Is 500GB SSD enough for gaming?

You may be wondering if 500GB SSD is enough for gaming with the sort of insane graphics games have been coming out with recently. Don’t worry, you’ve come to the right place.

One of the biggest struggles gamers face is making sure their device and console can actually play the games they want to play. One of the biggest barriers to this is storage memory. While most newly released gaming laptops and consoles contain in-built SSD drives, these tend to hover around the 500GB range. It’s important to know if the SSD you’ve got is enough, or if you need to invest in a separate hard drive to boost your SSD to the 1TB end. Fortunately, we’ve investigated the problem for you and can shed some light on the subject.

However, before we begin, you might want to first check up on the differences between SSDs and HDDs.

Let’s take a look at the answers.

Is 500GB SSD enough for gaming?

In short, yes, but it’s a bit more complicated than it first seems.

There are two main things you need to pay attention to with SSD (Solid-State Drive). These are storage and speed. The storage amount will determine how much you can load onto the SSD, while the speed determines how quickly that data can be accessed. Both are equally important.

Storage

How much SSD you will need will depend on what games you are planning to run. Most AAA games these days run between 50-100GB just to download and will easily fill up a 500GB SSD with gameplay data.

For reference we had a look at the minimum storage space needed to download three of the most popular games out right now. Here are the results:

• Resident Evil 4 = 67GB
• Final Fantasy XIV = 80GB
• Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty = 60GB

As you can see, if you’re mainly playing AAA first-person shooters you’re going to fill up 500GB SSD very quickly and it might be worth looking into more storage options. If you’re not sure where to start, we’ve put together a handy guide to help you make a decision about what storage option is best for you for PC and for PS5.

Alternatively, if you’re not playing such storage heavy games then 500GB SSD may be just right for your gaming needs. If you’re mainly playing games like Hotline Miami (250MB storage requirement), Portal 2 (8GB storage requirement), or Loop Hero (200MB storage requirement) then you’re not going to need nearly as much storage space and 1TB would be massively over your needs. Check how much storage the games you most frequently play take up and see if you’re averaging towards the lower or higher end.

Below is a list of some of the top ten most popular games right now and their storage requirements for PC. Have a look through it to see which end your storage needs fall.

Storage requirements for 10 popular games:

• Elden Ring – 60GB
• Deathloop – 30GB
• League of Legends – 22GB
• Diablo II: Resurrected – 30GB
• Apex Legends – 56GB
• Genshin Impact – 72.5GB
• World of Warcraft – 128GB
• The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim – 12GB
• Call of Duty: Black Ops II – 16GB
• Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales – 75GB

It is worth noting that even if a game has a low initial download GB requirement as you play through them, they will take up more and more space as textures and game files are saved.

Also consider if you intend to run several processes simultaneously. If you anticipate that kind of activity then 500GB may not be enough to allow for all of those processes to run and load smoothly, and you may want to consider 1TB instead.

Storage is not the only factor to consider though. If you’ve run into problems with inadequate SSD storage then the chances are that you’ve also run into issues with loading speed.

Speed

The speed of your SSD will impact gameplay experience massively as it determines how quickly your device can access all the information stored on the SSD. Generally, the more recent the version of the interface, the faster the SSD will be. In this case, newer really is better. Make sure that whichever SSD you go for uses MLC or TLC. MLC SSD is SSD that stores two data bits for every one cell. Similarly, TLC SSD is SSD that stores three data bits per cell. MLC and TLC SSD generally perform at faster speeds that average SSD so that’s something to look out for when choosing which SSD to go for.

Final Verdict – Is 500GB SSD enough for gaming?

At the end of the day, 500GB SSD should be enough if you don’t anticipate running multiple games or downloading multiple storage heavy games. But if that sounds like the sort of thing you can see yourself getting up to, you might want to look into investing in a bit of extra storage space. Storage is something that really varies game to game and how much you need will ultimately be decided by your individual needs and demands from your gaming set up.

If you’re unsure where to start with other aspects of your gaming set up we’re here to help with those issues too. If you’re not sure which laptop to choose, we’ve made a handy guide to the best cheap gaming laptops to help you out. Similarly, if you don’t know which CPU to go for on a budget we’ve got you covered. Or even if you don’t know which cable to pick for better resolution just head along to our guide to find the answers. We’re here to help.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does having a full SSD slow down games?

SSD’s (Solid-State Drives) are great for storing lots information that you can access quicker than a tradition hard drive. This allows for very smooth game play. However, as they fill up they drastically slow down and games can start to lag. Try not to completely fill your SSD to stop any issues with lagging or freezing.

How many games can I store on 500GB SSD?

The average storage size of major popular games right now is roughly 30-50GB initial download amount. While this should allow you to download roughly 10 games to a 500GM SSD, each of these games will take up more and more storage space as you play through them and as you start to fill up your SSD you may find yourself having to delete some.