Best PCIe 5.0 SSDs for 2023

Putting a solid-state drive, or SSD, into your computer is the single best upgrade you can make to the overall snappiness of the system. While SSD prices, including the faster M.2 NVMe SSDs, have dropped dramatically in recent years, now there’s a new update bringing prices back up. That’s PCIe 5.0, with theoretical transfer speeds twice that of PCIe 4.0, while using the same form factor and connectors. Since PCIe 5.0 SSDs are new to the market, there aren’t a lot of choices yet, but we’ve scoured the internet to find the best (and only) options available at this time.

These are the best PCIe 5.0 SSDs to buy in 2023

Source: Crucial

Crucial T700 NVMe SSD

Editor’s Choice

The fastest consumer SSD (for now)

$363 $370 Save $7

The Crucial T700 PCIe Gen5 NVMe SSD is one of the fastest solid state drives on the planet, with up to 11,700MB/s reads and 9,500MB/s writes on the 1TB capacity, increasing to 12,400MB/s reads and 11,800MB/s writes on the larger capacities.

Pros

• Blisteringly fast transfer speeds
• Supports Microsoft DirectStorage
• Optional heatsink

Cons

• Not many devices support PCIe Gen 5 yet
• Expensive compared to PCIe Gen 4 drives

The Crucial T700 is my pick for the best PCIe 5.0 SSD you can buy right now. That’s partly because it’s the fastest drive on the market, with 11,700MB/s max read speeds, and 9,500MB/s write speeds in sequential transfers. It’s also partly because it’s one of the cheaper drives on the market, only a few dollars more per drive than the most affordable PCIe NVMe SSDs.

The drive comes in an M.2 2280 single-side form factor with an NVMe controller, a DRAM chip, and two flash packages. Those flash packages are using Micron’s 232-layer TLC NAND3, which has a maximum speed of 2.4GB/s. Crucial has the edge as Micron is its parent company and gets access to the newer technology first, so it can optimize its SSDs accordingly.

The T700 drive is available in capacities of 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB, with or without heatsinks. We should mention that PCIe 5.0 SSDs run hot, and you will want a heatsink for them to work properly. The options with already-attached heatsinks are for motherboards that don’t already have onboard metal heatsinks to keep things cool.

The drive also supports Microsoft’s DirectStorage, which enables your graphics card and SSD to transfer data to each other without it first going through the CPU. This reduces loading times for textures and other assets while lowering CPU utilization. Only one current game supports this, Forsaken, but others are coming soon. It’s backed by a five-year warranty, which seems to be the standard for this gen.

Source: Inland

Inland TD510 PCIe 5.0 NVMe

Best active cooling

Has a tiny fan

$160 $185 Save $25

The Inland TD510 PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD has a 20mm thick aluminum heatsink with a small active fan for optimal cooling of the speedy PCIe 5.0 storage drive. It also has a 6-year limited warranty, one of the longest available.

Pros

• Large heatsink with active fan cooling
• DRAM cache
• 6-year limited warranty

Cons

• Speeds not near PCIe 5.0 maximums
• Fan will likely be noisy

Inland might not be a name you recognize, but you probably know of its parent company, MicroCenter. The in-house brand for SSDs is getting into the PCIe 5.0 market early, with the Inland TD510. This model has sequential reads up to 10,000MB/s, and writes up to 9,500MB/s. That’s not the fastest, but it’s also not the slowest, and this drive has other things going for it.

It was the first PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD on the market, beating the competition by a slim margin. The drive comes in an M.2 2280 single-sided form factor, and comes in capacities of 1TB and 2TB. The chunky heatsink keeps things cool under sustained transfers and has a tiny fan that supposedly helps. It will be annoyingly noisy though, as tiny fans often are, so you might want to leave it unplugged. That heatsink can be removed if your motherboard already has integrated heatsinks.

This drive has a six-year warranty, which outpaces the average of five. It has an endurance rating of 700TBW per 1TB of capacity (meaning the 2TB model will have a 1400TBW endurance rating), which should mean this SSD will last you for a very long time before it needs replacing.

Source: MSI

MSI Spatium M570 PCIe 5.0 NVMe

Premium Pick

Eye-catching design

$290 $350 Save $60

The MSI Spatium M570 PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD is a premium M.2 SSD with blisteringly fast 10,000MB/s read and write speeds using the PCIe 5.0 standard. It comes with a chunky aluminum heatsink to keep things cool, although you pay a premium for it.

Pros

• Up to 10,000MB/s read and write speeds
• Stylish heatsink design

Cons

• Faster Pro version is coming later this year
• Expensive
• No version without heatsink

The MSI Spatium M570 uses the slightly-slower 176-layer Micron NAND, which is rated at 1,600GB/s. That means it has a theoretical maximum of 10,000MB/s, and MSI has managed to squeeze every MB/s of performance out of the Phison E26 controller that every other drive on this list also uses. MSI is selling this SSD in 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB configurations, and a Pro version is coming later this year as well.

