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As of July 2026, the best affordable M.2 SSDs are still the strong Gen4 performers from storage giants Samsung and SandDisk, namely Samsung’s 990 EVO Plus and SanDisk’s WD Black SN7100, though the latter now goes by a different name (more on that below). A few reasonably priced Gen5 drives may be worth a look if your motherboard supports PCIe 5.0, but the value case is usually not there yet.
Also, “value” doesn’t mean what it did a year ago. The AI boom is causing price hikes not seen since the GPU mining craze in the 2010s. NAND storage prices are up four-fold since late 2025. Micron even abandoned its Crucial consumer brand entirely in February 2026 – to redirect supply to its more lucrative enterprise customers.
But we will put that discussion aside for now and focus on today’s best value picks, regardless of the overall market.
Best Value NVMe SSDs
Despite the ongoing shortage, you can still find the best price-to-performance ratio in the PCIe 4.0 space. If you want extra sequential throughput from a PCIe 5.0 x4 slot, Crucial’s P510 is one of the more sensible entry points into Gen5, assuming you can still find one.
Last update on 2026-07-13 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API
SanDisk’s WD Black SN7100 – recently renamed Optimus GX 7100 – is nevertheless a winner in the price/performance category, alongside the Samsung 990 EVO Plus.
Our go-to benchmark for comparing SSDs remains UL’s 3DMark Storage Benchmark, which models real-world gaming scenarios like installing, loading, and recording games (numbers that translate well to plenty of non-gaming workloads too). There’s still a clear gap between today’s DRAM-less drives and true flagship Gen5 SSDs, but also a gap worth knowing about between the top-tier Gen5 SSDs and the budget end of the market.
It’s still striking how small of an advantage entry-level Gen5 drives hold over the best Gen4 options for typical gaming and productivity use. What’s more, the latest DRAM-less drives keep punching above their weight, landing close to older flagships like the 990 PRO. That’s welcome news, since DRAM has only gotten pricier since we last checked in.
Today’s DRAM-less SSDs with 4-channel controllers have taken a huge leap forward from just a few years ago. Some standout options include:
Samsung 990 EVO Plus – Excellent DRAM-less SSD
Samsung’s 990 EVO Plus technically qualifies as a Gen5 hybrid SSD, but since it can only utilize two PCIe 5.0 lanes (rather than the standard four), it maxes out at Gen4 transfer rates. However, in any Gen4 system, it will use practically all available bandwidth from four lanes at its maximum sequential read speed of 7,250 MB/s. Random performance is also impressive for a DRAM-less SSD: 1,050K read and 1,400K write IOPS for the 2TB model, from a 5nm Samsung Piccolo controller paired with Samsung’s 8th-generation V8 236-layer TLC.
Important note: Don’t confuse the 990 EVO Plus with the non-Plus 990 EVO, which is significantly slower across all metrics.
Another thing worth watching: Samsung appears to be readying a third model in this family, simply called the 990, with no EVO or Pro suffix. Listings briefly went live on Samsung Canada’s site in early July before getting pulled, and early specs point to a cheaper, QLC, DRAM-less drive positioned below the EVO Plus, with roughly two-thirds its endurance, but nothing is official yet.
Budget Gen5 SSDs: The E31T Lineup
Until mid-2025, the Gen5 space stayed largely limited to flagship M.2 SSDs, but DRAM-less drives built around the Phison PS5031-E31T controller changed that. Built on TSMC’s 7nm process with four channels and modern high-density NAND, these drives deliver Gen5 sequential speeds without the heat and power draw of first-generation Gen5 hardware. Current SSDs using this configuration include:
- Crucial P510 (Amazon) – Micron G9 276-layer TLC; 11,000/9,500 MB/s (1TB), 10,000/8,700 MB/s (2TB)
- PNY CS2150 (Amazon) – Kioxia BiCS8 TLC; up to 10,300/8,600 MB/s
- Corsair MP700 Elite/Micro (Amazon) – Kioxia BiCS8 TLC; up to 10,000/8,500 MB/s (2TB)
- Kioxia Exceria Plus G4 (Amazon) – Kioxia BiCS8 TLC; up to 10,000/8,200 MB/s (2TB)
Note that Crucial stopped selling the P510 as part of Micron’s exit from the consumer market in February 2026. The other SSDs are functionally very similar drives, using the same Phison E31T controller, same Kioxia NAND. If you can find either at a better price point, it’s the more sensible pick.
