I get it, the allure of buying PCIe 5.0 storage for your new PC can be tempting. Before the memory crisis sent prices skyrocketing, Gen5 SSDs were more affordable than ever, and you might have thought, "What's a few extra dollars for some premium storage?" While a $50–$60 difference might not feel like a lot for a 2TB SSD, you're still wasting money that can be put to better use. Most people don't even need a Gen4 SSD for gaming, let alone a high-end Gen5 drive. Besides, you might be overlooking the thermal and size constraints of many Gen5 SSDs when making your decision. So, it's time to leave Gen5 SSDs alone for the near future.

Gen5 SSDs are lightning-fast on paper, but that's about it

Gaming doesn't care for sequential speeds

The whole point of moving from spinning hard drives to SSDs was slashing game load times, OS boot times, and overall system responsiveness. Anyone who has switched from a hard drive to a SATA SSD that's 3 times as fast can attest to the game-changing difference of that upgrade. It makes your PC feel brand-new again. However, that's where the benefits start to plateau. Even moving to a Gen3 NVMe SSD that's almost seven times as fast as a SATA SSD doesn't make a perceptible change to your gaming experience. Upgrading to a SATA SSD cuts down your game load times by up to 90%, and any further upgrade to a Gen3, Gen4, or Gen5 barely moves the needle. We're talking about 1–3 seconds of difference between a SATA and Gen5 NVMe SSD.

The reason for this seeming discrepancy is that gaming doesn't respond to sequential read/write speeds, which are what we refer to when throwing around numbers like 14,000MB/s. Random read/write speeds are what determine game load times, and even then, you hit a wall after NVMe storage has already delivered most of the performance you'll ever perceive. Technologies like DirectStorage were meant to bring down game load times even more by establishing a more direct link between storage and the GPU. Unfortunately, outside of a handful of games, DirectStorage hasn't been adopted by the gaming industry. Several challenges still exist in the GPU decompression stage (the GPU, not the CPU, decompresses game assets present on the SSD), making it difficult to realize the full potential of the technology.

You're throwing away money on expensive Gen5 drives

Especially in this market

Gen5 SSDs aren't completely useless, of course. For productivity users, especially those working in a professional environment, the blazing-fast sequential speeds can deliver massive benefits compared to older drives. For gaming, though, it's basically a more expensive drive serving as a bystander while your games continue to run the same as they would on a Gen4 or Gen3 SSD. Before the ongoing memory crisis hit us, 2TB Gen4 SSDs were routinely available for around $120. Equivalent Gen5 SSDs sold for around $200, a massive increase for no perceptible difference in game load times or system responsiveness.

The difference in the prices of Gen4 and Gen5 SSDs might have reduced somewhat in the last few months, but the fact is that you can still pocket the difference without losing any performance. The savings can go into buying a larger drive, a better motherboard, a budget aftermarket cooler, or even a faster graphics card — think the RTX 5070 instead of the RTX 5060 Ti 16GB. These upgrades are guaranteed to make a bigger difference to your PC's gaming performance, thermals & noise levels, and longevity. As things stand, Gen5 storage is still a new technology that hasn't found its footing in the larger market.

The age of Gen5 SSDs will come, but not anytime soon

Value for money isn't the only downside

It's a given that in time, Gen5 SSDs will replace Gen4 drives as the preferred storage standard, just like Gen4 drives replaced Gen3 models. That transition might be a few years away, and the reasons are more than just the absence of extra performance for the money. Gen5 drives also tend to run hotter than Gen4 counterparts due to the underlying complexity. The faster Gen5 SSDs have loads of signal amplification going on, along with signal degradation prevention and high-speed lane signaling, all of which is to say that these drives are too complex for their own good. Recent models have lowered the operating temperatures a bit, but thermal throttling is a very real problem on many Gen5 SSDs. They can sometimes exceed normal operating temps even when idle.

To tackle these high thermals, several Gen5 SSDs come with bulky heatsinks and even elaborate cooling designs, complete with discrete fans. These modules can be a pain to install in compact rigs, obstructing large graphics cards and coolers. Until Gen5 SSDs solve the inherent thermal constraints and start providing tangible benefits to the average user, they'll remain a niche that only a few enthusiasts invest in.

Gen5 SSDs might be impressive, but your gaming PC can use the money elsewhere

Despite Gen5 SSDs boasting double the transfer speeds of Gen4 drives, they don't offer any real difference in game load time, OS boot time, or general system snappiness. Your gaming PC will be perfectly fine with a Gen4 drive, and you can invest the money you save in other components for much better results. Gen5 SSDs will become relevant for the average user one day, but until then, it's okay to forget about them if your only objective is gaming, browsing, and regular PC usage.