The best SSDs for gaming
188 drives meet the rule below, 82 of them with a live Amazon listing. Every drive here is NVMe and rated at 3,000 MB/s or faster, which is the point where load times stop being limited by storage. Ranked by rated sequential read.
What is on this list
A drive is included when it meets all of:
- NVMe interface (PCIe 3.0, 4.0 or 5.0)
- Rated sequential read of 3,000 MB/s or more
What this data does not tell you:
- Between two good NVMe drives, measured game load times usually differ by a fraction of a second. Capacity and price per gigabyte matter more for a game library than the last thousand MB/s.
- This catalogue does not carry prices, so drives are ranked on specification, not on value for money.
Ranked by read
The top 20 of 188 are listed. The full SSD catalogue filters on every spec.
| # | Model | Tier | Controller | Read MB/s | TBW | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Sabrent ROCKET 4 PLUS 500GB, 1TB, 2TB, 4TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7200 | 2800 | Check price on Amazon |
| 2 |  Samsung 980 PRO 250GB, 500GB, 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | SAMSUNG ELPIS CONTROLLER (Samsung | 7000 | 1200 | Check price on Amazon |
| 3 |  TeamGroup CARDEA A440 M.2 PCIe 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | 1400 | Check price on Amazon |
| 4 |  Samsung 960 PRO M.2 500GB, 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | SAMSUNG POLARIS CONTROLLER (5-Core | 3500 | 1200 | Check price on Amazon |
| 5 |  ADATA XPG GAMMIX S70 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Innogrit IG5236 “Rainier” Controll | 7400 | 1480 | Find on Amazon |
| 6 |  ADATA XPG GAMMIX S70 BLADE 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Innogrit IG5236 “Rainier” Controll | 7400 | 1480 | Find on Amazon |
| 7 |  Patriot VIPER GAMING VP4300 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Innogrit IG5236 “Rainier” Controll | 7400 | 2000 | Find on Amazon |
| 8 |  Mushkin GAMMA 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7175 | 1400 | Find on Amazon |
| 9 |  Addlink S95 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7100 | 1400 | Find on Amazon |
| 10 |  Western Digital WD BLACK™ SN850 NVMe 500GB, 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | WD_BLACK G2 | Sandisk Modelo 20-82 | 7000 | 1200 | Find on Amazon |
| 11 |  Anacomda i4 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | — | Find on Amazon |
| 12 |  Corsair Gen4 PCIe MP600 Pro 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | 1400 | Find on Amazon |
| 13 | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | 1400 | Find on Amazon | |
| 14 |  Galax HALL OF FAME EXTREME 1TB, 2TB, 4TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | — | Find on Amazon |
| 15 |  Gigabyte Aorus Gen4 7000s 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | 1400 | Find on Amazon |
| 16 |  Gigabyte AORUS Gen4 7000s Premium 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | 1400 | Find on Amazon |
| 17 |  MSI SPATIUM M480 500GB, 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | — | 7000 | 1400 | Find on Amazon |
| 18 |  Reletech P400 EVO 500GB, 1TB, 2TB | Top-tier | Phison PS5018-E18 (TSMC 12nm, 8 Ca | 7000 | — | Find on Amazon |
| 19 |  Western Digital WD BLACK™ AN1500 NVMe 1TB, 2TB, 4TB | Top-tier | SANDISK 20-82-00705 (WD Custom Con | 6500 | — | Find on Amazon |
| 20 |  Gigabyte AORUS RAID SSD 4X512GB | Top-tier | Phison PS5012-E12 + (RAID Built in | 6300 | 700 | Find on Amazon |
Capacity matters more than speed
Modern releases run from 50 GB to well past 150 GB installed. A 1 TB drive holds a handful of large titles alongside an operating system, and 2 TB is where most people stop deleting games to make room. Buying a faster 500 GB drive over a slower 2 TB one is almost always the wrong trade for a game library.
Why the differences are smaller than they look
Game loading is mostly small random reads plus CPU-side decompression, not one long sequential transfer. That is why a Gen3 NVMe drive and a Gen5 flagship often land within a second of each other in load-time tests, despite a fourfold gap in headline bandwidth.
DirectStorage changes the picture slowly
DirectStorage moves asset decompression to the GPU and is designed around NVMe. It raises the ceiling for what fast storage can do, but only in titles built for it, and the installed base of those is still small.
Common questions
Is a DRAM-less SSD fine for gaming?
Yes. Game loading is read-heavy, and Host Memory Buffer covers that pattern well. The gap shows up in sustained random writes, which is not what a game library does.
How much SSD do I need for gaming?
1 TB is a workable minimum for an OS plus a few large titles. 2 TB is the size most people settle on if they keep more than about six modern games installed at once.
Does a gaming SSD need a heatsink?
Only the fastest Gen5 drives really need one, and most boards now include an M.2 heatsink. Gen3 and Gen4 drives run cool enough in a normal desktop without extra cooling.