The current external drive I have I formatted to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) but I've been reading a few articles that are saying exFAT is the way to go, as long as you're not planning on using the drive on older systems, which I most likely will not be. However, you can easily format any external hard drive on your Mac to work with both Mac and PC or Mac only. If you want to use the drive with both a Mac and PC it must be formatted in exFat or FAT32 format.
Format Hard Drive For Both Mac And Windows
Best External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc
Format External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc 2018
External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc
The technology of external hard drives and connection ports is constantly changing which is why weve taken a closer look at the best external hard drive for Mac of 2019.
The great thing for Mac users is that external HDDs have never been cheaper and storage sizes have never been bigger. Ten years ago, you would have paid several hundred dollars for a chunky hard drive with just a few Gigabytes (GB) of storage space on.
Now you can get 5 Terabytes (TB) of portable storage (5000 GB) for little more than $100 thats enough to backup several Macs in one go in a portable external hard drive that can fit in your pocket.
Getting an external hard drive can be useful for a variety of reasons. The most common reason is if youre running out of disk space and need somewhere to put all those photos and 4K videos from your digital camera or home movies from your video camera.
However, an external storage device is also useful if you want to setup a home surveillance system on your Mac, experience Virtual Reality games and apps or if you want to digitize all your documents and paperwork.
If youre in a hurry, check out the comparison table below for quick overview of our top picks. Youll find more detailed reviews below and you can use the quick navigation links on the right to jump to the section you want. The Best External Hard Drives For Mac Compared WD My Passport Seagate Backup Plus Transcend Storejet M3 WD MyBook Desktop WD MyBook Desktop Duo Capacity 1-4TB 1-4TB 1-2TB 1-8TB 4-16TB Size Portable Portable Portable Desktop Desktop USB 2.0 USB 3.0/Thunderbolt RAID Warranty (years) 3 2 2 3 3 Password Protection/Encryption
Buy Now
Buy Now
Buy Now
Buy Now
Buy Now
Here then is our selection of the best external hard drives for Mac in 2019 in order of ranking. 1. WD My Passport For Mac
The Western Digital 1TB My Passport For Mac is the perfect 1TB portable external hard drive for Mac users. Its ready formatted for use on Mac, Time Machine ready and small enough to fit in your coat pocket. With a 3 year warranty and big enough to backup all Mac hard drives, if you need a simple, fast and reliable backup solution for your Mac, you cant go wrong with the WD 1TB My Passport.
The WD My Passport for Mac supports USB 3.0/Thunderbolt connections but it will also work with USB 2.0 connections. We recommend paying that little extra for the 4TB which is the biggest version available in the My Passport Range which ranges from 1TB-4TB.
If youre going to carry it around a lot, we also recommend getting a proper carry case for it too. 2. Seagate Backup Plus For Mac
The Seagate Backup Plus for Mac is the closest rival to the WD My Passport for Mac. The Seagate Backup Plus For Mac ranges from 1TB to 4GB and like the WD My Passport, its ready formatted for use on Macs and Time Machine ready for instant backups as soon as you plug it into your Mac. It also has USB 3.0/Thunderbolt connectors and includes a USB 2.0 adapter cable for older Macs.
The Seagate Backup Plus for Mac also comes with Seagate Dashboard backup software but we found it a bit bloated and hard to customize backups with. Theres really no need to use it if youre using Time Machine for your backups. Although Seagate dont make it very clear in the product description, the Backup Plus For Mac has a 2 year warranty which is 1 less than Western Digital.
Be aware however that although Seagate has traditionally had a good reputation in the external hard drive industry, more recently there are far more reports of hard drive problems and customer service issues with Seagate external hard drives. There are also many satisfied customers too but to be on the safe side, you might as well go with WD drives as theyre exactly the same price and in our experience, rock solid. Theres also a shockproof carry case for it and Seagate are offering 2 months free Adobe Creative Cloud subscription included. 3. Transcend StoreJet M3
The main selling point of the Transcend StoreJet M3 is that its incredibly tough. In fact, it claims to be military drop tested with an advanced 3 stage shock protection system and a durable anti-shock rubber outer case.
The Transcend StoreJet M3 also comes with its own software that can be used for one-touch backups. Just press the button on the Transcend and the software will automatically backup. However, youre much better just using Time Machine which will automatically detect and use it for backups.
It also comes with an extra USB cable to connect to a second USB port in case your Mac cant provide enough power for it from one connection although most Mac users shouldnt need this.
If shock protection is important to you, the Transcend StoreJet M3 is a good choice but note that it only comes in a 1TB and 2TB version theres nothing bigger. To enhance protection, you can choose from a range of carry cases too. 4. WD My Book Desktop
If you dont need a portable external drive and are happy to simply have something bigger on your desktop, then look no further than the WD My Book Desktop . Weve used WD My Book Desktops for over 10 years and never had a problem and would not hesitate to recommend it still.
Unlike the portable version, the WD My Book Desktop has its own power supply which you connect to the mains so it doesnt draw any power from your Mac. It has a USB 3.0 connection port but also works with USB 2.0 ports. The WD My Book Desktop also comes with its own WD Backup Software which is straightforward but you really dont need it if you use Time Machine or another backup software. For security, the WD MyBook Desktop also features 256bit AES hardware encryption that password protects your data.
The WD My Book Desktop is available in 1TB going up to 8TB. 5. WD My Book Duo Desktop RAID
If you want the biggest and best external hard available on the market in 2019 at consumer prices, then go for the WD My Book Duo Desktop RAID . The Duo consists of two drives in one enclosure which can be combined as RAID drives to double capacity and speed. The 16TB drive for example is actually two 8TB WD Red HDDs packed together in one casing. By combining both drives in one, it offers super fast transfer speeds of around 324 Mbps.
The WD My Book Duo Desktop is the cheapest and most reliable external hard drive for Mac which allows you to choose RAID disks. RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) is just a way of combining two hard drives into one super hard drive. You can choose between using both drives as RAID 0 (very fast) or RAID 1 (more secure) or divide them both using JBOD. By default, it is configured in RAID 0 but you can easily change it to RAID 1.
If you want to take out or replace on the drives you can also push down on the top of the enclosure and the lid will pop up allowing you to remove the drives. However, note that you can only use the same drives with the same enclosure. If the enclosure fails for any reason, you cant just pop out the hard drives and pop them in a new one to save them as each hard drive has a unique encryption key for each enclosure. However, we still havent heard of a case of enclosure failure yet.
WD SmartWare will automate backups for you and even integrates with DropBox for cloud backups too but you can use Time Machine or any other Mac backup software. Note that this particular WD hard drive does not come ready formatted for Mac but you can easily format it for Mac in a few minutes using Disk Utility in OS X or by following these instructions.
Although its a bit on the pricey side, considering youre getting two Western Digital 8TB hard drives in one enclosure, its actually a very good deal. If 16TB is too big, you can also buy it in 4, 6, 8 and 12 TB. Its also surprisingly quiet for such a large hard drive and theres no noisy fan as its cooled from the bottom vents with warm air flowing out of the top vents. Best Thunderbolt External Drives For Mac
Thunderbolt 3 drives are still pretty expensive in 2019 and wed advise sticking to USB 3.0 for now since it offers by far the best value for money and can support transfer speeds of up to 5 Gbps which is more than fast enough for most needs. However, if you want a Thunderbolt 1 (10 Gbps) or a Thunderbolt 2 (20 Gbps) external drive for Mac and are willing to pay that bit extra, here are the two best Thunderbolt external drives for Mac. 1. WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo
The WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo is designed specifically for Thunderbolt 1 connections delivering transfer speeds of up to 10Gbps. Like the WD My Book Duo, its actually two drives combined and has two Thunderbolt connections so that you can access both drives at once if you need to (although note that it only comes with one Thunderbolt cable).
The WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo is quiet and is ready formatted for use on Mac. Its also RAID 0 ready although it can be configured for RAID 1 too. However, note that if just one drive is configured as RAID 0 and the other as RAID 1, you will lose any data on the RAID 0 drive if anything goes wrong so we strongly recommend using RAID 1 on both which treats them both separately even if it does deliver slower performance.
The WD My Book Thunderbolt duo to available in 4TB, 6TB and 8TB versions. If you want a reasonably priced Thunderbolt external drive for Mac that quiet and reliable, dont look any further than the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo. 2. OWC ThunderBay 4 Raid
The OWC ThunderBay Raid is pretty much the fastest and biggest external hard drive for Mac you can get with a maximum of a massive 40TB of storage. Its also one of the only external hard drives to support Thunderbolt 2 which gives incredible top speeds of 1.3Gbps although in reality, youll probably get sustained speeds nearing to 827Mbps which is about as fast as it gets for an external mechanical hard drive at the moment. The OWC ThunderBay also supports RAID 0, 1, 4, 5 and 1+0 meaning you can use each drive separately or combine them for fastest speeds.
The OWC ThunderBay Raid is however one of the most expensive external hard drives you can get for Mac with the largest 40TB of storage costing well over a few thousand dollars. The OWC ThunderBay is mainly aimed at video editors, enterprises and small businesses that need massive storage and ultra fast rock solid performance.
The Thunderbolt 2 connection is enough for video editors to edit and stream 2K or 4K footage from although note that it doesnt support Thunderbolt 3. Like all OWC external drives, the OWC ThunderBay 4 RAID comes with a 5 year warranty which is the longest youll find for a quality external hard drive on Mac.
