Sony made a big deal about the PS5’s SSD performance, and its games lean heavily into that speed, but with a fairly small 825GB drive, it fills up quickly. Luckily, the PS5 has an open M.2 SSD slot, so you can add more system storage that can be used for both PS5 and PS4 games. Sony says you need a PCIe Gen 4 SSD with 5,500MB/s or faster sequential read speed of up to 8TB in capacity, but make sure the SSD you use has a heatsink so it stays cool and performs optimally under load. Thanks to PlayStation Plus, you can try tons of digital games without deleting your favorites.

Upgrade your PS5 with space for all of your favorite games

While it’s not the fastest or flashiest drive you can get for your PS5, the Crucial P5 Plus has plenty of speed with 6,600MB/s of sequential read speed. Sequential read speeds are at their very best with large files, which is one of the reasons it’s important for game load times. This drive should have no trouble keeping up with the most demanding PS5 titles.

The included heatsink is nothing special, but it doesn’t need to be. It’s designed to fit inside the PS5 without any clearance issues, so installation should be as simple as slotting it in and tightening the screw.

This drive comes in 512GB, 1TB, and 2GB sizes with an integrated heatsink, all of which offer significant increases over the base storage. Some new games, like Baldur’s Gate 3 and Spider-Man 2, need over 100GB of storage space, so starting with a 1TB drive gives you a decent amount of space to try new games without deleting the favorites you go back to more often.

The Samsung 990 Pro is one of the best SSDs for gaming you’ll find with excellent performance, including some of the best random performance. Our 990 Pro review notes that this is one of the best-performing PCIe 4.0 SSDs available, making it one of the best-performing PS5 drives, as the console is limited to PCIe Gen 4.

We got over 7,400 MB/s read speeds and 6,890 MB/s write speeds in our testing, which is blisteringly fast. Note that we reviewed the bare version of this drive, but it's the same specs as the one with a heatsink applied. In some ways, this drive may be overkill for a PS5, but if you want to do everything you can to eliminate stutter or slowdown, the Samsung 990 Pro is the way to go.

This drive is available in 1TB, 2TB, or 4TB sizes with a heatsink installed. The heatsink is small enough to fit inside the PS5 without problems and has some aggressive red accents in the grills. Not that you’ll be seeing the drive once it’s installed in the console. Some retailers don’t have the 4TB version with a heatsink, so be sure you order one with a heatsink or buy a PS5-compatible heatsink to go with it.

Even going back to PS3, upgrading your storage with a WD Black was one of the best ways to know you’re getting excellent performance. While the SN850X isn’t the fastest drive around, it’s still blazing fast, with sequential read speeds of 7,300MB/s. This SSD comes with a beefy heatsink featuring an amber LED light, so it should have no trouble keeping cool enough.

This drive comes with a heatsink in 1TB and 2TB sizes. One thing to note is that there is an officially licensed version of this drive called the SN850P with a PlayStation logo on the heatsink that is available with up to 4TB of capacity. For 1TB and 2TB sizes, however, the SN850X is available at a lower price.

The Corsair MP600 Pro series is one of the best values for a PS5 upgrade thanks to its solid performance, well in excess of Sony’s recommendation. This drive supports sequential read speeds of up to 7,100MB/s and should have no trouble keeping up with the most demanding PS5 games. It’s available in a wide range of sizes starting at just 500GB, so you don’t have to spend a fortune to install a few more games.

The heat sink will fit just fine inside the PS5 and is even available in white to match the console. Mind you, you won’t see the SSD once you put the side panels back on, but you’ll know that it matches. You can also get a massive 4TB version, so you can download all of your favorite games that way they’re just a few clicks away at all times.

The Seagate Game Drive is a fairly compact, professional-looking SSD. Underneath the cooler, this drive is fairly standard with a quick 7,300MB/s sequential read speed and up to 2TB of capacity. This drive is also available in 1TB with a heatsink. Our review found that the real-world speeds were slightly slower than the rated ones, topping out at 7,051 MB/s for reads and 6,764 MB/s for writing. That's okay for PS5 use, though, as it only requires 5,500 MB/s read speeds as a minimum. It’s fully compatible with the PS5, so you’re ready to go simply by slotting it in and tightening the screw.

This SSD looks nice with a matte black finish and design. It gives the Game Drive PS5 a slim look while still providing ample cooling to prevent thermal throttling even with hours of heavy usage at a time. If you want more space on your PS5, this drive will have no trouble keeping up.

The Samsung 980 Pro isn’t Samsung’s latest SSD, but with a good price and plenty of performance for PS5 gaming, this SSD is still a good pick for the system. The 980 Pro comes in 1TB or 2TB sizes with a heatsink, which is a good sweet spot for most gamers, but it would have been nice to have a larger option. The heatsink on this drive should have no trouble keeping the SSD cool and running at its best speeds during your gaming sessions.

Believe it or not, the Lexar Professional NM800 Pro is a drive targeted at professional users and gamers alike. It comes with a chunky heatsink to help keep it cool when being hit with large loads like a video render on a PC or one of the most demanding PS5 games. It’s one of the fastest drives you can get, with up to 7,500MB/s read speeds, which are right around the fastest you’ll find on PCIe Gen 4.

The heatsink version of this drive you’ll need for PS5 comes in 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB sizes. The 4TB model is not available with a heatsink, so you’ll need to source your own if you want to use it with a PS5.

Upgrade your PS5 without wasting money on speed you don't need

The PS5 ships with an 825GB SSD but ends up with under 700GB of space available for games and apps. Adding even a 1TB drive is a significant increase and probably the sweet spot for many people. You want a drive with at least 5,500MB/s of sequential read speed with PCI-Express Gen 4x4 support, which is fairly common these days. You need a heatsink to keep the drive cool under heavy load to avoid stutter or slowdown in-game when the controller chip gets hot. It’s worth noting as well that there are lots of PS5-compatible SSD heatsinks available, so you can use just about any of the best M.2 SSDs if you’re willing to do a bit of DIY.

Some of the best SSDs are PCIe Gen 5 drives, which will work with the PS5 thanks to backward compatibility but will only run at Gen 4 speeds, so there’s no reason to spend any extra money on one. It’s also worth keeping in mind that PS4 games can be saved on an external USB drive which is way cheaper than a high-performance SSD. You can also offload PS5 games to that external drive. You’ll need to copy them back to the internal storage to play, but It's still much faster than downloading it all again.

Overall, the Crucial P5 Plus hits all the right marks with a solid PS5-compatible heatsink included and plenty of performance to keep PS5 games running as the developer intended. This drive is available in 1TB or 2TB versions, which should be plenty for most people. However, if you don’t ever want to delete any games, a 4TB Corsair MP600 PRO LPX may be worth it.