20GBps, and—ultimately with USB4—40Gbps as with Thunderbolt 3/4. Ignore the model quantity (3.x) and search for the pace.

The USB Discussion board has modified its nomenclature to point throughput pace—SuperSpeed USB 5Gbps (previously USB 3.x gen 1), SuperSpeed USB 10Gbps (previously USB 3.x gen 2), and SuperSpeed USB 20Gbps (previously USB 3.2 2×2). For the sake of brevity (and our sanity), we typically shorten these to, for instance, USB 10Gbps, 10Gbps USB, 10Gbps and so on.

All USB laborious drives use a slower normal, sometimes USB 5Gbps. No laborious drive, until mixed with different drives in RAID 0 or above, can saturate even the 5Gbps interface (roughly 500MBps real-world after overhead). Due to that, you’ll by no means see one rated larger.

The place SuperSpeed 10Gbps/20Gbps, USB4, or Thunderbolt are of worth is with the aforementioned RAID laborious drive setups, or extra probably—an SSD. USB 10Gbps is quick sufficient for many customers, and getting cheaper by the week. A 10Gbps Samsung T7 Defend will be had for $80 in a 1TB capability.

Quicker USB 20Gbps (Gen 2×2) mainly doubles pace however strikes you right into a higher-price bracket, with the Seagate Firecuda Gaming SSD costing $100 for under 500GB of storage. Though far sooner than 5/10Gbps, there nonetheless aren’t plenty of USB 20Gbps/USB4 ports on the market.

Thunderbolt 3 and the newer Thunderbolt 4 (nearly precisely the identical factor with stricter implementation necessities) are the highest-performing interfaces for exterior storage. The important thing negatives are the premium pricing and a basic lack of compatibility with the much more well-liked USB.

That stated, there are twin Thunderbolt/USB SSDs obtainable such because the Sandisk Professional-G40. The G40 is expensive at $160 for 1TB, however a incredible drive for many who can afford it. Pure Thunderbolt exterior SSDs will be even pricier, as they’re nearly all bought by Mac-oriented boutique distributors resembling OWC and Sabrent.

Ports

Exterior drives include quite a lot of ports, although they’re step by step (and fortunately) consolidating on the orientation-agnostic Kind-C connector. Right here’s the record of connectors you would possibly see in your drive:

USB 3 Micro-B — This wider, flatter port remains to be quite common on many lower-cost moveable and desktop exterior laborious drives. It’s really the identical Micro USB port used in your cellphone, however with extra knowledge strains to hit USB 3.0 speeds. It’ll do 5Gbps and is okay for laborious drives and SATA (internally) SSDs. Micro-B cables are typically Kind-A on the PC finish.

USB 3 Kind-B is the bigger, squarer model of USB 3.0 Micro B. Kind B ports have gotten uncommon, although you would possibly discover one on older 5.25-inch enclosures, printers, and scanners. It helps speeds as much as 5Gbps and cables are typically Kind-A on the PC aspect. 

USB Kind-C or just Kind-C is the newest USB connector and the one the world is standardizing on. It’s small, simple to insert, and also you don’t have to fret about which aspect faces up as with Kind-A.

Understand that Kind-C refers solely to the connector itself. What’s carried over the wires varies vastly: USB 2.0 Excessive Velocity (480Mbps) to USB 3.2 SuperSpeed 20Gbps, in addition to USB4 and Thunderbolt 3 and any mixture of them.

USB Kind-A You received’t discover this acquainted rectangular port on any drive, however you’ll nonetheless discover it on loads of PCs and laptops in addition to the male model on the opposite finish of most Kind-B and Kind-C adapter cables.

Thunderbolt 2 is lifeless at this level. It’s discovered on older Macs, however even Apple put it out to pasture in 2017. There’s no must spend money on a Thunderbolt 2 drive until it’s for legacy help points. That stated…

…Apple sells a bi-directional Thunderbolt 1/2 to three adapter if you could join the one era to the opposite. The adapter doesn’t, nevertheless, carry energy, so bus-powered exterior drives (no energy jack) would require a powered dock.

eSATA is one other legacy port that’s disappeared from newer tech. Created for attaching exterior storage to your laptop’s SATA bus, eSATA was an affordable manner in its day to maneuver past the toddling 60MBps efficiency of USB 2.0.

5Gbps USB 3.0 put the final nail in eSATA’s coffin. As with Thunderbolt 2, the one cause to spend money on an eSATA drive is to be used with older computer systems.

Two drives for backup?

There’s a elementary maxim in backup, appropriately named the Rule of Three. It states that you need to at all times keep three copies of your irreplaceable knowledge: the unique knowledge, a backup, and a backup of the backup.

Ideally, the 2 backups are stored in separate areas, one being offsite (on-line, or one other location). Maintaining a duplicate on-line is nice for smaller quantities of knowledge and positively meets the offsite standards.

Nevertheless, for huge picture, audio, and/or video collections, exterior drives in pairs (or extra), are a far sooner answer. Particularly with most broadband nonetheless being comparatively restricted in upstream pace.  

For steerage on constructing out the very best backup plan doable, see our roundups of the very best cloud backup companies and finest Home windows backup software program.

How we take a look at

A few of the older evaluations you would possibly discover right here function outcomes gathered on an Intel Core i7-5820K/X99 motherboard with 64GB of Kingston DDR4 reminiscence working Home windows 10. A discrete Gigabyte Alpine Ridge Thunderbolt 3 card and Ableconn USB 3.2 2×2 20Gbps card (Asmedia 2142 controller) have been used for connecting the exterior drives. An Asus USB 3.1/10Gbps (Asmedia 1142 controller) card was employed for among the actually previous drives on the chart. 

Subsequently, drives have been examined utilizing Home windows 11 64-bit working on an MSI MEG X570/AMD Ryzen 3700X combo with 4 16GB Kingston 2666MHz DDR4 modules, a Zotac (Nvidia) GT 710 1GB x2 PCIe graphics card, and the Asmedia ASM3242 USB 3.2×2 card. Copy assessments make the most of an ImDisk RAM disk utilizing 58GB of the 64GB whole reminiscence.

At the moment, we’re utilizing Home windows 11 64-bit working on an X790 (PCIe 4.0/5.0) motherboard/i5-12400 CPU combo with two Kingston Fury 32GB DDR5 4800MHz modules (64GB of reminiscence whole). Each 20Gbps USB and Thunderbolt 4 are on the board and Intel built-in graphics are employed. The 48GB switch assessments make the most of an ImDisk RAM disk taking on 58GB of the 64GB of whole reminiscence. The 450GB file is transferred from a Samsung 990 Professional 2TB which additionally runs the OS.

We run varied artificial benchmarks together with Crystal Disk Mark 6/7/8, AS SSD 2, and Iometer. We additionally carry out real-world switch assessments utilizing a 48GB batch of small recordsdata and folders, in addition to a big 48GB and 450GB recordsdata. The testbed boots from a NVMe drive, however the real-world (Home windows) file transfers are carried out to and from a 58GB RAM disk.

Observe that each one evaluate charts function outcomes garnered from the identical take a look at mattress.