Highest Exterior Arduous Power (2025): SSD to Retailer Knowledge, Video & Extra by means of NewsFlicks

If you are operating out of cupboard space for your pc or you want to again up your information and retailer that backlog of movies you are going to edit sooner or later (I’m, I swear), an exterior exhausting pressure can resolve your downside. The difficulty is, there are masses of pressure choices starting from dirt-cheap to crazy-expensive—which one is correct in your wishes? I have examined dozens, throughout running programs and with other use instances in thoughts, to search out the most productive exterior exhausting drives for garage, backups, gaming, video modifying, network-attached garage (NAS) gadgets, and extra.

Take a look at our different guides, together with Find out how to Again Up and Transfer Your Footage Between Products and services, Find out how to Again Up Your Virtual Existence, and Find out how to Again Up Your iPhone.

Up to date September 2025: We have now added the Seagate Extremely Compact SSD, LaCie’s new rugged SSD4 and the Corsair EX400U, and we topped the brand new Samsung 990 the most productive inside SSD. We’ve additionally up to date costs and hyperlinks right through.

Highest for Backups

{Photograph}: Western Virtual

Western Virtual

Parts Desktop Arduous Power

For incremental backups, which we advise, velocity is not an enormous issue. That is why the primary pressure I like to recommend is that this Western Virtual Parts exhausting pressure. I’ve been the usage of a variation of the Parts desktop exhausting pressure to make incremental backups of my information for greater than a decade. Those drives are giant and require exterior energy, however they are one of the least expensive, maximum dependable drives I have used.

Switch speeds aren’t off the charts—the Parts pressure I examined scored 120 megabytes in keeping with 2nd (MB/s) for sequential writes on Home windows—however once more, you will have to preferably be operating backups in a single day anyway, or even at those speeds the typical PC backup will likely be achieved by means of morning. Those drives use USB-C with enhance for USB 3, and I have had no downside the usage of them with Home windows, macOS, and Linux.

Garage choices move the entire manner as much as 20 terabytes. Simply take a look at the costs; occasionally you’ll get a 10- and even 12-TB pressure for now not a lot more than the 8-terabyte model. And I’ve now not observed an enormous distinction between the Parts line, the WD My Guide drives, or the WD My Passport drives. The My Passport drives command a top class value as a result of they are smaller, and the My Guide drives have some encryption options that pressure up the fee, however I to find the elemental Parts pressure is enough for the general public.

Different Nice Backup Drives

• Seagate Growth 8-TB Exterior Arduous Power for $159: Seagate is some other dependable pressure maker. It by no means hurts to have extra backups, and when you do need more than one backups, use drives from other manufacturers, since it’ll cut back the risk that each fail concurrently.

Highest for Moveable Backups

{Photograph}: Scott Gilbertson

Western Virtual

My Passport Extremely

In case you commute so much, you’ll be able to need one thing that is more straightforward to hold than the Parts drives, which are not the most productive in a suitcase. For backups when touring, I really like Western Virtual’s My Passport sequence, particularly the brand new “Extremely” model, which makes use of a regular USB-C twine, getting rid of the want to lift a separate cable. It is not the thinnest pressure in the marketplace, however it is not up to an inch thick and forged sufficient that I by no means apprehensive about tossing it in my bag. (Even though it will have to be mentioned that it is a spinning pressure, so do not actually toss it.) I additionally like that the corners are effectively rounded and there aren’t any screws or the rest that may catch on cloth on your bag.

There are a number of colours to be had and you’ll get from 1 TB to six TB. I examined the 5-TB type, however Western Virtual claims the similar speeds irrespective of pressure dimension. I examined it the usage of CrystalDiskMark on Home windows, AmorphousDiskMark on macOS, and KDiskMark on Linux and averaged the effects to get a hold of 121 MB/s for learn velocity and 115 MB/s write velocity. It is not what you’ll wish to reproduction pictures temporarily for a consumer within the box, however instant sufficient to run a day-to-day backup on your resort room.

