Compare the Best External Hard DrivesJanuary 2021

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

Extras

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

External Hard Drive Prices

In total we found 409 external hard disk drives ranging from £29 to £858. The average price of a new external hard drive is £173 and 80% of external harddisks are priced between £49 and £374. The Apricorn Aegis Padlock DT - 10TB is the most expensive external hard drive that we found at £858, and the Toshiba Canvio Basics - 500Gb is the cheapest at only £30.

External Hard Drive Brands - Price Range

IoSafe external hard disk drives range in price from £335 to £854, and the average price of ioSafe external hard disk drives is £577 which is the highest average price of all external hard drive brands.

The second highest average external hard drive price out of all brands is Apricorn external hard disk drive with an average price of £405. Apricorn external hard disk drive range in price from £124 to £858.

The average price of Digittrade external hard disks is £379 which is the third highest average price of all external hard drive brands. Digittrade external hard disks start at £130 and their most expensive external hard drive costs £647.

External Hard Drive Brands - Average Ratings

We have checked 123 expert reviews and 1,487 user reviews for external hard disk and used this information to calculate the average rating for each brand of external hard drive. Western Digital is the top rated external hard drive brand with an average rating of 90%. Seagate is the second best brand with 86% and Silicon Power is the third best brand with 75%.

Biggest External Hard Drive Retailers

The biggest external hard drive retailer by number of products currently for sale is Quzo. We found 385 current external hard drive offers from Quzo. The second biggest retailer is Amazon UK with 246 offers. That means Quzo is much bigger than Amazon UK when it comes to external hard drive. SmartTeck is the third biggest retailer with 206 current offers.

When Are Most New External Hard Disk Drive Released?

Over the last 3 years we couldn't see any evident pattern in the release month for new external harddisk. The biggest month in 2020 for new external hard drive releases was February, with six new external hard drives released that month. July was the biggest month in 2019 for new external hard disk, with nine new external hard disk released that month. 58 new external hard disks were released in June 2018 making it the biggest month that year for new external hard drive releases.

Weights

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

The weights of external harddisks range from 41g to 11.4kg. The weights of the majority of external hard disk range from 0g to 300g. The external hard drive with the heaviest weight is the ioSafe SoloPRO - 6Tb, which is a 6.8kg external hard drive and is on sale for £717.56. The external hard drive with the lightest weight is the Integral USB 3.0 Portable SSD External Hard Drive - 256GB, which is a 41g external hard drive and is priced at £108.99.

USB Powered

Whether the hard drive is powered by USB or not.

Of the 834 new external hard disk drives currently listed on Kagoo, the vast majority are USB powered external hard disk drives. 82% of external hard disk drives are USB powered external hard disk drives.

Hard Drive Capacities

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

Comparing all external harddisks, 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 external hard drive with the biggest hard drive capacity is the Western Digital Western Digital My Book Duo - 24Tb, which is a 24TB external hard drive and can be purchased for £699.00. The Western Digital WD My Passport Wireless - 2TB, which sells for £160.32, has the smallest hard drive capacity and is a 1GB external hard drive.

Which Are the Cheapest Retailers for External Hard Drive?

The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external hard disk drives. For each retailer it shows the total number of external hard disk drives where they currently have a market leading price. The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying external hard drives. 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. 105 of their external hard drive prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.

Proportion of External Hard 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. 42.7% of their external hard drive prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.