Prime Day hard drive and memory card deals: Up to $470 off on Lexar, Seagate, Samsung, and more

When you buy through our links, Insider may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more.

Amazon Prime Day is discounting plenty of storage devices. Whether it's portable hard drives or memory cards, you can save on the top brands, including Lexar, Seagate, Western Digital, and more. We scoured the list to find the ones that are top-rated and lauded by users and reviewers, including us.

Some of the best Prime Day hard drive and memory card deals include internal NVMe SSDs like the Crucial P5 Plus for $104 on Amazon, which are incredibly fast and great for high-end PCs and the PlayStation 5. The Lexar NS100 SSD for $35 is an affordable solution (it's nearly 50% off) for upgrading older computers. If you carry around a massive amount of files, the 4TB portable hard drive from Seagate is less than $100. Need more storage for your Nintendo Switch? Lexar's 1TB PLAY card is down to its lowest price, at $63.

Below, you'll find the best Prime Day storage deals. Most will last through July 12 or until they sell out, so be sure to grab them early. And check out our live blog for all the best Prime Day deals. Remember, you'll need a Prime Membership in order to get the sale prices.

Top 5 Prime Day hard drive and memory card deals 

• Nextorage 2TB Internal SSD $229.99 $111.83 at Amazon
• WD_BLACK 4TB Internal SSD $699.99 $229.99 at Amazon
• Lexar 2TB Portable SSD $127.99 $79.99 at Amazon
• Lexar PLAY 1TB microSD card $129.99 $62.99 at Amazon
• Seagate 8TB Internal HDD $234.99 $129.99 at Amazon

The best Prime Day SSD deals

The best Prime Day portable and external hard drive deals

The best Prime Day memory card deals

The best Prime Day internal hard-disk drive deals

Is SSD better than HDD?

When it comes to hard drive types, in general, they come in two variants: solid state (SSD) or hard disk (HDD).

Unlike HDDs, which use mechanical parts to read and write data, SSDs use circuit-based flash memory, which is much faster. And because there are no moving components, SSDs are also more resilient against accidental drops or heavy data transfers, making them more reliable over time. SSDs are also preferred when it comes to gaming, as the fast speeds are important for loading and keeping up with gameplay.

Deciding between an SSD or HDD comes down to capacity, price, and your needs. Although SSD prices have come down considerably, HDDs are still cheaper, and you can get more storage for the money. HDDs are ideal for archive purposes, storing files that you may not need to access often, such as photos and videos. The newest HDDs, whether internal, external, or portable, are now more robust than older models, but they still don't beat SSDs in speed and reliability.

Is a memory card the same as an SD card?

Years ago, there were many different competing types of memory cards, including Secure Digital (SD), xD, CompactFlash, Memory Stick, and others. Today, for consumers, the industry has standardized to the SD format, but there are now different variations of SD.

To pick the best SD card, first determine if you need the standard size (used in cameras and laptops) or the tiny microSD variant, which is used in action cameras, drones, phones, tablets, Nintendo Switch, and nearly all small electronics that require storage.

Next, you will need to pick the card with the right speed: If you are shooting high-res photos or 4K video, you will need a card with fast write speeds, for example. Check the specs on the card before you buy, as not all SD cards are the same.

Lastly, consider the capacity you'll need, as files like photos and videos can be massive.