Overall, the OWC ThunderBay Raid is easily the biggest and most reliable external storage drive for Mac available so if you need some serious storage space, its the ultimate external hard drive for Mac. Best SSD External Drive For Mac
As explained earlier, SSD drives offer the poorest value for money in terms of dollars per TB. There are very few SSD external drives for Mac that we can strongly recommend but in our opinion, the best consumer priced SSD external hard drive for Mac you can currently get in 2019 is the Samsung T3 Portable SSD. 1. Samsung T3 Portable SSD
The Samsung T3 Portable SSD is an SSD external hard drive for Mac with read-write speeds of up to 450 Mbps which is at least twice as fast as most mechanical drives. Its incredibly small being not much bigger than a credit card and weighs just 1.8 ounces. It works on Mac, PC and Android devices but note that its not ready formatted for OS X. The Samsung T3 is shock resistant and theres less chance of it burning-out that a mechanical hard drive because there are no moving parts. In fact, Samsung claims it can withstand 1500G of G-force equivalent to being dropped from 6.5 feet.
Its also one of the few external drives for Mac that supports USB 3.1 connections. It has a USB-C port which means you can use a Thunderbolt 3 cable with it although it cant deliver anything close to Thunderbolt 3 transfer speeds. Note that the T3 comes with a USB-C to USB-A cable in the box.
If youre looking for incredibly fast transfer speeds, the latest in SSD technology, portability and durability, the Samsung is the one SSD external drive for Mac we would recommend if we had to pick one. Tips On Macs External Hard Drive Compatibility
As many users have learned from bitter experience, its not all about price and size when it comes to external hard drives on Mac.
Here are some important things to consider before buying an external hard drive. Reliability
Reliability is probably the most important consideration when purchasing an external hard drive for your Mac. The worse thing that can happen to an external storage device is disk failure. When this happens, youve usually lost everything stored on it which can be a total disaster if youve got precious family photos or important documents on there.
Most manufacturers will guarantee at least two years of reliability and the best manufacturers like Western Digital (WD) offer three years and OWC five years although in reality, all should far outlast this.
Generally, the longer the warranty, the more expensive the hard drive.
However, any such guarantees are little compensation in terms of your precious data in the case of failure. You will have lost all of your files anyway but at least youll get a free replacement from the manufacturer.
Although manufacturers sometimes quote an Annualized Failure Rate of less than 1 (AFR is a percentage of its hard drives that fail annually) any figures on reliability arent worth basing your decision on in our opinion because everyone uses hard drives in different ways.
For example, those that leave their external hard drives switched on all the time or use it constantly for video editing are going to experience more frequent failures than those that only switch them on occasionally for backups.
There are some important measures you can take however to reduce the chance of external hard drive failure on your Mac. Buy A Decent Brand
This is probably the most important piece of advice when buying an external hard drive.
There is definitely a difference between established brands and lesser known newcomers to the market. In 2019, the general consumer external hard drive market is dominated by two big players, Western Digital and Seagate, which have both been in the business over 20 years.
At MacHow2 we use Western Digital (WD) external hard drives on a regular basis and would not hesitate to recommend them such as the rock solid WD My Passport range of external hard drives. Note that Hitachi drives are now owned by Western Digital so if you buy a Hitachi external hard drive, youre effectively getting a Western Digital product.
Seagate on the other hand used to be equally reliable although weve noticed more and more complaints about hard drive failures and customer service issues with them in recent years so our confidence in Seagate has reduced somewhat.
However, Mac users should definitely avoid brands such as LaCie, Fujitsu and Toshiba which in our experience, can be very flaky and significantly more prone to mechanical failure.
Of course, youll always find plenty of satisfied customers of these products too but in our experience and research, youll also find many more disgruntled ones too.
In these reviews, weve only focused on reputable established brands in market that we know are reliable choices for Mac users. Limit Backups Use
Do not use your external hard drive more than is absolutely necessary.
If you have it switched on all day, and particularly if you keep accessing it all day, its going to burn out far more quickly than if you just switch it on once daily or weekly to make backups.
Quite simply, the more you use an external hard drive, the quicker it will eventually fail.
Those that edit video directly from an external drive can therefore expect their hard drive fail quicker and should definitely invest in higher end quality hard drives featured here such as the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo or OWC ThunderBay. Always Use A Second Backup Solution
The chances of two external hard drives failing at the same moment are extremely slim so if your backups are really important, using two drives is the best thing you can do for backups.
If you dont want to purchase a second drive, alternatively you can make sure youre using a cloud backup solution in tandem with your external hard drive.
The WD My Book Duo for example also features backup software integration with DropBox.
For Mac and iOS users however, the easiest solution is to use Apples iCloud alongside your external hard drive. You get 5GB of free online storage with iCloud with plans starting at just $0.99 per month for 50GB. Prevent Power Surges
One thing that can instantly destroy your hard drive is a power surge in your home or office electricity supply. However, you can easily protect against this with a cheap Surge Protector Power Strip which is well worth the investment (for your Mac too).
However, a common occurrence with cheaper brand external hard drives is that the inverter inside fails which basically allows too much power to short-circuit and destroy the hard drive. In these cases, a surge protector wont help you which emphasizes the benefit of buying from a reputable brand. Never Move A Drive When Its Switched On
Try never to move an external hard drive when it is switched on.
In non SSD drives, there is a danger that the read/write heads can move and make contact with the hard drive in which case, it will break immediately.
These are some simple measures you can take to help protect yourself from the worst and preserve the life of your Mac external drive. If you want to learn more about why hard drives fail, you can find an interesting look at hard drive reliability here. Capacity: The Bigger The Better
External hard drives now offer massive amounts of storage space and the starting point in most external hard drives is now generally at least 1 Terabyte or more. 1 TB equals 1000GB and is roughly equivalent to 488,000 photos and 220 full length movies so a 5TB hard drive could be enough for a lifetime of photos or music for most people (see the table below).
Theres no right or wrong answer when it comes to storage but our advice is simply to buy the biggest you can afford.
Cloud storage solutions such as iCloud and OneDrive are certainly reducing the need for physical storage but the bigger your external storage device is, the more it can grow with you. As photos and videos increase in size (most high-end digital cameras and even iPhones can film in 4K for example which eats massive amounts of hard drive space) the bigger the better.
Nowadays, 1TB of hard drive can cost less than $100 while one of the biggest consumer priced external hard drives, the WD My Book Duo 16TB, costs around $499. For those looking for serious storage space for enterprise backups or 4K editing, the OWC ThunderBay goes up to 40TB but will set you back over a few thousand dollars. Desktop vs Portable
There are two types of external hard drives for Mac: 3.5 inch desktop drives that have their own mains power source and 2.5 inch portable external drives that take their power from your Mac.
Portable drives will easily fit in your jacket pocket. At the moment, desktop drives go up to a maximum of 40TB and Portable go to 4TB. Some of the biggest desktop external drives such as the WD My Book Duo and OWC ThunderBay are actually a combination of 2 drives in one enclosure which can be used as RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) drives which basically means you can combine them both for double the speed, storage and performance.
In these reviews, half of our picks are portable and the other half are desktop including the MyBook Desktop Duo that can be used in a RAID setup. SSD vs Mechanical Drives
Almost all external hard drives nowadays are still mechanical drives which means they have moving parts inside. Solid State Drives have no moving parts, are therefore less likely to break and theyre incredibly fast but theyre still rare and very expensive for very little storage space.
Theres no doubt that SSD drives will eventually replace mechanical drives in the external hard drive market but the economies of scale still arent there yet.
All new Macs since 2012 (except iMacs, Mac Minis and non-retina MacBook Pros) have internal SSD hard drives fitted as standard and anyone thats used older Macs with mechanical internal hard drives will tell you how much faster and more efficient they are.
Mechanical external hard drives feature moving parts which can deteriorate and break more easily. SSD drives are also silent and run cooler compared to mechanical drives which whir and buzz due to the drive spinning which also creates more heat.
A Solid State Drive (SSD)
As the technology improves, prices come down and capacity of SSD increases, its likely that eventually all external hard drives will be SSD drives. But at the moment, mechanical drives still rule the external drive market and offer the biggest capacities for the best prices.
If you really must have an external SSD drive for Mac however, then we have reviewed the best SSD external hard drive for Mac in this article which is the Samsung T3 Portable. External Hard Drive Speeds: RPM
The speed of backups or data transfer from your Mac to your hard drive depends on two things the connection type (see below) and the hard drives physical speed denoted in Revolutions per Minute (RPM).
Most external hard drives are 5400RPM but there are some faster high-end drives that are 7200RPM. A 7200RPM drive will be faster than a 5400RPM drive because the drive revolves faster and therefore can be read by the drive head quicker.
If youre connecting a 7200RPM hard drive via a super fast Thunderbolt or USB 3.0 connection, then youll enjoy the hard drives maximum transfer speed.
However, if youre connecting via a USB 2.0 or Firewire port, then your connection cable wont even be able to deliver the maximum speed of the hard drive so you might as well save some money and get a 5400RPM with greater capacity than a fast drive with less capacity.
The reality is that whichever hard drive you get, youll probably get around 100-200 Mbps transfer speed from most mechanical drives and about double this from an SSD drive.
This is well below the capabilities of most modern connection ports and cables but as well explain shortly, external hard drive technology still hasnt fully caught up with them.
Our advice is dont worry too much about hard drive speed on external drives.
Most external hard drives have a USB 3.0 connection which will deliver incredibly fast transfer speeds. Most consumer priced external drives are 5400RPM anyway so its not something you can easily be choosy about.
7200RPM external drives tend to be more expensive, noisier and most manufacturers are concentrating on trying to deliver more speed by designing hard drives that can take full advantage of connection types, than hard drive speeds as well see below. Connection Types
The business of external hard drive connections can be extremely confusing as technology changes and Apple seemingly keeps changing ports on every new generation of Mac.
All new Macs since 2012 have ditched Firewire in favor of Thunderbolt connections offering staggering maximum data transfer speeds of up to 40 Gigabits per second (Gbps) (port connection speeds are measured in Megabits per second (Mbps) or Gigabits per second (Gbps) 1000 Mbps equals 1 Gbps).
However, the problem is that most external hard drives dont even support the latest generation of Thunderbolt yet (Thunderbolt 3) apart from high end drives such as the OWC ThunderBay which supports the slightly slower Thunderbolt 2 (20 Gbps) and the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo which only supports the even slower Thunderbolt 1 (10 Gbps).
