This post includes the best NVMe SSDs among those I’ve reviewed that you can safely bring home today.
These are fast internal solid-state drives designed for computers and game consoles that use PCIe Gen 4 or Gen 5 bus speeds—they are the fastest consumer-grade internal storage options. If you’re looking for hard drive replacements, check out this post on the top-five SATA drives instead.
Best NVMe SSDs: The list
This list includes the current best NVMe SSDs and their alternatives. It is sorted in recommendation order, with the best on top—the numbers are the ranking.
Tip
NVMe and SATA are two distinctive internal storage types, with the former being much faster. Currently, the fastest NVMe drives use the PCIe 5.0 standard, though PCIe 4.0 and PCIe 3.0 counterparts remain viable in all cases. All NVMe SSDs can work with motherboards of all PCIe standards, regardless of the revision. Most modern computers come with one or a few M.2 slots to host NVMe SSDs.
1. Micron Crucial P510
The Crucial P510 is Micron’s third PCIe Gen 5 SSDs, but the first of the standard designed as a mainstream drive. As such, it currently has the best performance vs. cost ratio. That, plus the omission of excessive heat, makes it an excellent deal.
Similar alternatives from Micron:
Pros
Excellent performance; runs relatively cool
Helpful Crucial Storage Executive software
Comparatively affordable, 5-year warranty
Cons
Capacities cap at 2TB (for now)
2. Samsung SSD 990 EVO Plus
The Samsung SSD 990 EVO Plus is Samsung’s second attempt at PCIe Gen 5. Like the 990 EVO, it’s a two-lane drive when working as a PCIe Gen 5 SSD and a four-lane drive when working as a PCIe Gen 4 drive. This approach is balanced between delivering the needed performance and reducing the unneeded heat, and it proved to be a successful approach.
Alternatives:
Pros
Excellent performance with PCIe Gen. 4 and Gen. 5
Helpful Samsung Magician software with lots of useful settings and features
Run cool, 5-year warranty
Cons
Only two-lane bandwidth with PCIe 5.0
3. Samsung SSD 9100 Pro
The SSD 9100 Pro is Samsung’s first four-lane PCIe Gen 5 drive. It’s designed for gamers and prosumers and has everything to justify its cost.
Alternatives:
Pros
Fast and reliable PCIe Gen 5×4 performance
Helpful Samsung Magician software with lots of useful settings and features
Run cool, 5-year warranty, up to 8TB of storage space, heatsink option
4. Micron Crucial P310
The Crucial P310 is a compact 2230 NVMe SSD. These drives can fit even the most portable devices—and any standard application with the help of a length extender—yet pack a powerful punch in both performance and capacity.
Alternatives:
Pros
Compact, standard, and heatsink design options with excellent PCIe 4.0 performance
Helpful Storage Executive software
5-year warranty; runs cool
Cons
Modest endurance; no hardware encryption
5. WD Blue SN5000
The WD SN5000 is Western Digital’s latest PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD in the WD Blue family, continuing the tradition of affordability. This frill-free drive offers an excellent combination of performance and cost. It’s worth noting that this is one of the last SSDs made with the WD brand, considering Western Digital officially split off the NAND business to SanDisk in February 2025.
Similar alternatives from WD:
Pros
Excellent sequential performance
Up to 4TB of storage, affordable; helpful Dashboard software
5-year warranty; run cool
Cons
Random access performance and the 4TB version’s endurance rating could be better
No hardware encryption or user-accessible features
Best NVMe SSDs: The takeaway
For the past half a decade, the NVMe SSD has slowly become the norm for internal computer storage. It’s not impossible to buy a new computer that doesn’t use one as the primary storage unit.
While NVMe drives are not created equal, in most cases, any drive that uses PCIe Gen 4 or later will be fast enough for almost any application. That said, if you’re still using a computer with a SATA SSD (or a hard drive), it’s time to get a new computer, or at least migrate to an NVMe drive to get the best possible performance out of it.