The Spatium M570 comes with an attached heatsink with stacked fins in an attractive bronze coloring. This is easily removable by unscrewing some bolts along the sides, so it is a good option whether your motherboard already has heatsinks built in. The drives have up to 1,400TBW of endurance, with the 1TB model only having 700TBW, in line with other manufacturers’ endurance ratings. MSI is also giving these SSDs a five-year warranty.

It’s worth mentioning the upcoming M570 Pro model again, which will have sequential read speeds of up to 12,000MB/s and write speeds of up to 10,000/MB/s. That’s because it’s using the newer 232-layer Micron NAND, which has been in low supply until recently. If you really need the speed and like the look of the MSI, it’s perhaps better to wait.

Source: Gigabyte

Gigabyte Aorus Gen5 10000

Best Value

Fast and cheap

The Gigabyte Aorus Gen5 10000 was one of the first Gen5 SSDs to hit the market, and while it doesn’t quite reach the top end it’s a solid performer at 10,000MB/s speeds for reads and 9,500MB/s for writes. It also comes with an oversized heatsink comprised of heat pipes and fins, like a passive CPU cooler.

Pros

• 10,000MB/s speeds are among the best
• Black PCB
• Optional heatsink

Cons

• Heatsink is HUGE
• No 4TB capacity option

The Gigabyte Aorus Gen5 10000 is aptly named, given that it has sequential read and write speeds up to 10,000MB/s. It uses Phison’s E26 controller and the latest 232-layer 3D TLC NAND from Micron. This is the flash that has 2,400GB/s maximum speeds, although the company hasn’t gotten the full theoretical speeds on this drive. That will come when the Aorus Gen5 12000 is available later this year.

Gigabyte is currently selling 1TB and 2TB capacities of this drive, which come with a five-year warranty and 700TBW of endurance per 1TB of capacity. That’s on par with the competition. Gigabyte also supplies a mammoth heatsink with this drive, which has two heat pipes going into a large fin stack like on CPU air coolers. This is probably overkill, as most manufacturers are offering lower-profile aluminum heatsinks. Still, it’s nice to know that Gigabyte was thinking about heat, and lower heat overall will likely give your SSD a longer life span.

Source: Nextorage Japan

Nextorage Japan NVMe M.2 PCIe Gen5

Best heatsink

Designed to stay cool under pressure

The Nextorage Japan NVMe M.2 PCIe Gen5 has speeds of max read 9500MB/s and max write 8500MB/s, according to the company. It also has a five-year warranty, and multiple on-device protections like bad block management and thermal throttling.

Pros

• Huge, stylish heatsink
• Relatively affordable
• 5 year warranty

Cons

• Heatsink might give installation issues on some builds
• Speeds are on the slow side for PCIe 5.0

The Nextorage Gen5 SSD NE5N Series is another PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD with a beefy heatsink. This drive has sequential read speeds of up to 10,000MB/s, and write speeds of up to 10,000MB/s, making it among the fastest on the market today. It also uses the M.2 2280 form factor, double-sided this time, with two flash packages, a DRAM cache, and a controller on the PCB.

What it does differently is with the heatsink. The dual-heatsink is designed to cool the NAND flash and the controller separately, allowing the two components to stay at a temperature they are comfortable at. The NAND is slightly more efficient while warm, so the larger heatsink is connected to the controller chip, where it will be more useful.

This drive has 700TBW per 1TB of capacity, and is sold in 1TB and 2TB storage configurations. The 1TB drive is slightly slower, with sequential maximums of 9,500MB/s for reads and 8,500MB/s for writes. The DRAM cache also differs, as it uses 2GB of DDR4 per 1TB capacity, so the smaller drive capacity has 2GB, and the larger drive has 4GB. You also get a five-year warranty and a copy of Acronis True Image OEM for drive cloning from your existing device.

Source: Seagate

Seagate FireCuda 540 PCIe Gen5

Best for longevity

Dependable quality

The Seagate FireCuda 540 PCIe Gen5 SSD is another one of the faster drives in this roundup, with up to 10,000MB/s for both read and write speeds. It’s also rated for up to 2000TB total bytes written, which is a lifespan of 1TB of data rewritten daily for five years (based on the 2TB capacity).

Pros

• Up to 1.5 million IOPS 4KB Random Write
• 10,000MB/s read and write speeds
• Five-year warranty with 2000TB TBW

Cons

• No heatsink option
• Expensive

Seagate is one of the biggest names in storage, so it makes sense that it would be one of the early options in the PCIe 5.0 SSD market. The FireCuda 540 SSD is an M.2 2280 form-factor drive, only available without a heatsink option. It comes in 1TB and 2TB capacities, with the higher capacity reaching up to 10,000MB/s for sequential reads and writes. The smaller capacity caps out at 9,500MB/s for reads and 8,500MB/s for writes.