However, it is USB 3.0 (5 Gbps) that currently dominates the external hard drive market which has superseded the USB 2.0 (480 Mbps) ports that almost everyone has used at some point.
All Macs from 2012 have at least one USB 3.0 port and two Thunderbolt 1 or 2 ports although the good news is that most external drives with USB 3.0 are also backward compatible with USB 2.0 ports found on all older Macs.
To complicate things however, USB 3.1 (10 Gbps) was released a few years ago which is even faster but faces the same problem as Thunderbolt there are still very few manufacturers that support USB 3.1.
Firewire meanwhile has pretty much been abandoned by most external hard drive manufacturers although there are a few that still support it.
As you can see, it seems that port connection standards, usually driven by Intel and Apple, are changing faster than external hard drive manufacturers can keep up with but to clarify things, here well take a closer look at the sometimes bewildering world of external hard drive port connections on Mac. USB 2.0 USB 3.0
Almost all external hard drives for Mac now use a USB 3.0 port. If your Mac is from 2012 onwards then it will have at least one USB 3.0 port. You can check this by doing the following:
Go to the Apple logo in the top left of your Mac and select About this Mac
Click on System Report on the Overview tab
Select USB down the left hand margin
There you will see if you have a USB 3.0 port. Macs before 2012 only have USB 2.0 but the good news is that all USB 3.0 external hard drives are backwards compatible with USB 2.0 ports.
The only difference is you will get a maximum data transfer speed of 480Mbps compared to 5 Gbps with USB 3.0 (see the port connection speed comparison table below for an overview of speed differences between connection ports). USB 3.1
USB 3.1 was released a few years ago and offers more than double the speed of USB 3.0 at 10Gbps (roughly the same as Thunderbolt 1). The problem is that most external hard drive manufacturers simply do not support it.
There are some models such as the Samsung T3 Portable SSD which is both an SSD drive and 3.1 compatible but only goes up to 1TB and is quite expensive. Our advice is, dont look for a USB 3.1 drive at this stage the adoption by manufacturers and economies of scale simply still arent there. Thunderbolt 1, 2 3 / USB-C
Since 2012, new Macs have Thunderbolt connections. The latest MacBook Pros from late 2016 onwards have Thunderbolt 3 connections which offers speeds of up to 40 Gbps per second.
This is incredibly fast and easily allows you to edit video from your Mac as if it were on your Macs internal hard drive or even connect an external monitor to.
Thunderbolt has been developed by Intel and Apple but uses the same connection port and cable type as USB-C which was developed separately by the USB Implementers Forum and which will eventually replace USB 3.1. USB-C devices however can only handle a top speed of 10 Gbps.
Thunderbolt replaces older Firewire connections and is now standard in all new Macs. If youve got a pre 2016 Mac with a Thunderbolt 2 port, youll need a conversion cable from Apple to connect it to Thunderbolt 3 or USB-C ports.
If youre backing up large amounts of data, a Thunderbolt compatible external hard drive is definitely worth the investment because it makes backups much quicker.
Or if youre planning on regularly transferring or backing-up 4K video, a Thunderbolt connection makes creating backups and editing in real-time from an external hard drive much quicker.
However, theres one big problem with Thunderbolt 3 and USB-C. At the moment, there are no external drives that actually support Thunderbolt 3. The closest weve found is the OWC ThunderBay which supports Thunderbolt 2 capable of speeds of up to 20Gbps.
Beware that there are some manufacturers that claim to be Thunderbolt 3 compatible but this is misleading as it merely means it can plug into a Thunderbolt 3 port it does not deliver Thunderbolt 3 transfer speeds.
Always check the small print what the maximum transfer speed is if its not at least 40 Gbps then its not Thunderbolt 3 compatible.
At the moment in 2019, we therefore advise against making Thunderbolt a priority when choosing an external hard drive for Mac for several reasons which can be summarized as:
External hard drives still havent caught up with the speed of Thunderbolt connections. A Thunderbolt port can transfer at a staggering 40Gbps but even the fastest hard drives cant get anywhere near this.
There are three types of Thunderbolt version 1, 2 and 3 each faster than the last. The problem is that those Thunderbolt drives that do exist still use Thunderbolt 1 or 2 which is the slowest standard so youre not even getting the best that Thunderbolt on the latest generation of Macs can offer.
Those Thunderbolt drives that currently exist are mainly only Thunderbolt 1 compatible (10Gbps) and expensive for very little capacity compared with USB 3.0 drives which transfer at a very respectable 5Gbps. For example, LaCie offer a 4GB Thunderbolt 1 external hard drive but we would never recommend LaCie drives anyway to Mac users. If you must have a Thunderbolt drive, the best thunderbolt external drive for Mac is the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo or if you want something really big, the OWC ThunderBay. Firewire
Macs before 2012 also have Firewire (400 and 800) ports but this standard is gradually being phased out and we dont recommend getting a Firewire external hard drive.
The majority of manufacturers that still produce Firewire drives are not established brands either and therefore reliability may also be an issue.
However, if a Firewire port is important for you, we can recommend the well-respected and reliable OWC range of Firewire drives for Mac which support both Firewire and USB 3.0. OWC have been in the business over 25 years.
Apple has replaced Firewire ports on all Macs made after 2012 with Thunderbolt ports which well look at next. Note that if the external hard drive has a Firewire connection but you only have a Thunderbolt connection port on your Mac, you can use a Firewire to Thunderbolt adapter cable to connect it to your Mac although transfer speeds will be at Firewire speed, not Thunderbolt speed.
The conclusion from all this is that in 2019, the fastest, most widely used and economical external hard drive connection that Mac users should focus on is USB 3.0.
All of the best external drives for Mac featured here use at least a USB 3.0 connection but weve also featured a few which support Thunderbolt as well.
To summarize the speed difference between the different connections check the comparison table below which is done in order of speed. Speeds are measured in Megabits per second (Mbps) and faster devices such as USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt in Gigabits per second (Gbps).
Note that these are maximum speeds and real world speeds may be 10-20 less depending on the type of data being transferred and other factors. As mentioned earlier, there are no external drives that can achieve these speeds yet and the best you can expect is around 100-200 Mbps transfer speed from most mechanical drives and about double that from an SSD drive. Connection Type Speed Firewire 400 400 Mbps USB 2.0 480 Mbps Firewire 800 800 Mbps USB 3.0 5 Gbps USB 3.1 10 Gbps USB-C 10 Gbps Thunderbolt 1 10 Gbps Thunderbolt 2 20 Gbps Thunderbolt 3 40 Gbps
The world of connection ports is changing rapidly and theres an ongoing debate over which will eventually win out between USB 3.1 and Thunderbolt / USB-C.
At the moment though, its USB 3.0 thats out in front. For more on using USB 3.0 on Mac, check out Apples USB 3.0 FAQ. Apple Airport Time Capsule
Apple offers its own tailor-made external hard drive, the Apple Airport Time Capsule.
Time Capsule works over your WiFi connection so the smart thing is, backups are performed wirelessly. However, backing up via WiFi is also much slower than using an external hard drive connected with either a USB 3.0 cable or Thunderbolt connection.
Apples Time Capsule is also considerably more expensive than most other external hard drives with similar capacity so unless wireless backups are important to you, there are better options available. Format Types
You can format an external hard drive so that it works on both Mac and PC or Mac only. The best models featured here are ready formatted for use on Mac (except the WD My Book Duo and OWC ThunderBay).
However, you can easily format any external hard drive on your Mac to work with both Mac and PC or Mac only. If you want to use the drive with both a Mac and PC it must be formatted in exFat or FAT32 format.
The problem is that FAT32 is limited to 4GB so since all the hard drives featured here at 1TB or more, you have to use exFat.
As we say, you wont need to do this as all of the drives here are ready formatted for Mac and Time Machine ready but you can find easy to follow instructions here. Mac Backup Software
This could be an article in itself but we have absolutely no problem using Apples Time Machine software for backing up Macs and strongly recommend using it.
Time Machine is free in macOS, its quick and its easy to use. If anything happens to your hard drive, everything on your Mac including setup and configuration is saved in Time Machine. Just plug Time Machine in case of data loss, operating system problems or plug it into a new Mac if your hard drive failed, and you can instantly roll back to the last working version of your Mac with all your files and folder.
There are other more manual solutions however, the best being CarbonCopy Cloner or SuperDuper for Mac.
Most external hard drive manufacturers also include their own backup and management software but they can be unintuitive, inflexible and you really dont need them. Seagates Dashboard software for example is quite bloated and doesnt make it easy to customize backups. Conclusion
We hope this article has helped clarify the ever-changing and often confusing world of external hard drives on Mac.
Theres never been a better time for Mac users to extend storage capacity with an external hard drive. External hard drives have never been smaller or cheaper although the range of reliable manufacturers has dwindled significantly.
Today, Western Digital are one of the few left that offer genuine reliability and quality which is why 3 out of our top 5 external hard drives for Mac in 2019 are Western Digital drives. At the top end of the market, OWC external hard drives are an excellent choice as they specialize in Mac but cost a lot more.
If youve got any comments, experiences, issues or suggestions regarding any of the hard drives featured here, let us know in the comments below.
Welcome to our guide to buying the best external hard drive or backup hard drive in 2019. When looking to buy the best external hard drive for your needs, there are quite a lot of things you need to consider - and this guide will help you.
Plus, with Amazon Prime Day 2019 rapidly approaching, there's a good chance that we're going to see some major price cuts to the best external hard drives out there. If you do find a killer deal for any of the drives on this best external hard drive list, then you can buy in full confidence that you're getting a brilliant external drive for your money.
When buying the best external hard drive for your needs, you need to make sure you get a device that can safely and securely store your important files. Reliability is of the upmost importance here, as you do not want to buy an external hard drive that fails on you - making you lose all your important backups.