These drives launched at a premium over Gen4 SSDs, and while pricing has settled somewhat since their debut, the broader NAND crisis means “cheaper” is relative these days. The Crucial P510 still offers good all-around performance, with strong sustained write speeds and better power efficiency than the first wave of Gen5 drives. As before, the 2TB model is rated slightly slower than the 1TB (10,000 vs. 11,000 MB/s sequential read), an odd inversion that reviewers noted at launch and never fully explained.
Looking ahead, Phison’s newer E37T controller, unveiled at CES 2026, promises up to roughly 14.7 GB/s reads while drawing well under half the power of the E31T. But as of this writing, no retail drives use it yet.
If you have a recent system with a Gen5 x4 M.2 slot, these drives warrant consideration when priced competitively.
Best Laptop SSD: WD Black SN7100
If you want an affordable SSD upgrade for a laptop or handheld gaming device (this drive also comes in a 2230 form factor, useful for the smallest systems), the artist formerly known as WD Black SN7100 (now Optimus GX 7100) still deserves a spot on your shortlist. Nothing about the hardware changed: same controller, same NAND, same warranty. You may still spot old WD_BLACK-branded stock at some retailers until it sells through, so don’t be thrown off if you see both names side by side on the shelf.
This drive stands out for its exceptional power efficiency topping efficiency charts relative to performance. Despite having no onboard DRAM cache, it competes with the best Gen4 SSDs available.
The SN7100 is a major step up from its already-excellent SN770 predecessor. Its sequential throughput uses most of the available bandwidth, with the 2TB model reaching 7,250 MB/s reads and 6,900 MB/s writes. Its single-sided design makes it compatible with most laptops, consoles, and small form factor systems. Needless to say, it’s also a solid pick for a full-size desktop system, even if power efficiently matters less in that context. .
Cheap Entry-Level NVMe SSDs
What separates the cheapest NVMe SSDs from slightly more expensive DRAM-less options is primarily the NAND quality tier. The cheapest drives often use QLC (quad-level cell) NAND, which is generally slower and less durable than TLC (triple-level cell) NAND.
However, these drives can still be excellent choices for secondary storage, external USB-C enclosures, or entry-level PCs. The gap between QLC and TLC has narrowed in recent generations, though it has not closed.
Top choices in this category include, in order of performance:
- Crucial P310
- Kingston NV3
- WD Blue SN5100
Crucial P310 – Top QLC Performance in 2026
Although Micron launched the P310 back in mid-2024, it’s still one of the best budget QLC SSDs around, and a clear step up from the P3 it replaced. Maximum sequential performance approaches the Gen4 x4 interface ceiling at 7,100 MB/s read and 6,000 MB/s write, and random performance holds up too, at over 1M IOPS.
The P310 even outperforms the 990 EVO Plus in some benchmarks, which is quite remarkable for a QLC drive. However, the endurance rating reflects its QLC nature: 440 TBW for the 2TB model versus 1,200 TBW for comparable TLC drives.
Other Budget QLC Gen4 SSDs
Depending on daily prices and availability, the Kingston NV3 and WD Blue SN5100 are worth considering as budget alternatives. Kingston’s NV3 offer major improvements over its predecessor (the NV2). The WD Blue SN5100 (now known as Optimus 5100) comes with TLC on the 500GB, 1TB, and 2TB capacities, and QLC on the 4TB. For a primary system drive, the SN5000’s TLC variants are the better long-term choice, with PCWorld noting it as one of the faster HMB SSDs in real-world workloads.
| Budget QLC Gen4 SSDs | Product (1TB capacity) | Sequential read/write (MB/s) | 4K random read/write (IOPS) | DRAM | NAND Type | Endurance/ Warranty | Latest Price* | Check Availability |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Kingston NV3 | 6000/4000 | N/A | N/A | QLC | 320 TBW/ 5-Year | Price not available | Amazon |
 | Corsair MP600 Core XT | 5000/3500 | 700K/900K | N/A | QLC | 250 TBW/ 5-Year | Price not available | Amazon Newegg |
 | MSI Spatium M461 | 5000/3200 | 630K/750K | N/A | QLC | 250 TBW/ 5-Year | Price not available | Amazon Newegg |
 | Crucial P3 Plus | 5000/3600 | N/A | N/A | QLC | 220 TBW/ 5-Year | Price not available | Amazon Newegg |
Among slightly older alternatives, the Corsair MP600 Core XT and MSI’s Spatium M461 both use the Phison E21T controller with QLC NAND – the same combination tested in our Corsair MP600 Mini review, where it performed well in the Steam Deck.