This drive has a five-year warranty, but you might get to the end of that before you have any issues with your SSD. That’s because it has one of the highest endurance ratings of all the PCIe 5.0 SSDs, with 1000TBW per 1TB of capacity. That gives you 2000TBW for the 2TB capacity drive, or enough to rewrite 1TB of data every single day for five years. That’s an extreme data transfer number, and most users won’t get anywhere near this figure with their daily use.

The only bad point here is that the price is similar to drives that come with a heatsink while not coming with a heatsink. Some users might appreciate not having to unbolt or unpeel a heatsink to fit their drive onto their motherboard, and I’m one of them. The ease of use of a bare NVMe SSD is more useful to me than having to figure out which M.2 slot I can use. With PCIe 5.0 M.2 slots mostly coming on higher-end motherboards, they already have metal heatsinks to use.

Source: Corsair

Corsair MP700 PCIe Gen5

Best customer support

From a trusted name

The Corsair MP700 PCIe Gen5 SSD is rated for up to 9,500MB/s read speeds and 8,500MB/s write speeds, with up to 1.6 million 4KB random write IOPS. That’s pretty speedy, with a five-year warranty to back it up.

Pros

• Up to 10,000MB/s read / 9,500MB/s write speeds
• 24/7 customer support and 5 year warranty
• More affordable than other options

Cons

• Doesn’t come with heatsink

The Corsair MP700 is the first PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD from the company. It is a barebones M.2 drive with the 2280 form factor, which means it doesn’t come with a heatsink. Maybe that’s okay, because it’s the cheapest drive on this list while still keeping pace with the pack. Corsair also sells an NVMe waterblock if you are worried about temperatures or don’t have a motherboard with integrated heatsinks.

This drive comes in two capacities, 1TB and 2TB, both with sequential read speeds of up to 10,000MB/s. The 2TB matches that for write speeds, while the smaller capacity is slightly slower at 9,500MB/s. They also have 700TBW endurance per TB of capacity, so you don’t lose out on longevity even with the lower price.

Corsair gives you a five-year warranty for this drive, matching the rest of the manufacturers. What gives this PCIe 5.0 extra value is the 24-hour, 7-days-a-week customer service that Corsair is known for, meaning if you have a problem, you won’t have to wait long to get it dealt with.

Source: fanxiang

Fanxiang S900 PCIe Gen5

Best no-frills

Fast performance and an included optional heatsink

The Fanxiang S900 PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD is a new name to the market but it boasts the same specifications as the big-name drives. That’s up to 10,000MB/s for reads and writes, 1.5 million IOPS, and has a 2GB DRAM cache for sustained transfer speeds.

Pros

• Comes with a heatsink
• 10,000MB/s speeds
• Five-year warranty

Cons

• Relatively unknown brand

The Fanxiang S900 PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD rounds up this list, being the only other PCIe 5.0 SSD that’s available to buy right now. The name isn’t one I was familiar with until now, but it comes with every specification of the better-known brands so it deserves a place here.

The M.2 2280 form-factor drive has sequential read and write speeds of up to 10,000MB/s. It also has up to 1,500K IOPS for random read and write speeds. That’s on par with any drive here except for our top choice, the Crucial T700. It uses the latest 232-layer NAND flash, and has 700TBW per 1TB of capacity.

You also get a separate heatsink, which you can apply if your motherboard doesn’t already have metal heatsinks. Fanxiang says this drive comes with a five-year warranty and has its own factory and service team in case something goes wrong.

What you need to know about the best PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSDs in 2023

The Crucial T700 Gen5 NVMe SSD is my recommendation for anyone buying a PCIe 5.0 SSD today. It has the fastest speeds available at 11,700MB/s sequential read, which is unsurprising since every other PCIe Gen5 manufacturer is using Micron’s 232-layer TLC NAND to make its SSDs. Keeping things in-house means Crucial could get more performance from Phison’s E26 controller. This is the drive to beat, and it only costs a few dollars more than the cheapest options.

That said, it costs more to get Crucial’s T700 with a heatsink, which is why value-orientated shoppers will want to look at other options, like Gigabyte’s Aorus Gen5 10000. This drive has slightly slower speeds, but you probably won’t notice that in everyday use, and the heatsink it comes with looks to dissipate the 11W power usage of the SSD easily. For a more stylish heatsink option, the MSI Spatium M570 is worth a look, especially if your PC is already full of other MSI hardware, as the designs will mesh together nicely.

This is just the first round of releases for PCIe 5.0 SSDs, with over a dozen new models in the works from the usual suspects. While we’re only starting to test units, we have no doubt that at least some will end up as our favorite SSDs, purely from overall performance alone.

Source: Crucial

Crucial T700 NVMe SSD

Editor’s Choice

Fastest drive on the market right now

The Crucial T700 PCIe Gen5 NVMe SSD is one of the fastest solid-state drives on the planet, with up to 11,700MB/s reads and 9,500MB/s writes on the 1TB capacity, increasing to 12,400MB/s reads and 11,800MB/s writes on the larger capacities.