The best external hard drives will also be quick - either because they use SSD (Solid State Drive) technology, or because they use the latest connectivity technology, such as USB-C.
The biggest deciding factors when it comes to data transfer rates is the connection the drive uses, and whether it is a standard hard drive or a solid state drive (SSD). Many external hard drives use USB 2.0 connections, but for faster speeds you'll want USB 3.0 or ideally the newer USB Type-C connection. You'll need to ensure your PC or laptop also has a USB Type-C port.
You'll also need to think about how much storage space you need. The best external hard drives offer a range of capacities. We'd recommend 500GB to start with, as that gives you plenty of space to store your files without costing too much money.
However, if you deal in large files, such as high resolution photos and videos, then you may want to consider buying a bigger drive, with external hard drives offering terabytes (TB) of storage space. Format Hard Drive For Both Mac And Windows
Buying the best external hard drive for your needs involves figuring out how much space you need. You don't want to buy an external hard drive that's too small, and end up running out of space, but neither do you really want to pay over the odds for storage space you'll never need.
So, we've listed the best external hard drives money can buy in 2019. Each external drive (or backup hard drive) on this page has been carefully picked to make sure it offers fast data transfer speeds essential if you move lots of big files regularly while also offering sturdy build quality so you don't have to worry about them breaking and losing your files.
When buying the best external hard drive for your needs, there are certain things you need to take into account. For example, you'll want to make sure you have a drive that offers fast data transfer speeds.
In this guide we list the best external hard drives with both traditional hard drives and faster (and more expensive) solid state drives.
Still, the best external hard drives are also dependable and rugged, so you can safely store your data without worry. The best external drives will also be light enough to carry in your bag, with large capacities so that you can keep your data safe when travelling.
There's a huge range of external hard drives on offer, so we've put together this list of the best external hard drives to help you find the perfect one for your needs. 1. Buffalo MiniStation Extreme NFC external hard drive
Wireless security
Capacity: 2TB Interface: USB 3.0 Today's best Buffalo MiniStation Extreme NFC 2TB deals NFC security Not the fastest drive
An external hard drive you can buy without breaking the bank, Buffalo's MiniStation Extreme NFC could be your match made in heaven.
With compatibility for both Mac and Windows machines, the Buffalo MiniStation Extreme NFC is very flexible, and comes with a rugged case that's dust and water resistant, along with a built-in USB 3.0 cable.
Not only is your data kept protected from knocks and drops with the rugged shell, but it's also got 256-bit AES security features and NFC (Near Field Communication) features as well.
Essentially it allows you to unlock the drive to get to your files quickly and easily by tapping the supplied NFC card onto the drive's body. Pretty neat!
This product is only available in the US at the time of this writing. UK and Australian readers: check out a fine alternative in the Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro We check over 130 million products every day for the best prices 2. Western Digital My Passport Ultra 4TB external hard drive
Comes with Encryption and a long warranty
Capacity: 4TB Interface: USB 3.0 Large capacity Suite of applications
The latest generation of the Western Digital My Passport Ultra range of external hard drives has landed, coming in sizes from 1TB to 4TB. It features cloud storage and 256-AES encryption, along with WD's own software suite.
It is a good performer when it comes to data transfer speeds but doesn't come near the top of the leaderboard. Unsurprisingly, it doesn't reach the top speeds of solid state external drives, but for external hard drives based on traditional HDDs, this is the drive to consider. 3. Samsung T5 SSD external hard drive
The best external SSD of 2018
Capacity: 250GB, 500GB, 1TB, 2TB Interface: USB Type-C Incredibly fast Best External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc Expensive
If you'd rather have an external hard drive that took advantage of solid state drive (SSD) speeds, then the Samsung Portable SSD T5 is definitely the best external hard drive for you. Samsung has a brilliant reputation for external SSDs, thanks to products like the T3, and the T5 builds on its predecessor by adding a fast USB Type-C connection that ekes out every last drop of performance from the solid state drive inside. Of course, it's also backwards compatible with USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 if your PC doesn't have USB Type-C. It's expensive, but it's well worth the cash.
Read the full review: Samsung Portable SSD T5 4. Adata SD700 External SSD
Capacity: 256GB, 512GB or 1TB Interface: USB 3.0 Format External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc 2018 Great performance No USB Type-C
The Adata SD700 will suit those looking for a rugged storage device that can provide ample capacity without costing too much. It performs superbly well and remains the only SSD weve seen that is IP68 rated.
Thanks to the solid state drive that resides in this external hard drive, it's a lot faster than external drives that use traditional spinning hard drives - so you're getting great transfer speeds as well as rugged protection.
It also comes in capacities up to 1TB, so you don't have to worry about missing out on storage space just because it uses an SSD - this drive really does hit all the right notes. 5. WD My Book Duo 4TB external hard drive
Capacity: 4TB Interface: USB 3.0 x 2 Huge amounts of space Expensive
If you're looking for the absolute largest capacity external hard drive, then the WD My Book Duo 4TB is the one to get, offering a huge 4TB (you can also get versions with up to 20TB) of storage space over two hard drives.
If you don't mind sacrificing some of the ample storage space you can set the drives up in a RAID array, so you have file backups of your files should one of the drives die.
This USB 3.0 drive has many of the features of a fully-fledged NAS device (including a high price), and if you have a router with a USB 3.0 port you could use this as a network attached storage device in its own right.
The device, which comes with two-year warranty, has 256-bit AES hardware encryption, and automatic backup software (WD SmartWare Pro).
Worth noting that the enclosure used is fully serviceable and that WD ships the drive already pre-formatted for Windows users (NTFS). 6. Buffalo MiniStation Thunderbolt external hard drive
Best Thunderbolt external hard drive
Capacity: 1TB, 2TB Interface: Thunderbolt, USB 3.0 Low price compared to other Thunderbolt drives Not SSD
If you have a device with a Thunderbolt port, then this is a great option, as it provides twice the speeds of standard USB 3.0 drives. It's also not especially expensive compared to other Thunderbolt drives. The price is kept down due to its use of a traditional hard drive, rather than an SSD, which limits the potential speeds. It also comes with a USB 3.0 port for people without access to Thunderbolt.
This product is only available in the US and UK at the time of this writing. Australian readers: check out a fine alternative in the WD MyBook Duo 7. Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Drive 5TB
Capacity: 5TB Interface: USB 3.0 Today's best Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Drive 5TB deals External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc Very fast data transfer speeds You pay more for the Mac-formatted version
If you want to combine speed and capacity, then the Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Drive 5TB is definitely worth considering. It comes in a range of sizes up to 8TB and it beats the competition when it comes to read and write speeds as well.
On top of this storage and speed, you get a decent amount of peace of mind thanks to Seagate's lower than average failure rates, especially in bigger capacity hard drives.
You also get backup software, and the drive is compatible with both Windows and Macs, though it's formatted for Windows out of the box unless you go for a Mac-specific hard drive - though these are more expensive. 8. Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro external hard drive
Capacity: 2TB Interface: USB 3.0 and Wi-Fi Today's best Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro deals Wireless AC Good battery life Expensive due to Wi-Fi features
Even if we had mixed feelings on past versions of the My Passport Wireless, the 2016 pro variant of the external HDD restores faith in the Western Digital name. The design, for one, has been overhauled and no longer resembles the My Passport Ultra or My Passport for Mac. Instead, theres now a more premium feel to the My Passport Wireless Pro. It resembles an external DVD drive, but considering the onboard SD card slot, dont worry about getting it confused with anything else. For photographers, this will make the Wireless Pro stand out.
For everyone else, theres a massive 6,400mAh battery built into the device. This lets the drive be used completely free of wires over 2.4GHz or 5GHz channels. When its wired up, however, dont expect cutting edge connection tech, as the My Passport Wireless Pro uses only USB Type-B to Type-A. Completely absent is the latest and greatest USB-C connection.
Where the My Passport Wireless Pro compromises on affordability, its able to benefit in just about every other area. Of course, not everyone needs a wireless hard drive or SD card support, but for those who do, its almost essential.
Read the full review: Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro
9. LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive 4TB
Capacity: 4TB Interface: USB-C Today's best LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive 4TB deals Fast USB-C connection Expensive
You may have stumbled upon the LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive when perusing the Apple website for USB-C accessories . Theres a reason for that: the Porsche Design ships with both USB Type-C to Type-A and USB Type-C to Type-C connectors, making it a worthy candidate regardless of your setup.
Its expensive for an external hard drive, dont get us wrong, especially if youre in the market for the top-end 4TB option. On the other hand, this is an HDD that could theoretically output speeds of up to 5Gbps, if it werent hindered by the limits of SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording) technology.
Comprising five 800GB platters in a 15mm form factor, the LaCie Porsche Design Mobile is an excellent challenger to the Seagate M3, though its notably bigger in both weight and dimensions.
Sure, it packs an extra convenience factor in the form of USB-C, but it should be noted that the Porsche Design Mobile is still limited to USB 3.0 speeds. Plus, even an aluminum finish cant prevent it from clashing with your Rose Gold MacBook . Nevertheless, LaCies offering is the best USB-C external HDD money can buy, at least for the time being.
Read our full review: LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive 4TB
10. iStorage diskAshur 2TB external hard drive
Best for security
Capacity: 2TB Interface: USB 3.0 Physical security Expensive
Typically, iStorage hard disks cater best to governments and multinational organizations around the world, for good reason too they offer tight security like no other drives around.
If someone tries to tamper with your iStorage drive, you can configure it to self-desturct. What's more, the data is encrypted by the 256-bit AES protocol, with multiple forms of protection in place to ensure the bad guys don't get in no matter how persistent. When you consider all that extra security, the prices won't scare you away either.
Sure, it's still expensive, four times the price of an equivalent 2TB drive, and unlikely to be the most nimble performer. But, you're paying for a product that's virtually uncrackable. Bear in mind, though, you'll get no help from the manufacturer if things go awry and you lose your password.
