Compare the Best External Hard DrivesJuly 2020

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

Extras

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

External Hard Drive Prices

We currently list 349 external hard disk drives ranging from £5 to £854. A new external hard drive costs on average £147 and 80% of external hard disk drive are priced between £47 and £300. The Apricorn Aegis Padlock DT - 10TB is the most expensive external hard drive that we found at £854, and the Western Digital My Passport is the cheapest at only £6.

External Hard Drive Brands - Price Range

The average price of Apricorn external hard drives is £854 which is the highest average price of all external hard drive brands. Apricorn external hard drives start at £854 and their most expensive external hard drive costs £854.

The second highest average external hard drive price out of all brands is Glyph external harddisk with an average price of £566. Glyph external harddisk start at £566 and their most expensive external hard drive costs £566.

IoSafe external hard drives start at £335 and their most expensive external hard drive costs £764. The average price of ioSafe external hard drives is £503 which is the third highest average price of all external hard drive brands.

External Hard Drive Brands - Average Ratings

We have analysed 264 expert reviews and 1,617 user reviews for external hard drives and used this data to determine the average rating for each brand of external hard drive. The top three external hard drive brands are Western Digital, Seagate and Buffalo. Western Digital has an average rating of 88%, Seagate has an average rating of 76% and Buffalo has an average rating of 75%.

Biggest External Hard Drive Retailers

The biggest external hard drive retailer by number of products currently for sale is Quzo. We found 290 current external hard drive offers from Quzo. The second biggest retailer is SmartTeck with 172 offers. That means Quzo is much bigger than SmartTeck when it comes to external hard drives. Amazon UK is the third biggest retailer with 121 current offers.

When Are Most New External Hard Drives Released?

We looked at the release dates for new external hard drives over the last 3 years, but couldn't see any clear trend. Last year most new external harddisks were released in February, with 11 new external harddisks released that month. In June 2018, 59 new external hard disk were released making it the biggest month that year for new external hard drive releases. July was the biggest month in 2017 for new external hard disks, with 36 new external hard disks released that month.

How Fast Do External Hard Drive Prices Drop After Release?

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

That means that on a typical external hard drive costing £147 you could save on average £1 by waiting 6 months before buying.

Weights

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

Comparing all external hard drives, the weights range from 41g to 11.4kg. The weights of most external harddisk range from 0g to 300g. The external hard drive with the heaviest weight is the ioSafe Solo G3 Fireproof External Hard Drive - 3TB, which is a 6.8kg external hard drive and currently retails for £421.00. The Integral USB 3.0 Portable SSD External Hard Drive - 256GB, which sells for £108.99, has the lightest weight and is a 41g external hard drive.

USB Powered

Whether the hard drive is powered by USB or not.

The vast majority of the 874 new external hard drives currently listed on Kagoo are USB powered external harddisks. 703 external hard drives (80%) are USB powered external harddisks.

Hard Drive Capacities

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

Comparing all external hard disk drive, the hard drive capacities range from 1GB to 64TB. The hard drive capacities of the majority of external hard disk drives range from 0GB to 1.5TB. The Western Digital My Book Duo - 20Tb, which is available at £636.62, has the biggest hard drive capacity and is a 20TB external hard drive. The Western Digital WD My Passport Wireless - 2TB, which can be purchased for £160.32, has the smallest hard drive capacity and is a 1GB external hard drive.

Which Are the Cheapest Retailers for External Harddisk?

The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external harddisk. For each retailer it shows the total number of external harddisk where they currently have a market leading price. The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external harddisks. For each retailer we took all of their prices and looked at what proportion of those prices where the cheapest on the market. The cheapest retailer that we found was Amazon UK. 46 of their external hard drive prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.

Proportion of External Hard Disk Drive for Which Each Retailer is Cheapest?

Assessing how cheap each retailer is for external hard disk drive by counting the number of cheapest prices for that retailer, makes the retailers that offer the greatest number of external hard drive prices more likely to offer the greatest number of cheapest prices. The chart below considers the proportion of each retailer's external hard drive prices that are the cheapest compared to other retailers. The cheapest retailer that we found using this approach was Amazon UK. 38% of their external hard drive prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.