Cheapest SSD per TB: Portable vs Internal

The cheapest SSD per terabyte in our catalog right now is a portable drive: the SanDisk Extreme 1TB at $67.99, or $68 per TB, in our daily Amazon prices on October 14, 2026. That undercuts every internal NVMe and SATA SSD we track, including the Crucial P310 at $107 per TB.

TechRadar spotted the same pattern at 8TB on October 14: the SanDisk Desk Drive 8TB external SSD worked out at $112 per TB, against $185 per TB for Samsung's internal 870 QVO 8TB. Our data covers 54 SSDs; below are the cheapest of each type, plus two popular drives for comparison.

What is the cheapest SSD per TB right now?

Three types of SSD now share the bottom of the price-per-terabyte table: portable USB drives, internal SATA and internal NVMe. Prices are our latest daily Amazon prices (October 13 and 14, 2026); speeds are the manufacturers' rated sequential reads.

The bargains are specific models, not a whole product type. Samsung's T7 2TB and T9 2TB portable SSDs cost $193 and $223 per TB on the same days, so a portable drive is only cheaper if you pick the right one. The SanDisk Extreme 1TB has also been cheaper still: its lowest price in our last 90 days was $51.44.

You may notice the TeamGroup Vulcan Z 4TB has a higher Value Score (73) than the cheaper SanDisk Extreme 1TB (71). Value Scores rank each drive against its own category, so they don't compare across types: the SanDisk is scored against other portable SSDs, where its 1,050 MB/s is mid-pack, and the TeamGroup against SATA drives, where its 550 MB/s is near the top but its QLC endurance rating scores lowest. Our about page explains how the score is calculated, and each product page shows its full breakdown.

What do you give up with a portable SSD?

Speed is the trade-off: a 10Gbps portable SSD such as the SanDisk Extreme reads at 1,050 MB/s, while an internal PCIe 4.0 drive like the Crucial P310 reaches 7,100 MB/s. For backups, photo libraries and moving files between computers, 1,050 MB/s is plenty. For a Windows boot drive or a game library inside a PC, the internal NVMe drive is the right buy at the same $107 per TB. On a PS5, Sony lets you store PS5 games on USB drives but only play them from internal storage, so a console needs an M.2 drive for anything beyond storage. Our NVMe vs external SSD guide covers the use cases in more detail.

Is it cheaper to build your own external SSD?

At 2TB, yes. A Crucial P310 2TB ($214.99) in a Fideco M210 enclosure ($15.99) came to $230.98 on October 13 and 14, or $115 per TB, against $145 per TB for a ready-made SanDisk Extreme 2TB. The 10Gbps enclosure limits the drive to roughly SanDisk Extreme speeds, but you can move the SSD into a PC later and get the full 7,100 MB/s. Every enclosure we track is on our NVMe enclosure rankings.

Is a hard drive still cheaper per TB?

Hard drives still cost half or less per terabyte: the cheapest new drives we track ran $28 to $36 per TB, including the Toshiba X300 4TB internal drive at $28 and the Seagate One Touch 8TB external at $36. That is about half the cheapest SSD and a third of most others. For a large backup that you write once and rarely read, a hard drive is still the value pick, as our external SSD vs HDD comparison explains.

Which cheap SSD should you buy?

My verdict: for backup or carrying files, buy the SanDisk Extreme 1TB while it sits near $68 per TB, or the Crucial X10 6TB if you need one big drive. For a PC upgrade, the Crucial P310 2TB gives you NVMe speed for the same $107 per TB. Prices change daily, so check the current price on each product page or compare all portable drives on our external SSD rankings.