Read our full review: iStorage diskAshur DT
Gabe Carey and Matt Hanson also contributed to this article
Format Hard Drive For Both Mac And Windows
Best External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc
Format External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc 2018
External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc
The technology of external hard drives and connection ports is constantly changing which is why weve taken a closer look at the best external hard drive for Mac of 2019.
The great thing for Mac users is that external HDDs have never been cheaper and storage sizes have never been bigger. Ten years ago, you would have paid several hundred dollars for a chunky hard drive with just a few Gigabytes (GB) of storage space on.
Now you can get 5 Terabytes (TB) of portable storage (5000 GB) for little more than $100 thats enough to backup several Macs in one go in a portable external hard drive that can fit in your pocket.
Getting an external hard drive can be useful for a variety of reasons. The most common reason is if youre running out of disk space and need somewhere to put all those photos and 4K videos from your digital camera or home movies from your video camera.
However, an external storage device is also useful if you want to setup a home surveillance system on your Mac, experience Virtual Reality games and apps or if you want to digitize all your documents and paperwork.
If youre in a hurry, check out the comparison table below for quick overview of our top picks. Youll find more detailed reviews below and you can use the quick navigation links on the right to jump to the section you want. The Best External Hard Drives For Mac Compared WD My Passport Seagate Backup Plus Transcend Storejet M3 WD MyBook Desktop WD MyBook Desktop Duo Capacity 1-4TB 1-4TB 1-2TB 1-8TB 4-16TB Size Portable Portable Portable Desktop Desktop USB 2.0 USB 3.0/Thunderbolt RAID Warranty (years) 3 2 2 3 3 Password Protection/Encryption
Buy Now
Buy Now
Buy Now
Buy Now
Buy Now
Here then is our selection of the best external hard drives for Mac in 2019 in order of ranking. 1. WD My Passport For Mac
The Western Digital 1TB My Passport For Mac is the perfect 1TB portable external hard drive for Mac users. Its ready formatted for use on Mac, Time Machine ready and small enough to fit in your coat pocket. With a 3 year warranty and big enough to backup all Mac hard drives, if you need a simple, fast and reliable backup solution for your Mac, you cant go wrong with the WD 1TB My Passport.
The WD My Passport for Mac supports USB 3.0/Thunderbolt connections but it will also work with USB 2.0 connections. We recommend paying that little extra for the 4TB which is the biggest version available in the My Passport Range which ranges from 1TB-4TB.
If youre going to carry it around a lot, we also recommend getting a proper carry case for it too. 2. Seagate Backup Plus For Mac
The Seagate Backup Plus for Mac is the closest rival to the WD My Passport for Mac. The Seagate Backup Plus For Mac ranges from 1TB to 4GB and like the WD My Passport, its ready formatted for use on Macs and Time Machine ready for instant backups as soon as you plug it into your Mac. It also has USB 3.0/Thunderbolt connectors and includes a USB 2.0 adapter cable for older Macs.
The Seagate Backup Plus for Mac also comes with Seagate Dashboard backup software but we found it a bit bloated and hard to customize backups with. Theres really no need to use it if youre using Time Machine for your backups. Although Seagate dont make it very clear in the product description, the Backup Plus For Mac has a 2 year warranty which is 1 less than Western Digital.
Be aware however that although Seagate has traditionally had a good reputation in the external hard drive industry, more recently there are far more reports of hard drive problems and customer service issues with Seagate external hard drives. There are also many satisfied customers too but to be on the safe side, you might as well go with WD drives as theyre exactly the same price and in our experience, rock solid. Theres also a shockproof carry case for it and Seagate are offering 2 months free Adobe Creative Cloud subscription included. 3. Transcend StoreJet M3
The main selling point of the Transcend StoreJet M3 is that its incredibly tough. In fact, it claims to be military drop tested with an advanced 3 stage shock protection system and a durable anti-shock rubber outer case.
The Transcend StoreJet M3 also comes with its own software that can be used for one-touch backups. Just press the button on the Transcend and the software will automatically backup. However, youre much better just using Time Machine which will automatically detect and use it for backups.
It also comes with an extra USB cable to connect to a second USB port in case your Mac cant provide enough power for it from one connection although most Mac users shouldnt need this.
If shock protection is important to you, the Transcend StoreJet M3 is a good choice but note that it only comes in a 1TB and 2TB version theres nothing bigger. To enhance protection, you can choose from a range of carry cases too. 4. WD My Book Desktop
If you dont need a portable external drive and are happy to simply have something bigger on your desktop, then look no further than the WD My Book Desktop . Weve used WD My Book Desktops for over 10 years and never had a problem and would not hesitate to recommend it still.
Unlike the portable version, the WD My Book Desktop has its own power supply which you connect to the mains so it doesnt draw any power from your Mac. It has a USB 3.0 connection port but also works with USB 2.0 ports. The WD My Book Desktop also comes with its own WD Backup Software which is straightforward but you really dont need it if you use Time Machine or another backup software. For security, the WD MyBook Desktop also features 256bit AES hardware encryption that password protects your data.
The WD My Book Desktop is available in 1TB going up to 8TB. 5. WD My Book Duo Desktop RAID
If you want the biggest and best external hard available on the market in 2019 at consumer prices, then go for the WD My Book Duo Desktop RAID . The Duo consists of two drives in one enclosure which can be combined as RAID drives to double capacity and speed. The 16TB drive for example is actually two 8TB WD Red HDDs packed together in one casing. By combining both drives in one, it offers super fast transfer speeds of around 324 Mbps.
The WD My Book Duo Desktop is the cheapest and most reliable external hard drive for Mac which allows you to choose RAID disks. RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) is just a way of combining two hard drives into one super hard drive. You can choose between using both drives as RAID 0 (very fast) or RAID 1 (more secure) or divide them both using JBOD. By default, it is configured in RAID 0 but you can easily change it to RAID 1.
If you want to take out or replace on the drives you can also push down on the top of the enclosure and the lid will pop up allowing you to remove the drives. However, note that you can only use the same drives with the same enclosure. If the enclosure fails for any reason, you cant just pop out the hard drives and pop them in a new one to save them as each hard drive has a unique encryption key for each enclosure. However, we still havent heard of a case of enclosure failure yet.
WD SmartWare will automate backups for you and even integrates with DropBox for cloud backups too but you can use Time Machine or any other Mac backup software. Note that this particular WD hard drive does not come ready formatted for Mac but you can easily format it for Mac in a few minutes using Disk Utility in OS X or by following these instructions.
Although its a bit on the pricey side, considering youre getting two Western Digital 8TB hard drives in one enclosure, its actually a very good deal. If 16TB is too big, you can also buy it in 4, 6, 8 and 12 TB. Its also surprisingly quiet for such a large hard drive and theres no noisy fan as its cooled from the bottom vents with warm air flowing out of the top vents. Best Thunderbolt External Drives For Mac
Thunderbolt 3 drives are still pretty expensive in 2019 and wed advise sticking to USB 3.0 for now since it offers by far the best value for money and can support transfer speeds of up to 5 Gbps which is more than fast enough for most needs. However, if you want a Thunderbolt 1 (10 Gbps) or a Thunderbolt 2 (20 Gbps) external drive for Mac and are willing to pay that bit extra, here are the two best Thunderbolt external drives for Mac. 1. WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo
The WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo is designed specifically for Thunderbolt 1 connections delivering transfer speeds of up to 10Gbps. Like the WD My Book Duo, its actually two drives combined and has two Thunderbolt connections so that you can access both drives at once if you need to (although note that it only comes with one Thunderbolt cable).
The WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo is quiet and is ready formatted for use on Mac. Its also RAID 0 ready although it can be configured for RAID 1 too. However, note that if just one drive is configured as RAID 0 and the other as RAID 1, you will lose any data on the RAID 0 drive if anything goes wrong so we strongly recommend using RAID 1 on both which treats them both separately even if it does deliver slower performance.
The WD My Book Thunderbolt duo to available in 4TB, 6TB and 8TB versions. If you want a reasonably priced Thunderbolt external drive for Mac that quiet and reliable, dont look any further than the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo. 2. OWC ThunderBay 4 Raid
The OWC ThunderBay Raid is pretty much the fastest and biggest external hard drive for Mac you can get with a maximum of a massive 40TB of storage. Its also one of the only external hard drives to support Thunderbolt 2 which gives incredible top speeds of 1.3Gbps although in reality, youll probably get sustained speeds nearing to 827Mbps which is about as fast as it gets for an external mechanical hard drive at the moment. The OWC ThunderBay also supports RAID 0, 1, 4, 5 and 1+0 meaning you can use each drive separately or combine them for fastest speeds.
The OWC ThunderBay Raid is however one of the most expensive external hard drives you can get for Mac with the largest 40TB of storage costing well over a few thousand dollars. The OWC ThunderBay is mainly aimed at video editors, enterprises and small businesses that need massive storage and ultra fast rock solid performance.
The Thunderbolt 2 connection is enough for video editors to edit and stream 2K or 4K footage from although note that it doesnt support Thunderbolt 3. Like all OWC external drives, the OWC ThunderBay 4 RAID comes with a 5 year warranty which is the longest youll find for a quality external hard drive on Mac.
Overall, the OWC ThunderBay Raid is easily the biggest and most reliable external storage drive for Mac available so if you need some serious storage space, its the ultimate external hard drive for Mac. Best SSD External Drive For Mac
As explained earlier, SSD drives offer the poorest value for money in terms of dollars per TB. There are very few SSD external drives for Mac that we can strongly recommend but in our opinion, the best consumer priced SSD external hard drive for Mac you can currently get in 2019 is the Samsung T3 Portable SSD. 1. Samsung T3 Portable SSD
The Samsung T3 Portable SSD is an SSD external hard drive for Mac with read-write speeds of up to 450 Mbps which is at least twice as fast as most mechanical drives. Its incredibly small being not much bigger than a credit card and weighs just 1.8 ounces. It works on Mac, PC and Android devices but note that its not ready formatted for OS X. The Samsung T3 is shock resistant and theres less chance of it burning-out that a mechanical hard drive because there are no moving parts. In fact, Samsung claims it can withstand 1500G of G-force equivalent to being dropped from 6.5 feet.
