The Good Hard Drives For Gaming In 2024

Dan Simmons By, Dan Simmons
Updated
Good Hard Drives For Gaming
Good Hard Drives For Gaming

The Rundown

1. Best Of The Best: Seagate Portable 2TB Hard Drive

The Seagate Portable 2TB Hard Drive is the perfect addition to your digital assistant. With its intuitive drag and drop feature and fast backup rate, you can store and access up to 2TB of content on the go. Read Review

2. Best For The Price: Maxone 500GB Hard Drive

The Maxone 500GB Hard Drive With its ultra-thin and sturdy metal design, this all-aluminum scratch-resistant model offers outstanding strength and durability, making it the ideal portable hard drive for those on the go. Plus, its reliable game drive technology ensures fast and efficient performance so you can keep up with your demanding workload. Read Review

3. Best Speed: WD_BLACK 5TB Hard Drive

The WD Black 5TB Hard Drive is the perfect solution for anyone looking for a Portable form factor hard drive that can store games. This 5TB hard drive holds up to 125 games, making it the perfect solution for those who want to keep their old favorites and also want to move on to new games. Read Review

4. Best Performance: WD 6TB Elements Hard Drive

The WD 6TB Elements Hard Drive With lightning-fast data transfer speeds and universal connectivity to USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 devices, this desktop storage device is the perfect choice for anyone who needs to store a large amount of data. And with its sleek design features and capacities of up to 10TB, you'll be able to keep all your files organized and easily accessible. Read Review

5. Best Economical: UnionSine Hard Drive

UnionSine hard drive is the fastest external hard drive on the market- up to 137MB/s read speed and 103MB/s write speed. UnionSine is thin and quiet, making it perfect for portable use. Plus, an extra signal shield ensures your data transfer is faster than other hard drives. Read Review

Gamers know playing their favorite games requires a reliable computer system with excellent hardware components. One of the most crucial components is the hard drive, which stores all the game files, saves, and updates. As a gaming enthusiast, you want a hard drive that can handle the high-performance demands of modern games without crashing, slowing down, or corrupting your data.

With so many options available in the market, choosing the right hard drive that suits your gaming needs is essential. In this article, we'll explore some of the best hard drives for gaming, including their features, specifications, and performance metrics. Whether you're a casual gamer or a professional esports player, we've covered you with our top picks for the best gaming hard drives. So, let's dive into gaming hard drives and discover which is perfect for you!

After extensive study and analysis over a 19 hours, We think the good hard drives for gaming is Seagate Portable 2TB Hard Drive. With a Hard Drive, Easily store and access up to 2TB of content on the go and perform quick backups with simple drag and drop.  You can consider Maxone 500GB Hard Drive as an alternative if you're still undecided. Other suggestions on this list are worth considering, and we've put up a useful shopping guide to help you decide!

Our Top Picks

TOP Choice #1 Seagate Portable 2TB Hard Drive
Our Score:
9.9
Seagate

This USB drive provides plug and play simplicity with the included 18 inch USB 3.0 cable

Designed to work with Windows or Mac computers, this external hard drive makes backup a snap just drag and drop

Easily store and access 2TB to content on the go with the Seagate Portable Drive, a USB external hard drive

To get set up, connect the portable hard drive to a computer for automatic recognition no software required

TOP Choice #2 Maxone 500GB Hard Drive
Our Score:
9.8
Maxone

✔ Ultra Slim and Sturdy Metal Design: Merely 0.4 inch thick. All-Aluminum anti-scratch model delivers remarkable strength and durability, keeping this portable hard drive running cool and quiet

✔ Improve PC Performance: Powered by USB 3.0 technology, this USB hard drive is much faster than - but still compatible with - USB 2.0 backup drive, allowing for super fast transfer speed at up to 5 Gbit/s

✔ Plug and Play: This external drive is ready to use without external power supply or software installation needed. Ideal extra storage for your computer and game console

TOP Choice #3 WD_BLACK 5TB Hard Drive
Our Score:
9.6
WD_BLACK

Premium HDD with 3-year limited warranty, purpose-built for gamers based on WD_BLACK quality and reliability

Available in capacities up to 5TB that can hold up to 125 games, so that you can save old favorites and still have room for new titles (As used for storage capacity, one terabyte (TB) = one trillion bytes. Total accessible capacity varies depending on operating environment. Number of games based on a 36GB average per game. The number of games will vary based on file size, formatting, other programs, and factors.)

Compatible with Xbox Series X/S (play and store Xbox One games, archive Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S games) and PlayStation 5 (play and store PS4 games, archive PS5 games) consoles

Comes with an 18-inch (457mm) USB Type-A to Micro-B cable with SuperSpeed interface up to 5Gbps (Cable length may vary.)

Portable form factor with sleek metal top covering that provides fast access to your growing game library

4 WD 6TB Elements Hard Drive
Our Score:
9.4
Western Digital

Fast data transfers

High-capacity add-on storage

Plug-and-play ready for Windows PCs

5 UnionSine Hard Drive
Our Score:
9.2
UnionSine

【Double anti-interference】-The external hard drive chip adds a signal shielding layer, the transmission speed of the hard disk will be faster than other hard disks, stable and undisturbed

【Ultra-Fast Data Transfers 】- The external hard drive works with the USB 3.0 thickened copper core cable to provide super fast transfer speed. The theoretical read speed is as high as 125MB/s-137MB/s, and the write speed is as high as 103MB/s.