Different Moveable Backup Drives

• Western Virtual Parts 5-TB Moveable HDD for $130: This pressure is quite thinner than our most sensible pick out, however feels flimsier in my revel in. Speeds are tad slower as neatly, however in case you are on the cheap this will likely prevent slightly money. Corsair is advertising and marketing this as a great way to backup your iPhone ProRes pictures, and whilst it without a doubt works for that, efficiency is proscribed by means of the iPhone’s USB-C interface. For optimum throughput, attach it to a PC with a USB4 or Thunderbolt 4 port.

The Thunderbolt 5 Power: When Pace Is The whole thing

{Photograph}: Scott Gilbertson

LaCie has up to date its rugged SSD line with the Rugged Pro5. This one ditches the enduring orange padding for blue, however it’s another way identical to the strange LaCie padded drives at the out of doors. At the inside of, that is an amazingly instant pressure. The 5 within the title is for, you guessed it, Thunderbolt 5, which in spite of being introduced apparently endlessly in the past, has been painfully gradual to trickle onto the marketplace. This made checking out a little tough, however thankfully a chum let me borrow his brand-new MacBook Professional 14 for checking out. And the effects had been spectacular.

LaCie claims learn/write speeds of as much as 6,700 MB/s and 5,300 MB/s, which it says are sufficient for real-time modifying of 8K and 6K RAW pictures. In checking out the best speeds, record transfers had been 5,787 MB/s learn and 5,188 MB/s write—which, whilst now not relatively matching the declare, remains to be some distance and away the quickest pressure at the web page. However uncooked speeds are simply numbers for spreadsheets; I used to be extra all for real-world efficiency. Since I came about to even be checking out the Nikon Z6III (8/10, WIRED Recommends), which is able to shoot 6K ProRes RAW, I loaded a just right little bit of pictures at the Pro5 and used to be certainly ready to edit the usage of DaVinci Get to the bottom of Studio.

The drawback here’s the fee. At $600 for the 4-TB model (which is the minimal you’ll need for operating with ProRes RAW video recordsdata), it is a very dear pressure. It’s alternatively, neatly definitely worth the cash if it is velocity you are after.

Highest USB4 Power

{Photograph}: Scott Gilbertson

If you do not but have any gadgets with Thunderbolt 5 enhance, this Thunderbolt 4 pressure can be my advice for any person obsessive about velocity. Corsair’s EX400U is an excellent little pressure, constantly handing over speeds of round 3,800 MB/s for sequential learn and and three,550 MB/s write. Once more, that is handiest going to be imaginable you probably have a tool that helps USB4/Thunderbolt 4 (together with fresh Macbooks, Dell XPS, and others—see our information to the most productive laptops for extra). Technically, simply as I used to be wrapping up this replace, Lacie’s new rugged SSD got here out which beat this pressure in my exams by means of about 10 MB/s, however this pressure is smaller, lighter, and less expensive.

I additionally like that Corsair has incorporated a Magsafe connector at the again of the case, which makes nice choice for backing up ProRes video pictures out of your iPhone.

Highest Price range Moveable SSD

{Photograph}: Scott Gilbertson

Those A very powerful drives are my favourite general-purpose exterior garage drives. They are relatively priced (for a conveyable SSD) and fast sufficient for many makes use of. The X6 is light-weight and tiny, making it a sensible choice for operating on the espresso store.

This is not a blinding-fast exhausting disk. Actually, below the hood, the X6 makes use of an older pressure interface (Serial AT Attachment, or SATA), which used to be extra commonplace with spinning exhausting drives. So whilst it is small and light-weight, its velocity is proscribed by means of that older interface generation. In my checking out on Home windows and macOS, that works out to about 550 MB/s learn velocity and 208 MB/s write velocity. That is just right sufficient for backup and use as an exterior pressure, however I do not suggest it for Xbox or PlayStation use. It does paintings wonderful with the iPad Professional although.