Its also one of the few external drives for Mac that supports USB 3.1 connections. It has a USB-C port which means you can use a Thunderbolt 3 cable with it although it cant deliver anything close to Thunderbolt 3 transfer speeds. Note that the T3 comes with a USB-C to USB-A cable in the box.
If youre looking for incredibly fast transfer speeds, the latest in SSD technology, portability and durability, the Samsung is the one SSD external drive for Mac we would recommend if we had to pick one. Tips On Macs External Hard Drive Compatibility
As many users have learned from bitter experience, its not all about price and size when it comes to external hard drives on Mac.
Here are some important things to consider before buying an external hard drive. Reliability
Reliability is probably the most important consideration when purchasing an external hard drive for your Mac. The worse thing that can happen to an external storage device is disk failure. When this happens, youve usually lost everything stored on it which can be a total disaster if youve got precious family photos or important documents on there.
Most manufacturers will guarantee at least two years of reliability and the best manufacturers like Western Digital (WD) offer three years and OWC five years although in reality, all should far outlast this.
Generally, the longer the warranty, the more expensive the hard drive.
However, any such guarantees are little compensation in terms of your precious data in the case of failure. You will have lost all of your files anyway but at least youll get a free replacement from the manufacturer.
Although manufacturers sometimes quote an Annualized Failure Rate of less than 1 (AFR is a percentage of its hard drives that fail annually) any figures on reliability arent worth basing your decision on in our opinion because everyone uses hard drives in different ways.
For example, those that leave their external hard drives switched on all the time or use it constantly for video editing are going to experience more frequent failures than those that only switch them on occasionally for backups.
There are some important measures you can take however to reduce the chance of external hard drive failure on your Mac. Buy A Decent Brand
This is probably the most important piece of advice when buying an external hard drive.
There is definitely a difference between established brands and lesser known newcomers to the market. In 2019, the general consumer external hard drive market is dominated by two big players, Western Digital and Seagate, which have both been in the business over 20 years.
At MacHow2 we use Western Digital (WD) external hard drives on a regular basis and would not hesitate to recommend them such as the rock solid WD My Passport range of external hard drives. Note that Hitachi drives are now owned by Western Digital so if you buy a Hitachi external hard drive, youre effectively getting a Western Digital product.
Seagate on the other hand used to be equally reliable although weve noticed more and more complaints about hard drive failures and customer service issues with them in recent years so our confidence in Seagate has reduced somewhat.
However, Mac users should definitely avoid brands such as LaCie, Fujitsu and Toshiba which in our experience, can be very flaky and significantly more prone to mechanical failure.
Of course, youll always find plenty of satisfied customers of these products too but in our experience and research, youll also find many more disgruntled ones too.
In these reviews, weve only focused on reputable established brands in market that we know are reliable choices for Mac users. Limit Backups Use
Do not use your external hard drive more than is absolutely necessary.
If you have it switched on all day, and particularly if you keep accessing it all day, its going to burn out far more quickly than if you just switch it on once daily or weekly to make backups.
Quite simply, the more you use an external hard drive, the quicker it will eventually fail.
Those that edit video directly from an external drive can therefore expect their hard drive fail quicker and should definitely invest in higher end quality hard drives featured here such as the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo or OWC ThunderBay. Always Use A Second Backup Solution
The chances of two external hard drives failing at the same moment are extremely slim so if your backups are really important, using two drives is the best thing you can do for backups.
If you dont want to purchase a second drive, alternatively you can make sure youre using a cloud backup solution in tandem with your external hard drive.
The WD My Book Duo for example also features backup software integration with DropBox.
For Mac and iOS users however, the easiest solution is to use Apples iCloud alongside your external hard drive. You get 5GB of free online storage with iCloud with plans starting at just $0.99 per month for 50GB. Prevent Power Surges
One thing that can instantly destroy your hard drive is a power surge in your home or office electricity supply. However, you can easily protect against this with a cheap Surge Protector Power Strip which is well worth the investment (for your Mac too).
However, a common occurrence with cheaper brand external hard drives is that the inverter inside fails which basically allows too much power to short-circuit and destroy the hard drive. In these cases, a surge protector wont help you which emphasizes the benefit of buying from a reputable brand. Never Move A Drive When Its Switched On
Try never to move an external hard drive when it is switched on.
In non SSD drives, there is a danger that the read/write heads can move and make contact with the hard drive in which case, it will break immediately.
These are some simple measures you can take to help protect yourself from the worst and preserve the life of your Mac external drive. If you want to learn more about why hard drives fail, you can find an interesting look at hard drive reliability here. Capacity: The Bigger The Better
External hard drives now offer massive amounts of storage space and the starting point in most external hard drives is now generally at least 1 Terabyte or more. 1 TB equals 1000GB and is roughly equivalent to 488,000 photos and 220 full length movies so a 5TB hard drive could be enough for a lifetime of photos or music for most people (see the table below).
Theres no right or wrong answer when it comes to storage but our advice is simply to buy the biggest you can afford.
Cloud storage solutions such as iCloud and OneDrive are certainly reducing the need for physical storage but the bigger your external storage device is, the more it can grow with you. As photos and videos increase in size (most high-end digital cameras and even iPhones can film in 4K for example which eats massive amounts of hard drive space) the bigger the better.
Nowadays, 1TB of hard drive can cost less than $100 while one of the biggest consumer priced external hard drives, the WD My Book Duo 16TB, costs around $499. For those looking for serious storage space for enterprise backups or 4K editing, the OWC ThunderBay goes up to 40TB but will set you back over a few thousand dollars. Desktop vs Portable
There are two types of external hard drives for Mac: 3.5 inch desktop drives that have their own mains power source and 2.5 inch portable external drives that take their power from your Mac.
Portable drives will easily fit in your jacket pocket. At the moment, desktop drives go up to a maximum of 40TB and Portable go to 4TB. Some of the biggest desktop external drives such as the WD My Book Duo and OWC ThunderBay are actually a combination of 2 drives in one enclosure which can be used as RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) drives which basically means you can combine them both for double the speed, storage and performance.
In these reviews, half of our picks are portable and the other half are desktop including the MyBook Desktop Duo that can be used in a RAID setup. SSD vs Mechanical Drives
Almost all external hard drives nowadays are still mechanical drives which means they have moving parts inside. Solid State Drives have no moving parts, are therefore less likely to break and theyre incredibly fast but theyre still rare and very expensive for very little storage space.
Theres no doubt that SSD drives will eventually replace mechanical drives in the external hard drive market but the economies of scale still arent there yet.
All new Macs since 2012 (except iMacs, Mac Minis and non-retina MacBook Pros) have internal SSD hard drives fitted as standard and anyone thats used older Macs with mechanical internal hard drives will tell you how much faster and more efficient they are.
Mechanical external hard drives feature moving parts which can deteriorate and break more easily. SSD drives are also silent and run cooler compared to mechanical drives which whir and buzz due to the drive spinning which also creates more heat.
A Solid State Drive (SSD)
As the technology improves, prices come down and capacity of SSD increases, its likely that eventually all external hard drives will be SSD drives. But at the moment, mechanical drives still rule the external drive market and offer the biggest capacities for the best prices.
If you really must have an external SSD drive for Mac however, then we have reviewed the best SSD external hard drive for Mac in this article which is the Samsung T3 Portable. External Hard Drive Speeds: RPM
The speed of backups or data transfer from your Mac to your hard drive depends on two things the connection type (see below) and the hard drives physical speed denoted in Revolutions per Minute (RPM).
Most external hard drives are 5400RPM but there are some faster high-end drives that are 7200RPM. A 7200RPM drive will be faster than a 5400RPM drive because the drive revolves faster and therefore can be read by the drive head quicker.
If youre connecting a 7200RPM hard drive via a super fast Thunderbolt or USB 3.0 connection, then youll enjoy the hard drives maximum transfer speed.
However, if youre connecting via a USB 2.0 or Firewire port, then your connection cable wont even be able to deliver the maximum speed of the hard drive so you might as well save some money and get a 5400RPM with greater capacity than a fast drive with less capacity.
The reality is that whichever hard drive you get, youll probably get around 100-200 Mbps transfer speed from most mechanical drives and about double this from an SSD drive.
This is well below the capabilities of most modern connection ports and cables but as well explain shortly, external hard drive technology still hasnt fully caught up with them.
Our advice is dont worry too much about hard drive speed on external drives.
Most external hard drives have a USB 3.0 connection which will deliver incredibly fast transfer speeds. Most consumer priced external drives are 5400RPM anyway so its not something you can easily be choosy about.
7200RPM external drives tend to be more expensive, noisier and most manufacturers are concentrating on trying to deliver more speed by designing hard drives that can take full advantage of connection types, than hard drive speeds as well see below. Connection Types
The business of external hard drive connections can be extremely confusing as technology changes and Apple seemingly keeps changing ports on every new generation of Mac.
All new Macs since 2012 have ditched Firewire in favor of Thunderbolt connections offering staggering maximum data transfer speeds of up to 40 Gigabits per second (Gbps) (port connection speeds are measured in Megabits per second (Mbps) or Gigabits per second (Gbps) 1000 Mbps equals 1 Gbps).
However, the problem is that most external hard drives dont even support the latest generation of Thunderbolt yet (Thunderbolt 3) apart from high end drives such as the OWC ThunderBay which supports the slightly slower Thunderbolt 2 (20 Gbps) and the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo which only supports the even slower Thunderbolt 1 (10 Gbps).
However, it is USB 3.0 (5 Gbps) that currently dominates the external hard drive market which has superseded the USB 2.0 (480 Mbps) ports that almost everyone has used at some point.
