Compare the Best External Hard DrivesJune 2021

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

In total we found 120 external hard drives ranging from $45 to $850. On average, a new external hard drive costs $186 and 80% of external harddisk are priced between $79 and $330. The Seagate Expansion Portable - 1Tb is the cheapest external hard drive at only $45, and G-Technology G-DRIVE Thunderbolt 3 - 8Tb is the most expensive at $850.

External Hard Drive Brands - Price Range

IoSafe external hard disk drive range in price from $413 to $702, and the average price of ioSafe external hard disk drive is $503 which is the highest average price of all external hard drive brands.

DataLocker external hard drive start at $312 and their most expensive external hard drive costs $450. The average price of DataLocker external hard drive is $387 which is the second highest average price of all external hard drive brands.

G-Technology external hard disk drive start at $78 and their most expensive external hard drive costs $850. The average price of G-Technology external hard disk drive is $260 which is the third highest average price of all external hard drive brands.

External Hard Drive Brands - Average Ratings

We have checked 120 expert reviews and 1,845 user reviews for external harddisk and used this information to evaluate the average rating for each brand of external hard drive. The top rated external hard drive brand is Western Digital with an average rating of 89%. The second best brand is Seagate with 87% and the third best brand is Silicon Power with 77%.

Biggest External Hard Drive Retailers

We found 100 current offers for external hard disks from Adorama making it the biggest external hard drive retailer. That is much bigger than the second biggest retailer, Overstock for whom we found 61 current offers for external hard disks. The third biggest retailer is Pictureline with 2 current external hard drive offers.

When Are Most New External Harddisk Released?

We looked at the release dates for new external harddisks over the last 3 years, but couldn't see any prominent pattern. Five new external hard disk were released in February 2020 making it the biggest month that year for new external hard drive releases. The biggest month in 2019 for new external hard drive releases was September, with 10 new external hard drives released that month. In 2018 most new external hard drive were released in June, with 57 new external hard drive released that month.

How Fast Do External Hard Drive Prices Drop After Release?

On average, in the first 6 months after release, external hard drives drop in price by 0%.

That means that on a typical external hard drive costing $188 you could save on average $1 by waiting 6 months before buying.

Weights

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

The weights of external harddisks range from 41g to 11.4kg. The weights of the majority of external hard drives range from 0g to 300g. The ioSafe Solo G3 - 4Tb, which is priced at $441.99, has the heaviest weight and is a 6.8kg external hard drive. The Seagate One Touch - 500Gb, which currently retails for $74.99, has the lightest weight and is a 65g external hard drive.

USB Powered

Whether the hard drive is powered by USB or not.

The vast majority of the 838 new external hard drive currently listed on Kagoo are USB powered external hard disks. 688 out of 838 are USB powered external hard disks.

Hard Drive Capacities

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

Across the range of external harddisk, the hard drive capacities range from 1GB to 64TB. The hard drive capacities of most external harddisks range from 0GB to 1.5TB. The external hard drive with the biggest hard drive capacity is the G-Technology G-Raid - 12Tb, which is a 12TB external hard drive and currently retails for $659.99. The Western Digital WD My Passport Wireless - 1TB, which is priced at $164.27, has the smallest hard drive capacity and is a 1GB external hard drive.

Which Are the Cheapest Retailers for External Hard Disk?

The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external hard drives. For each retailer it shows the total number of external hard drives where they currently have a market leading price. The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external hard disk drive. 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. 54 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 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. 88.5% of their external hard drive prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.