If you’re running out of storage space on your laptop or you need to back up your data and store that backlog of videos you’re going to edit one day (I am, I swear), an external hard drive can solve your problem. The trouble is, there are hundreds of drive options ranging from dirt-cheap to crazy-expensive—which one is right for your needs? I’ve tested dozens, across operating systems and with different use cases in mind, to find the best external hard drives for storage, backups, gaming, video editing, network-attached storage (NAS) devices, and more.
Check out our other guides, including How to Back Up and Move Your Photos Between Services, How to Back Up Your Digital Life, and How to Back Up Your iPhone.
Updated September 2025: We’ve added the Seagate Ultra Compact SSD, LaCie’s new rugged SSD4 and the Corsair EX400U, and we crowned the new Samsung 990 the best internal SSD. We’ve also updated prices and links throughout.
Table of Contents
Best for Backups
Photograph: Western Digital
Western Digital
Elements Desktop Hard Drive
For incremental backups, which we recommend, speed isn’t a huge factor. That’s why the first drive I recommend is this Western Digital Elements hard drive. I have been using a variation of the Elements desktop hard drive to make incremental backups of my data for more than a decade. These drives are big and require external power, but they’re some of the cheapest, most reliable drives I’ve used.
Transfer speeds are not off the charts—the Elements drive I tested scored 120 megabytes per second (MB/s) for sequential writes on Windows—but again, you should ideally be running backups overnight anyway, and even at these speeds the average PC backup will be done by morning. These drives use USB-C with support for USB 3, and I’ve had no problem using them with Windows, macOS, and Linux.
Storage options go all the way up to 20 terabytes. Just check the prices; sometimes you can get a 10- or even 12-TB drive for not much more than the 8-terabyte version. And I have not seen a huge difference between the Elements line, the WD My Book drives, or the WD My Passport drives. The My Passport drives command a premium price because they’re smaller, and the My Book drives have some encryption features that drive up the price, but I find the basic Elements drive is sufficient for most people.
Other Great Backup Drives
- Seagate Expansion 8-TB External Hard Drive for $159: Seagate is another reliable drive maker. It never hurts to have more backups, and if you do want multiple backups, use drives from different brands, since it will reduce the chance that both fail simultaneously.
Best for Portable Backups
Photograph: Scott Gilbertson
Western Digital
My Passport Ultra
If you travel a lot, you’ll want something that’s easier to carry than the Elements drives, which aren’t the best in a suitcase. For backups when traveling, I love Western Digital’s My Passport series, especially the new “Ultra” version, which uses a standard USB-C cord, eliminating the need to carry a separate cable. It’s not the thinnest drive on the market, but it’s less than an inch thick and solid enough that I never worried about tossing it in my bag. (Although it should be said that this is a spinning drive, so don’t literally toss it.) I also like that the corners are nicely rounded and there are no screws or anything else that will catch on fabric in your bag.
There are a variety of colors available and you can get from 1 TB to 6 TB. I tested the 5-TB model, but Western Digital claims the same speeds regardless of drive size. I tested it using CrystalDiskMark on Windows, AmorphousDiskMark on macOS, and KDiskMark on Linux and averaged the results to come up with 121 MB/s for read speed and 115 MB/s write speed. It’s not what you’d want to copy photos quickly for a client in the field, but fast enough to run a daily backup in your hotel room.
Other Portable Backup Drives
- Western Digital Elements 5-TB Portable HDD for $130: This drive is slightly thinner than our top pick, but feels flimsier in my experience. Speeds are tad slower as well, but if you’re on a budget this will save you a little cash. Corsair is marketing this as a good way to backup your iPhone ProRes footage, and while it certainly works for that, performance is limited by the iPhone’s USB-C interface. For maximum throughput, connect it to a PC with a USB4 or Thunderbolt 4 port.
The Thunderbolt 5 Drive: When Speed Is Everything
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Photograph: Scott Gilbertson
LaCie