All Macs from 2012 have at least one USB 3.0 port and two Thunderbolt 1 or 2 ports although the good news is that most external drives with USB 3.0 are also backward compatible with USB 2.0 ports found on all older Macs.
To complicate things however, USB 3.1 (10 Gbps) was released a few years ago which is even faster but faces the same problem as Thunderbolt there are still very few manufacturers that support USB 3.1.
Firewire meanwhile has pretty much been abandoned by most external hard drive manufacturers although there are a few that still support it.
As you can see, it seems that port connection standards, usually driven by Intel and Apple, are changing faster than external hard drive manufacturers can keep up with but to clarify things, here well take a closer look at the sometimes bewildering world of external hard drive port connections on Mac. USB 2.0 USB 3.0
Almost all external hard drives for Mac now use a USB 3.0 port. If your Mac is from 2012 onwards then it will have at least one USB 3.0 port. You can check this by doing the following:
Go to the Apple logo in the top left of your Mac and select About this Mac
Click on System Report on the Overview tab
Select USB down the left hand margin
There you will see if you have a USB 3.0 port. Macs before 2012 only have USB 2.0 but the good news is that all USB 3.0 external hard drives are backwards compatible with USB 2.0 ports.
The only difference is you will get a maximum data transfer speed of 480Mbps compared to 5 Gbps with USB 3.0 (see the port connection speed comparison table below for an overview of speed differences between connection ports). USB 3.1
USB 3.1 was released a few years ago and offers more than double the speed of USB 3.0 at 10Gbps (roughly the same as Thunderbolt 1). The problem is that most external hard drive manufacturers simply do not support it.
There are some models such as the Samsung T3 Portable SSD which is both an SSD drive and 3.1 compatible but only goes up to 1TB and is quite expensive. Our advice is, dont look for a USB 3.1 drive at this stage the adoption by manufacturers and economies of scale simply still arent there. Thunderbolt 1, 2 3 / USB-C
Since 2012, new Macs have Thunderbolt connections. The latest MacBook Pros from late 2016 onwards have Thunderbolt 3 connections which offers speeds of up to 40 Gbps per second.
This is incredibly fast and easily allows you to edit video from your Mac as if it were on your Macs internal hard drive or even connect an external monitor to.
Thunderbolt has been developed by Intel and Apple but uses the same connection port and cable type as USB-C which was developed separately by the USB Implementers Forum and which will eventually replace USB 3.1. USB-C devices however can only handle a top speed of 10 Gbps.
Thunderbolt replaces older Firewire connections and is now standard in all new Macs. If youve got a pre 2016 Mac with a Thunderbolt 2 port, youll need a conversion cable from Apple to connect it to Thunderbolt 3 or USB-C ports.
If youre backing up large amounts of data, a Thunderbolt compatible external hard drive is definitely worth the investment because it makes backups much quicker.
Or if youre planning on regularly transferring or backing-up 4K video, a Thunderbolt connection makes creating backups and editing in real-time from an external hard drive much quicker.
However, theres one big problem with Thunderbolt 3 and USB-C. At the moment, there are no external drives that actually support Thunderbolt 3. The closest weve found is the OWC ThunderBay which supports Thunderbolt 2 capable of speeds of up to 20Gbps.
Beware that there are some manufacturers that claim to be Thunderbolt 3 compatible but this is misleading as it merely means it can plug into a Thunderbolt 3 port it does not deliver Thunderbolt 3 transfer speeds.
Always check the small print what the maximum transfer speed is if its not at least 40 Gbps then its not Thunderbolt 3 compatible.
At the moment in 2019, we therefore advise against making Thunderbolt a priority when choosing an external hard drive for Mac for several reasons which can be summarized as:
External hard drives still havent caught up with the speed of Thunderbolt connections. A Thunderbolt port can transfer at a staggering 40Gbps but even the fastest hard drives cant get anywhere near this.
There are three types of Thunderbolt version 1, 2 and 3 each faster than the last. The problem is that those Thunderbolt drives that do exist still use Thunderbolt 1 or 2 which is the slowest standard so youre not even getting the best that Thunderbolt on the latest generation of Macs can offer.
Those Thunderbolt drives that currently exist are mainly only Thunderbolt 1 compatible (10Gbps) and expensive for very little capacity compared with USB 3.0 drives which transfer at a very respectable 5Gbps. For example, LaCie offer a 4GB Thunderbolt 1 external hard drive but we would never recommend LaCie drives anyway to Mac users. If you must have a Thunderbolt drive, the best thunderbolt external drive for Mac is the WD My Book Thunderbolt Duo or if you want something really big, the OWC ThunderBay. Firewire
Macs before 2012 also have Firewire (400 and 800) ports but this standard is gradually being phased out and we dont recommend getting a Firewire external hard drive.
The majority of manufacturers that still produce Firewire drives are not established brands either and therefore reliability may also be an issue.
However, if a Firewire port is important for you, we can recommend the well-respected and reliable OWC range of Firewire drives for Mac which support both Firewire and USB 3.0. OWC have been in the business over 25 years.
Apple has replaced Firewire ports on all Macs made after 2012 with Thunderbolt ports which well look at next. Note that if the external hard drive has a Firewire connection but you only have a Thunderbolt connection port on your Mac, you can use a Firewire to Thunderbolt adapter cable to connect it to your Mac although transfer speeds will be at Firewire speed, not Thunderbolt speed.
The conclusion from all this is that in 2019, the fastest, most widely used and economical external hard drive connection that Mac users should focus on is USB 3.0.
All of the best external drives for Mac featured here use at least a USB 3.0 connection but weve also featured a few which support Thunderbolt as well.
To summarize the speed difference between the different connections check the comparison table below which is done in order of speed. Speeds are measured in Megabits per second (Mbps) and faster devices such as USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt in Gigabits per second (Gbps).
Note that these are maximum speeds and real world speeds may be 10-20 less depending on the type of data being transferred and other factors. As mentioned earlier, there are no external drives that can achieve these speeds yet and the best you can expect is around 100-200 Mbps transfer speed from most mechanical drives and about double that from an SSD drive. Connection Type Speed Firewire 400 400 Mbps USB 2.0 480 Mbps Firewire 800 800 Mbps USB 3.0 5 Gbps USB 3.1 10 Gbps USB-C 10 Gbps Thunderbolt 1 10 Gbps Thunderbolt 2 20 Gbps Thunderbolt 3 40 Gbps
The world of connection ports is changing rapidly and theres an ongoing debate over which will eventually win out between USB 3.1 and Thunderbolt / USB-C.
At the moment though, its USB 3.0 thats out in front. For more on using USB 3.0 on Mac, check out Apples USB 3.0 FAQ. Apple Airport Time Capsule
Apple offers its own tailor-made external hard drive, the Apple Airport Time Capsule.
Time Capsule works over your WiFi connection so the smart thing is, backups are performed wirelessly. However, backing up via WiFi is also much slower than using an external hard drive connected with either a USB 3.0 cable or Thunderbolt connection.
Apples Time Capsule is also considerably more expensive than most other external hard drives with similar capacity so unless wireless backups are important to you, there are better options available. Format Types
You can format an external hard drive so that it works on both Mac and PC or Mac only. The best models featured here are ready formatted for use on Mac (except the WD My Book Duo and OWC ThunderBay).
However, you can easily format any external hard drive on your Mac to work with both Mac and PC or Mac only. If you want to use the drive with both a Mac and PC it must be formatted in exFat or FAT32 format.
The problem is that FAT32 is limited to 4GB so since all the hard drives featured here at 1TB or more, you have to use exFat.
As we say, you wont need to do this as all of the drives here are ready formatted for Mac and Time Machine ready but you can find easy to follow instructions here. Mac Backup Software
This could be an article in itself but we have absolutely no problem using Apples Time Machine software for backing up Macs and strongly recommend using it.
Time Machine is free in macOS, its quick and its easy to use. If anything happens to your hard drive, everything on your Mac including setup and configuration is saved in Time Machine. Just plug Time Machine in case of data loss, operating system problems or plug it into a new Mac if your hard drive failed, and you can instantly roll back to the last working version of your Mac with all your files and folder.
There are other more manual solutions however, the best being CarbonCopy Cloner or SuperDuper for Mac.
Most external hard drive manufacturers also include their own backup and management software but they can be unintuitive, inflexible and you really dont need them. Seagates Dashboard software for example is quite bloated and doesnt make it easy to customize backups. Conclusion
We hope this article has helped clarify the ever-changing and often confusing world of external hard drives on Mac.
Theres never been a better time for Mac users to extend storage capacity with an external hard drive. External hard drives have never been smaller or cheaper although the range of reliable manufacturers has dwindled significantly.
Today, Western Digital are one of the few left that offer genuine reliability and quality which is why 3 out of our top 5 external hard drives for Mac in 2019 are Western Digital drives. At the top end of the market, OWC external hard drives are an excellent choice as they specialize in Mac but cost a lot more.
If youve got any comments, experiences, issues or suggestions regarding any of the hard drives featured here, let us know in the comments below.
Welcome to our guide to buying the best external hard drive or backup hard drive in 2019. When looking to buy the best external hard drive for your needs, there are quite a lot of things you need to consider - and this guide will help you.
Plus, with Amazon Prime Day 2019 rapidly approaching, there's a good chance that we're going to see some major price cuts to the best external hard drives out there. If you do find a killer deal for any of the drives on this best external hard drive list, then you can buy in full confidence that you're getting a brilliant external drive for your money.
When buying the best external hard drive for your needs, you need to make sure you get a device that can safely and securely store your important files. Reliability is of the upmost importance here, as you do not want to buy an external hard drive that fails on you - making you lose all your important backups.
The best external hard drives will also be quick - either because they use SSD (Solid State Drive) technology, or because they use the latest connectivity technology, such as USB-C.
