Compare the Best External Hard DrivesAugust 2020

External hard drives are portable and used to backup files and data from your computer, so they’re safeguarded in case of accident or for retrieval at a later date. While Cloud-based backups are being used more and more for backups, external hard drives still have several important benefits compared to online backups:

Extras

Finally, there are a wealth of extras that can be found in more advanced models of external hard drives. Some of these may only be useful in specific situations, and you will usually pay more for them, but the utility may well be worth the extra cost. Some examples of extra features include:

External Hard Drive Prices

The price range of external hard disk drive is from $40 to $780 and in total we found prices for 138 external hard disk drive. On average, a new external hard drive costs $182 and 80% of external hard drive are priced between $75 and $330. The LaCie Rugged Mini - 500GB is the cheapest external hard drive at only $40, and G-Technology G-Raid - 12Tb is the most expensive at $780.

External Hard Drive Brands - Price Range

IoSafe external hard drive range in price from $413 to $702, and the average price of ioSafe external hard drive is $519 which is the highest average price of all external hard drive brands.

The average price of DataLocker external hard drives is $469 which is the second highest average price of all external hard drive brands. DataLocker external hard drives range in price from $394 to $562.

OWC external harddisks range in price from $155 to $500, and the average price of OWC external harddisks is $288 which is the third highest average price of all external hard drive brands.

External Hard Drive Brands - Average Ratings

We have analysed 139 expert reviews and 1,558 user reviews for external hard disk and used this data to calculate the average rating for each brand of external hard drive. The top three external hard drive brands are Western Digital, Seagate and Buffalo. Western Digital has an average rating of 90%, Seagate has an average rating of 83% and Buffalo has an average rating of 75%.

Biggest External Hard Drive Retailers

The biggest external hard drive retailer by number of products currently for sale is Adorama. We found 59 current external hard drive offers from Adorama. The second biggest retailer is Overstock with 55 offers. That means Adorama is slightly bigger than Overstock when it comes to external hard disk.

When Are Most New External Hard Drive Released?

The most common period for new external harddisk to be released in is between June and July. That means that most of the latest external hard drive technology was released in within the last 3 months, and now is good time to buy. July was the biggest month in 2019 for new external hard disk drive, with seven new external hard disk drive released that month. In June 2018, 59 new external hard drives were released making it the biggest month that year for new external hard drive releases. The biggest month in 2017 for new external hard drive releases was April, with 28 new external hard drives released that month.

How Fast Do External Hard Drive Prices Drop After Release?

On average external harddisks drop in price by 1% in the first 6 months after release.

That means a saving of $2 on a typical $181 new external hard drive if you wait 6 months before buying.

Weights

'Weight' denotes the weight of the external hard drive, measured in grams (g).

Comparing all external hard disk drive, the weights range from 41g to 11.4kg. The weights of most external hard disk range from 0g to 300g. The ioSafe SoloPRO - 3Tb, which can be purchased for $701.99, has the heaviest weight and is a 6.8kg external hard drive. The LaCie Rugged - 1Tb, which currently retails for $72.49, has the lightest weight and is a 100g external hard drive.

USB Powered

Whether the hard drive is powered by USB or not.

The vast majority of the 804 new external hard disk currently listed on Kagoo are USB powered external harddisks. 666 out of 804 are USB powered external harddisks.

Hard Drive Capacities

'Hard Drive Capacity' denotes how much data the hard drive can hold, measured in gigabytes (GB).

Across the range of external hard disk drives, the hard drive capacities range from 1GB to 64TB. The hard drive capacities of the majority of external harddisks range from 0GB to 1.5TB. The Western Digital My Book Duo - 16Tb, which is on sale for $349.00, has the biggest hard drive capacity and is a 16TB external hard drive. The external hard drive with the smallest hard drive capacity is the Western Digital WD My Passport Wireless - 1TB, which is a 1GB external hard drive and is available at $164.27.

Which Are the Cheapest Retailers for External Hard Disk Drive?

The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external harddisk. For each retailer it shows the total number of external harddisk where they currently have a market leading price. The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external harddisks. For each retailer we took all of their prices and looked at what proportion of those prices where the cheapest on the market. The cheapest retailer that we found was Overstock. 47 of their external hard drive prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.

Proportion of External Hard Drives for Which Each Retailer is Cheapest?

Assessing how cheap each retailer is for external hard disk drive by counting the number of cheapest prices for that retailer, makes the retailers that offer the greatest number of external hard drive prices more likely to offer the greatest number of cheapest prices. The chart below considers the proportion of each retailer's external hard drive prices that are the cheapest compared to other retailers. The cheapest retailer that we found using this approach was Overstock. 85.5% of their external hard drive prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.