The WD_Black is one of the most recommended SSDs for the PS5, owing to the nod from Mark Cerny, who is a designer and programmer and part of the development team for the PS5.
Benchmarked and tested by many reviewers, the WD_Black SN850, but the most in depth (and PS5 specific) tests we found were from NASCompares, who found the SSD to perform very close to manufacturer specs. The WD Black SN850 SSD achieved 6,457MB/s Sequential Read on the PS5, and games loaded marginally faster using the SN850 over the internal PS5 storage.
The WD_Black is also available in 1TB and 2TB capacities, with optional heatsinks.
The Aorus is great looking, there’s no doubt there, but it won’t be on display inside your PS5 so that’s not really a feature we care about here! With the reliability you automatically assume with Gigabyte, and a great price point, the Aorus is available in 1TB and 2TB depending on your needs, and uses the same E16 controller and Toshiba BiCS4 NAND Flash.
Best PS5 Compatible SSDs Without a Heatsink
Crucial P5 Plus 1TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe SSD
The Crucial P5 Plus may be positioned as a budget storage expansion for the PS5, but the performance aligns it with some of the best NVMe SSD out there. The P5 Plus exceeds Sony's 5500MB/s recommendation, with a superb 6600MB/s read speed, available in 500TB, 1TB and 2TB sizes.
Crucial P5 Plus 1TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe SSD
Whilst the P5 Plus does not come with a heatsink as standard, and Sony recommend using one - reviewers and benchmarking websites have not seen any apparent issues with using the P5 Plus without one. Third party heatsinks are inexpensive (around £10), so it is not such a big deal to upgrade and have peace of mind.
Being a PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe SSD, the Crucial P5 Plus offers all the trappings of this super-fast interface, but more importantly, the reliability that Crucial brings to the table is what sets them apart from similar priced rivals. The reliability of their SSDs was highlighted in the form of recognition by ExtremeTech.com and PlatinumDataRecovery.com in their tests last year of various SSD brands. Crucial is part of Micron - a worldwide leader in NAND design, research and development, so quality is assured regardless of the application. SSDs are tested for over 1000 hours and undergo endurance testing that far outweighs the stress a PlayStation 5 could put on it during everyday gaming use.
One point to note with the P5 Plus, is that you can absolutely guarantee that you will get 100% compatibility. Crucial offer a 45-day compatibility guarantee, so you'll get your money back if the PS5 did not not recognise the solid state drive. Of course, this would be an extremely rare case, as Crucial are very proud of the PS5 support.
In a recent test by NASCompares on YouTube, the Crucial P5 Plus, there was no real delay in loading screens (at most 0.5 - 1 second) with games like Demon's Souls, GTA 5, and PS5 favourite, Ratchet and Clank. The real takeaway is the performance, with textures and assets loading on-screen perfectly, with no framerate decrease or pesky pop-ins.
All in all, the Crucial P5 Plus feels a lot like it was made for the budget conscious PS5 gamer, who wants a very quick and easy installation, and high performance SSD that operates seamlessly with the PlayStation hardware.
Seagate FireCuda 530 500GB M.2-2280 SSD – BEST VALUE
An excellent value SSD, the FireCuda 500GB is well within most budgets. With a custom heatsink thanks to Seagate’s partnership with EKWB, their FireCuda 530 series benefits from impressive cooling from a high-grade aluminium block with a “finely textured anodized finish to help maximise cooling efficiency”.
The FireCuda offers enviable performance, rated 2x faster than PCIe Gen3 NVMe™ SSDs, and maximum sequential read speeds of up to 7,000 MB/s.
| Specification | Details |
| Read Speed | Up to 7,000 MB/s |
| Write Speed | Up to 3,000 MB/s |
| 4K Random Read (AS SSD) | Up to 400,000 IOPS |
| 4K Random Write (AS SSD) | Up to 700,000 IOPS |
Seagate FireCuda 530 1TB M.2-2280 SSD
The 1TB version of the FireCuda 530 offers the same reliability and excellent cooling, with an improvement in read/write speeds. The 1TB gets the full potential from the PCIe 4.0 x4 generation with maximum sequential read speeds of up to 7,300 MB/s.
| Specification | Details |
| Read Speed | Up to 7,300 MB/s |
| Write Speed | Up to 6,800 MB/s |
| 4K Random Read (AS SSD) | Up to 800,000 IOPS |
| 4K Random Write (AS SSD) | Up to 1,000,000 IOPS |
Samsung 980 PRO 1TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe SSD
If you don’t mind purchasing an aftermarket heatsink, this Samsung SSD represents amazing value, backed by the excellent pedigree of one of the market leaders. You’ll be relying on Samsung's custom Elpis controller for PCIe 4.0 SSDs and the latest V-NAND and DRAM.
The Samsung 980 PRO has benchmarked sequential read and write speeds of ~7,000MB/s and 5,000MB/s respectively, and random read/write speeds of up to 1,000K IOPS. When compared to previous generation SSDs, the 980 PRO is around 2x as fast as PCIe 3.0 SSDs and 12.7x faster than SATA SSDs.
