In 2026, expect to pay $50-70 per TB for quality NVMe SSDs and $40-60/TB for SATA SSDs. Flagship drives like Samsung 990 Pro cost $70-90/TB. Anything under $50/TB for NVMe Gen 4 is a great deal. Watch for sales during Prime Day, Black Friday, and holiday seasons when prices can drop 20-30%.

1TB is the minimum recommended for a primary/boot drive in 2026. Modern games can be 100GB+ each, and Windows plus applications easily consume 100-200GB. 2TB is the sweet spot for most users — enough for OS, games, and files without constant management. 4TB is ideal for content creators or those who want everything installed. The $/TB is often similar across capacities, so bigger is usually better value.

For most users, NVMe and SATA feel similar in daily use. Boot times, app launches, and game loads are only marginally faster on NVMe. However, NVMe shines for large file transfers, video editing, and professional workloads. Since NVMe prices are now competitive with SATA, choose NVMe if your system supports it. SATA is still great for older laptops, secondary storage, or budget builds where every dollar counts.

Samsung, WD, and Crucial are all highly reliable. Samsung has the longest track record and uses in-house components (controller + NAND). WD/SanDisk and Crucial (Micron) are also excellent with very low failure rates. Avoid obscure brands without established track records. All major brands offer 5-year warranties on their mainstream SSDs, indicating confidence in their reliability.

For NVMe, the Crucial P3 Plus and WD Blue SN580 offer excellent value under $50/TB. For SATA, the Crucial MX500 and Samsung 870 EVO are proven reliable choices. The Crucial BX500 is even cheaper but lacks DRAM cache. For pure budget, look for deals on TeamGroup, Silicon Power, or Kingston drives — just verify reviews for reliability.

Gen 4 is the sweet spot in 2026. Gen 5 drives are faster on paper (12,000+ MB/s vs 7,000 MB/s) but cost significantly more, run hotter, and show minimal real-world improvement for gaming and typical workloads. Gen 5 only makes sense for professional video editors working with 8K footage or specialized applications. For gaming, PS5, and general use, Gen 4 offers the best value.

Price differences come from: NAND type (QLC is cheaper than TLC), DRAM cache (DRAM-less drives cost less but may slow down when full), controller quality, and brand premium. Very cheap SSDs often use QLC NAND without DRAM — fine for secondary storage but not ideal for boot drives. Check reviews for sustained write performance if you're considering budget options for primary use.

Modern SSDs last 10+ years under normal use. Endurance is rated in TBW (Terabytes Written) — a typical 1TB drive is rated for 300-600 TBW. Writing 50GB per day (heavy use), a 600 TBW drive would last over 30 years. Most users write far less. SSDs are more reliable than HDDs with no moving parts. They can lose data if left unpowered for years, so don't use them for cold storage archives.