The biggest deciding factors when it comes to data transfer rates is the connection the drive uses, and whether it is a standard hard drive or a solid state drive (SSD). Many external hard drives use USB 2.0 connections, but for faster speeds you'll want USB 3.0 or ideally the newer USB Type-C connection. You'll need to ensure your PC or laptop also has a USB Type-C port.
You'll also need to think about how much storage space you need. The best external hard drives offer a range of capacities. We'd recommend 500GB to start with, as that gives you plenty of space to store your files without costing too much money.
However, if you deal in large files, such as high resolution photos and videos, then you may want to consider buying a bigger drive, with external hard drives offering terabytes (TB) of storage space. Format Hard Drive For Both Mac And Windows
Buying the best external hard drive for your needs involves figuring out how much space you need. You don't want to buy an external hard drive that's too small, and end up running out of space, but neither do you really want to pay over the odds for storage space you'll never need.
So, we've listed the best external hard drives money can buy in 2019. Each external drive (or backup hard drive) on this page has been carefully picked to make sure it offers fast data transfer speeds essential if you move lots of big files regularly while also offering sturdy build quality so you don't have to worry about them breaking and losing your files.
When buying the best external hard drive for your needs, there are certain things you need to take into account. For example, you'll want to make sure you have a drive that offers fast data transfer speeds.
In this guide we list the best external hard drives with both traditional hard drives and faster (and more expensive) solid state drives.
Still, the best external hard drives are also dependable and rugged, so you can safely store your data without worry. The best external drives will also be light enough to carry in your bag, with large capacities so that you can keep your data safe when travelling.
There's a huge range of external hard drives on offer, so we've put together this list of the best external hard drives to help you find the perfect one for your needs. 1. Buffalo MiniStation Extreme NFC external hard drive
Wireless security
Capacity: 2TB Interface: USB 3.0 Today's best Buffalo MiniStation Extreme NFC 2TB deals NFC security Not the fastest drive
An external hard drive you can buy without breaking the bank, Buffalo's MiniStation Extreme NFC could be your match made in heaven.
With compatibility for both Mac and Windows machines, the Buffalo MiniStation Extreme NFC is very flexible, and comes with a rugged case that's dust and water resistant, along with a built-in USB 3.0 cable.
Not only is your data kept protected from knocks and drops with the rugged shell, but it's also got 256-bit AES security features and NFC (Near Field Communication) features as well.
Essentially it allows you to unlock the drive to get to your files quickly and easily by tapping the supplied NFC card onto the drive's body. Pretty neat!
This product is only available in the US at the time of this writing. UK and Australian readers: check out a fine alternative in the Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro We check over 130 million products every day for the best prices 2. Western Digital My Passport Ultra 4TB external hard drive
Comes with Encryption and a long warranty
Capacity: 4TB Interface: USB 3.0 Large capacity Suite of applications
The latest generation of the Western Digital My Passport Ultra range of external hard drives has landed, coming in sizes from 1TB to 4TB. It features cloud storage and 256-AES encryption, along with WD's own software suite.
It is a good performer when it comes to data transfer speeds but doesn't come near the top of the leaderboard. Unsurprisingly, it doesn't reach the top speeds of solid state external drives, but for external hard drives based on traditional HDDs, this is the drive to consider. 3. Samsung T5 SSD external hard drive
The best external SSD of 2018
Capacity: 250GB, 500GB, 1TB, 2TB Interface: USB Type-C Incredibly fast Best External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc Expensive
If you'd rather have an external hard drive that took advantage of solid state drive (SSD) speeds, then the Samsung Portable SSD T5 is definitely the best external hard drive for you. Samsung has a brilliant reputation for external SSDs, thanks to products like the T3, and the T5 builds on its predecessor by adding a fast USB Type-C connection that ekes out every last drop of performance from the solid state drive inside. Of course, it's also backwards compatible with USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 if your PC doesn't have USB Type-C. It's expensive, but it's well worth the cash.
Read the full review: Samsung Portable SSD T5 4. Adata SD700 External SSD
Capacity: 256GB, 512GB or 1TB Interface: USB 3.0 Format External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc 2018 Great performance No USB Type-C
The Adata SD700 will suit those looking for a rugged storage device that can provide ample capacity without costing too much. It performs superbly well and remains the only SSD weve seen that is IP68 rated.
Thanks to the solid state drive that resides in this external hard drive, it's a lot faster than external drives that use traditional spinning hard drives - so you're getting great transfer speeds as well as rugged protection.
It also comes in capacities up to 1TB, so you don't have to worry about missing out on storage space just because it uses an SSD - this drive really does hit all the right notes. 5. WD My Book Duo 4TB external hard drive
Capacity: 4TB Interface: USB 3.0 x 2 Huge amounts of space Expensive
If you're looking for the absolute largest capacity external hard drive, then the WD My Book Duo 4TB is the one to get, offering a huge 4TB (you can also get versions with up to 20TB) of storage space over two hard drives.
If you don't mind sacrificing some of the ample storage space you can set the drives up in a RAID array, so you have file backups of your files should one of the drives die.
This USB 3.0 drive has many of the features of a fully-fledged NAS device (including a high price), and if you have a router with a USB 3.0 port you could use this as a network attached storage device in its own right.
The device, which comes with two-year warranty, has 256-bit AES hardware encryption, and automatic backup software (WD SmartWare Pro).
Worth noting that the enclosure used is fully serviceable and that WD ships the drive already pre-formatted for Windows users (NTFS). 6. Buffalo MiniStation Thunderbolt external hard drive
Best Thunderbolt external hard drive
Capacity: 1TB, 2TB Interface: Thunderbolt, USB 3.0 Low price compared to other Thunderbolt drives Not SSD
If you have a device with a Thunderbolt port, then this is a great option, as it provides twice the speeds of standard USB 3.0 drives. It's also not especially expensive compared to other Thunderbolt drives. The price is kept down due to its use of a traditional hard drive, rather than an SSD, which limits the potential speeds. It also comes with a USB 3.0 port for people without access to Thunderbolt.
This product is only available in the US and UK at the time of this writing. Australian readers: check out a fine alternative in the WD MyBook Duo 7. Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Drive 5TB
Capacity: 5TB Interface: USB 3.0 Today's best Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Drive 5TB deals External Hard Drive For Both Mac And Pc Very fast data transfer speeds You pay more for the Mac-formatted version
If you want to combine speed and capacity, then the Seagate Backup Plus Desktop Drive 5TB is definitely worth considering. It comes in a range of sizes up to 8TB and it beats the competition when it comes to read and write speeds as well.
On top of this storage and speed, you get a decent amount of peace of mind thanks to Seagate's lower than average failure rates, especially in bigger capacity hard drives.
You also get backup software, and the drive is compatible with both Windows and Macs, though it's formatted for Windows out of the box unless you go for a Mac-specific hard drive - though these are more expensive. 8. Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro external hard drive
Capacity: 2TB Interface: USB 3.0 and Wi-Fi Today's best Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro deals Wireless AC Good battery life Expensive due to Wi-Fi features
Even if we had mixed feelings on past versions of the My Passport Wireless, the 2016 pro variant of the external HDD restores faith in the Western Digital name. The design, for one, has been overhauled and no longer resembles the My Passport Ultra or My Passport for Mac. Instead, theres now a more premium feel to the My Passport Wireless Pro. It resembles an external DVD drive, but considering the onboard SD card slot, dont worry about getting it confused with anything else. For photographers, this will make the Wireless Pro stand out.
For everyone else, theres a massive 6,400mAh battery built into the device. This lets the drive be used completely free of wires over 2.4GHz or 5GHz channels. When its wired up, however, dont expect cutting edge connection tech, as the My Passport Wireless Pro uses only USB Type-B to Type-A. Completely absent is the latest and greatest USB-C connection.
Where the My Passport Wireless Pro compromises on affordability, its able to benefit in just about every other area. Of course, not everyone needs a wireless hard drive or SD card support, but for those who do, its almost essential.
Read the full review: Western Digital My Passport Wireless Pro
9. LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive 4TB
Capacity: 4TB Interface: USB-C Today's best LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive 4TB deals Fast USB-C connection Expensive
You may have stumbled upon the LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive when perusing the Apple website for USB-C accessories . Theres a reason for that: the Porsche Design ships with both USB Type-C to Type-A and USB Type-C to Type-C connectors, making it a worthy candidate regardless of your setup.
Its expensive for an external hard drive, dont get us wrong, especially if youre in the market for the top-end 4TB option. On the other hand, this is an HDD that could theoretically output speeds of up to 5Gbps, if it werent hindered by the limits of SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording) technology.
Comprising five 800GB platters in a 15mm form factor, the LaCie Porsche Design Mobile is an excellent challenger to the Seagate M3, though its notably bigger in both weight and dimensions.
Sure, it packs an extra convenience factor in the form of USB-C, but it should be noted that the Porsche Design Mobile is still limited to USB 3.0 speeds. Plus, even an aluminum finish cant prevent it from clashing with your Rose Gold MacBook . Nevertheless, LaCies offering is the best USB-C external HDD money can buy, at least for the time being.
Read our full review: LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive 4TB
10. iStorage diskAshur 2TB external hard drive
Best for security
Capacity: 2TB Interface: USB 3.0 Physical security Expensive
Typically, iStorage hard disks cater best to governments and multinational organizations around the world, for good reason too they offer tight security like no other drives around.
If someone tries to tamper with your iStorage drive, you can configure it to self-desturct. What's more, the data is encrypted by the 256-bit AES protocol, with multiple forms of protection in place to ensure the bad guys don't get in no matter how persistent. When you consider all that extra security, the prices won't scare you away either.
Sure, it's still expensive, four times the price of an equivalent 2TB drive, and unlikely to be the most nimble performer. But, you're paying for a product that's virtually uncrackable. Bear in mind, though, you'll get no help from the manufacturer if things go awry and you lose your password.
Read our full review: iStorage diskAshur DT
Gabe Carey and Matt Hanson also contributed to this article
