The best SSD for gaming isn’t only great for loading into your match quickly, it’s also one of the best ways to improve your entire desktop experience. Drop it alongside one of the best graphics cards and best gaming CPUs and you’ll have a rig that’s about as snappy as you can get, especially if you install your operating system on the SSD. Not only will your boot times, Windows UI interactions, and app load times be significantly improved, but with games such as Microsoft Flight Simulator recommending an SSD, its becoming even more of an essential component of the best gaming PC.
And solid-state drives are no longer just the preserve of the PC gaming elite – even the best M.2 SSDs are now more affordable than they’ve ever been. And faster, too. Don’t worry about compatbility – any of the best gaming motherboards in 2021 have an M.2 slot – the days of searching for a motherboard with an M.2 slot are gone. The SSD vs. HDD war is pretty much over, at this point: NVMe SSDs are now so affordable that HDDs have become all but redundant. The top of the tech tree is still dominated by Samsung SSDs, but Crucial and ADATA have all still got something to add to the storage conversation too, whether it’s about capacity or price. And for price to performance, a lesser-known Addlink SSD comes in strong.
Our PC SSD benchmarking gauntlet is ruthless, and only the best gaming drives make it through the tests alive. We’ve tested the top SATA and NVMe drives around to find the best SSDs available. It can be easy to spend a phat wad of cash on NAND Flash drives, but you don’t necessarily need to break open your piggy bank for seriously speedy storage anymore.
RELATED LINKS: Best SSD for gaming, How to build a gaming PC, Best gaming CPUOriginal Article