【What You Get 】- 1 x Portable Hard Drive, 1 x USB 3.0 Cable, 1 x User Manual, Gift-type shell packaging ,Three-year manufacturer's warranty and free technical support services

6 Seagate 4TB External Hard Drive
Our Score:
9.0
Seagate

XBOX-CERTIFIED Compatible with Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and all generations of Xbox One

WARRANTY Enjoy peace of mind with the included 3-year Rescue Data Recovery Services and 1-year limited warranty

LIGHT IT UP A built-in LED bar illuminates your gaming center in Xbox green

7 WD_BLACK 6TB Hard Drive
Our Score:
8.8
WD_BLACK

Performance storage available in up to 10TB* capacities | * As used for storage capacity, 1TB = one trillion bytes. Actual user capacity may be less depending on operating environment.

Desktop performance gaming hard drive

Designed for gamers, system builders, and creative professionals.

An industry-leading 5-year limited warranty** | ** See official Western Digital website for warranty details.

Western Digital’s StableTrac and Dynamic Cache Technology increase reliability and optimize performance

8 Seagate FireCuda Hard Drive
Our Score:
8.6
Seagate

DUAL FRONT-FACING PORTS Connect and power your peripherals with front-facing USB-C and USB-A ports

BILLIANT DESIGN A bold and refined design, crafted to compliment gaming battlestations

LIGHT IT UP Create an epic gaming atmosphere with customizable RGB LED lighting

9 Fantom Drives 2TB External Hard Drive
Our Score:
8.4
Fantom Drives

Fantom Drives GFORCE3 7200RPM is a very fast, easy to use plug and play external hard drive.

The enclosure is made with high quality aluminum which doubles as a heat sink. GFORCE3 is great at heat dissipation and is fan less to ensure cool and quiet operation.

With USB 3. 0 connection allowing transfer rates up to 10 times the rate of USB 2. 0, the GFORCE3 is made for fast data transfer.

10 Toshiba Hard Drive
Our Score:
8.2
Toshiba

Includes Toshiba 3 year standard limited

Ultra-portable, slim & lightweight aluminum design

Compatible devices: Desktop

Product Images, Product Titles, Product Highlights from Amazon Product Advertising API

What to Look For in a good hard drives for gaming?

A valuable product is determined by many factors (included below). The process of researching the good hard drives for gaming is pretty significant because of these features related to the products. However, rest assured that we are here to support your challenges.

Having a closer look at the following factors would benefit you a lot. These are the most important things among various ones you need to consider:

External Vs. Internal HDD

The main advantage of external hard disks is their portability. Which also makes them perfect backups in case your PC is compromised. Desktop PCs allow you room to add extra hard disks, but if you are using a laptop or other gaming device, you will have to replace your existing hard drive.

Reliability

All hard drives eventually die, and there’s no definitive answer on when that day will come. We recommend replacing your backup drives between the third and sixth years of use, if possible. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to get metrics on which hard drive models are more reliable over the long run, and even so, there will always be outliers and failures that occur sooner than expected.

Rotation Speed

Did you know that hard drives store information on spinning magnetic plates? The faster these plates spin, the faster the load and access time. The rotation is measured in RPM (Rotations per Minute), and although we recommend hard disks with 7200RPM, 5400RPM is still a good option.

Cache Memory

This is a cache that functions much like Computer RAM Memory. It stores important files temporarily so that it takes less time to access them on the disk. The larger the cache size, the faster the hard disk will be. However, the difference is not major, and as such, this should not be the biggest determiner.

Size Of The Disk

I understand that you are buying the hard disk in order to eliminate the need to delete some files when you install a new game or add modifications. Also, at a time when a single game can take up to 100GB, Call of Duty WWII is 90GB; it only makes sense that you select the hard disk that will allow you sufficient storage space.

Performance

Transfer speed is the feature that most people notice on a daily basis. We evaluated each drive with tests that replicated different real-world uses, and we focused on the drives that consistently outperformed the other contenders. Drives that did well on some tests but failed others were unreliable and not worth purchasing.

Speed

HDDs, or hard drives, contain spinning disks that read and write your data. The faster these disks spin—rated in rotations per minute (RPM)—the faster the drive can access data and transfer it to your computer.

FAQs

What size hard drive do I need for gaming?

The size of the hard drive you need will depend on the games you want to play. Generally, you should look for a drive with at least 500GB of storage space. However, if you plan on playing a lot of large, newer games, you may want to look for a drive with 1TB or more of storage space.

How do I know if my hard drive is suitable for gaming?

When choosing a hard drive for gaming, look for a drive that has a high read/write speed, low latency, and enough storage capacity for your gaming needs. Some drives may also have specific features that are optimized for gaming, such as extra cooling or vibration protection.

What type of hard drive is best for gaming?

Solid-state drives (SSDs) are typically the best choice for gaming, as they offer the highest read/write speed, the lowest latency, and the least amount of power consumption. However, if you’re on a budget, a traditional hard drive (HDD) can still be a viable option.

What is latency and why is it important for gaming?

Latency is the time it takes for data to be transferred between the hard drive and the CPU. Low latency is important for gaming, as it ensures that data is transferred quickly and accurately, resulting in a better gaming experience.


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About Dan Simmons

Dan Simmons

Dan Simmons is a writer who loves home theater and HiFi audio. As the editor of TheAudioInsights, he has helped countless people enjoy the best possible sound quality in their homes. He is an audiophile who takes great pleasure in helping others find the perfect audio equipment for their needs. When he's not writing or editing, Dan enjoys listening to music and spending time with his family.