Budget M.2 SSD FAQs
What’s ‘DRAM-less’ and HMB?
“DRAM-less” is pretty self-explanatory: it’s an SSD without onboard DRAM. That’s a departure from traditional SSD design, where DRAM acts as a buffer to speed up reads and, especially, writes while cutting latency. DRAM runs orders of magnitude faster than NAND storage media, but it also drives up manufacturing costs and retail prices.
To make up for the missing DRAM, DRAM-less SSDs use a host memory buffer, or HMB. Instead of onboard DRAM, the SSD borrows a small slice of the host PC’s main memory (usually 64MB) as a mapping cache. Modern HMB implementations have gotten so effective that current DRAM-less drives often match or beat older DRAM-equipped drives, which is a big reason why DRAM-less designs now dominate the budget and midrange market.
What’s the Difference Between TLC and QLC NAND?
Today’s SSDs have incredible density, which is a real engineering feat, but writing more bits to each memory cell comes with trade-offs. As density climbs from MLC (multi-level cell) through TLC (triple-level cell) to QLC (quad-level cell) NAND, both endurance and performance take a hit.
First, all else being equal, QLC NAND performs noticeably worse than TLC. Higher density makes QLC slower and more error-prone, which pushes manufacturers to lean on correction measures, partly through an SLC (single-level cell) cache. Once that faster cache fills up, the SSD starts writing directly to QLC memory, and performance drops to a fraction of the maximum sequential rate. TLC-based SSDs feel this too, just less dramatically.
Second, endurance ratings for QLC-based SSDs tend to be much lower than TLC equivalents. The 2TB Crucial P310 carries a 440 TBW rating versus 1,200 TBW for the 2TB SN7100 or 990 EVO Plus – a 2.7x difference. For average gaming and office use this is rarely a meaningful constraint, but it matters if you do video editing or other write-heavy work. You can clone your existing OS to an M.2 SSD using free methods if you’re upgrading rather than building fresh, which slightly reduces the write burden during setup.
The main issue with QLC SSDs historically hasn’t been reliability or speed (they’re actually quite good at both), but rather that they haven’t been cheap enough compared to their more durable TLC counterparts. The P310 remains good value within the QLC category, but the price gap between it and TLC drives like the SN7100 is narrow enough that for a primary drive, TLC is still the objectively better choice for most users.
Summary: Get TLC NAND and Check TBW Ratings
Some compromises have to be made to get the best possible value in the budget M.2 NVMe SSD space, but it’s important to make the right ones.
To wrap this up:
- PCIe Gen4 NVMe SSDs now offer the best value overall – The WD Black SN7100 and Samsung 990 EVO Plus remain the top picks. In real-world loading times and everyday use, you’re not missing much by choosing Gen4 over Gen5 for typical gaming and productivity workloads.
- TLC NAND remains preferable to QLC for most users – Although QLC technology has improved dramatically (the P310 is genuinely impressive), TLC still offers better endurance and more consistent performance.
- Don’t compromise on endurance or warranty – On that same note, you don’t have to settle for mediocre endurance ratings or reduced warranty periods. At this time, the price difference between drives with or without an industry-standard warranty (five years) and good endurance is often non-existent.
- Consider Gen5 if you have compatible hardware – The Phison E31T-based drives (PNY CS2150, Corsair MP700 Elite) are a reasonable entry into Gen5 without the heat issues of early Gen5 drives. The practical advantage over the best Gen4 DRAM-less drives is however small for gaming and productivity, and prices have risen along with the rest of the NAND market.
However, the bigger story for now is that the market as a whole is terrible for all but NAND and DRAM manufacturers. AI data centers keep absorbing whatever DRAM and NAND they can get at any price, which keeps pushing prices up for the rest of us. TrendForce’s latest numbers suggest a “slower increase” in the latter part of 2026, but no meaningful relief until 2027.
Waiting for prices to drop is a long-term bet at this point, especially with Crucial fully out of the consumer market and other manufacturers thinning their lineups. If you’re building or upgrading a PC in 2026, it is likely a good idea to secure your storage capacity early in the process.
Do you have a different opinion of what makes the best affordable M.2 NVMe SSDs at this time? Don’t hesitate to share it in the comments.
Great article with very useful comparisons and analyses. Essential shopping guide.
Thanks!