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Portable SSDs are all over the place in terms of build quality and price. Usually, by sticking to trusted brands, you can score a reliable and well-performing device. With this in mind, the WD My Passport SSD offers a reasonable blend of capable hardware and value. Still, it may not be as resilient as LaCie’s Rugged SSD or SanDisk’s Extreme Pro if you frequently trek out into the elements with your devices.
Aesthetically, WD’s My Passport SSD offers a little more form than function in its design. It is sleek, compact, and comes in various color options, but it lacks an activity light, and the included cable is very short at just six inches.
(Image credit: Tom's Hardware)
Performance-wise, the My Passport SSD isn’t the fastest device we tested due in part to the lack of DRAM. Still, WD’s My Passport SSD delivered fairly solid results during our testing. It also offers a significant boost in performance over its predecessor and is magnitudes of order faster than any HDD, not to mention more shock tolerant, too.
At $150-$165 for the 1TB model, the My Passport is priced competitively. If you've been on the hunt for a new portable SSD, WD’s My Passport SSD is well worth a look. Whether you're a student or a business professional, this SSD will store almost anything you throw at it, and in some ways, it’s overkill for simple file backups.
Depending on your color and build quality preference, Samsung’s T7 is a tough competitor, though. It has a full aluminum design that is much more solid for the $160 price tag.
Crucial’s X8 is also faster in some workloads due to its tweaked-and-tuned QLC flash and a larger dynamic cache, but it lacks encryption support and does not offer anywhere near the same level of sustained performance as the WD drive. Between the two, at $150, we would recommend the WD My Passport.
