If you are looking for an answer on how much storage should a gaming laptop have? then you have landed at the right place. Due to a lack of storage, people compromise the gaming experience and delete their old games or software to install new games.
Therefore, it becomes mandatory to have sufficient storage to avoid such inconvenient experiences of deleting files or games to save the storage. Nowadays, SSD (Solid State Drive) is being used widely around the world due to its performance. The gaming laptop storage depends on one’s requirements. Sufficient storage determines that a person can install many games on the gaming laptop and it doesn’t get slow down. Let’s find out about it.
Table of Contents
Let’s find out, how much storage should a gaming laptop have?
Recommended Storage For A Gaming Laptop
What should be a gaming laptop storage then a gaming laptop must have at least 500 GB of storage as the minimum requirement, however, 1000 GB/1 TB of storage is recommended for a better experience. Most of the games don’t use much storage but the AAA titles take a large amount of storage and this is the reason, 1000 GB of gaming storage is recommended.
For many gamers who are pro gamers, even the 1000 GB of storage is not sufficient. It depends on the storage requirement of the games you intend to play and people don’t use gaming laptops for games only, they use the machine to store other stuff as well and this changes the storage requirement.
From the brand’s offering, you will find standard storage of 256 GB, 512 GB, and 1000 GB/1 TB however a pro gamer should go above the recommended 1 TB storage to avoid storage-related issues during multiple titles.
Most AAA titles require above 50 GB of storage and only 1 TB of storage at least can justify the gaming experience. Let’s have a look at some AAA titles and their storage requirements which can give you an idea for storage selection:
| Game Title | Minimum Storage Requirement |
| Minecraft | 1 GB |
| Player Unknown Battlegrounds (PUBG) | 30 GB |
| Fortnite | 16 GB |
| Dota | 15 GB |
| Call Of Duty Modern Warfare | 175 GB |
| Grand Theft Auto V: | 65 |
| Shadow Of The Tomb Raider | 40 GB |
| Overwatch | 40 – 50 GB |
| Doom Eternal | 50 GB |
| The Witcher 3 | 50 GB |
As shown in the above table most AAA games require plenty of storage. If you have limited storage installed on your gaming laptop then there is no need to be worried as the storage can be expanded as the brands make sure that it can be expanded further in the future if the user needs it.
Deciding The Amount Of Storage You Need For A Gaming Laptop
In order to get an idea that how much storage should a gaming laptop have? for a gaming laptop, you need to keep the following points in mind:
1. The Kinds Of Games You Play
It’s no rocket science to understand that different types of games need different amounts of free storage to run smoothly. More graphics-intensive games use more disk space than less graphics-intensive games.
If you are planning or already playing simple less graphic-intensive games on the gaming laptop then you may go with 512 GB of RAM or continue with your existing storage.
How Frequent You Purchase Games
If you are not a hardcore gamer and just do casual gaming and looking for a gaming laptop for your casual gaming then 512 GB SSD storage is more than sufficient.
However, if you buy game titles frequently, especially AAA games then you are going to face storage issues if you go with less storage option. Frequent purchase means you play games a lot and they can include graphics-intensive games too. In this case, you need at least 1 TB of storage for smooth gaming.
How Many Games You Already Own
If you already have many games then at least 1 TB storage is necessary for the gaming laptop. However it is still recommended storage only and one should always consider more storage if the budget allows.
Whether You Hoard Games
Some gamers delete games to try or play new games due to existing storage issues. Laptop OS requires a good amount of storage and after the occupancy of the storage by the OS, many games cannot be installed simultaneously so one has to delete the apps or games to free up the space.
Other Software And Files You Want To Store
Apart from games, one may store movies, songs, some files, or school or office projects. There can be several types of data that can be stored in such cases, a good amount of storage is ideal to be future-proof in a gaming laptop.
How Much You Intend To Spend
Everyone wants a handful of storage and doesn’t want to stay behind in terms of storage but the budget is the thing that stops one from upgrading or going for higher storage.
However, if the budget isn’t one’s issue, then can go for better storage capacity. Most of the high-end gaming laptops come with at least 2 TB of storage and one can go for the higher variant. However, there are several other things that make a gaming laptop faster since we are discussing storage in this post so we will stick to our topic.
Why Gaming Laptops Have Both SSD And HDD Storage
At present, many gaming laptops come with two types of storage. One is HDD and the other is SSD. HDD stands for Hard Drive Disc while SSD stands for Solid State Drive. SSD is the latest technology in storage and works very fast but still, some gaming laptops carry both of the storage types.
In such gaming laptops, SSD is used for OS and games installation and HDD is used for other stuff like movies, files, etc. so the laptop can stay fast and still remain within budget as the SSD-only variants cost more.
Different Types Of Storage In Gaming Laptops
(a) Hard Disk Drive (HDD)
A hard disk drive (HDD), or you can say hard disk/hard drive/fixed disk, is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores or you can say write and retrieves the data using magnetic storage with the help of one or more rigid swift rotating platters which are coated with the magnetic material.
The HDDs are a type of non-volatile storage, retaining stored data when powered off.
(b) Solid State Disk (SSD)
On the other hand, Solid State Disk (SSD) is a flash/chip-based storage device that doesn’t need rotating platters to store or retrieve the data. SSD is a far better option than HHD as the performs every task 5-20 times faster whether it is to store or retrieve data, it is always very fast. They are the best storage option at present to read or write the data. Due to its fast reading and writing speed, it is widely used in gaming and professional laptops.
Since the SSDs are very fast and perform tasks way better, it is a bit costly too. But if your pocket allows you then choosing an SSD over HHD is always recommended.
(c) M.2 SSDs
M.2 is the new form factor designed to put the SSD into a small space in the machine. Due to their capability to support SATA3 (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment 3) and VNMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express) and being small in size, they can be used in Gaming machines which are compact such as Razer Blade Stealth and Gigabyte Aero 15 gaming laptops.
Nowadays, laptops manufacturer are giving preference to NVMe SSDs as they are much faster than the SATA3 SSDs and their data transfer has the capability to reach 3.5 GB/s or much higher.
Currently, we can say that NVMe SSD is the future of storage unless something new doesn’t come to the market.
(d) Solid State Hybrid Drive (SSHD)
An SSHD is a combination of SSD and HHD. It is pretty much faster than HHDs but not as fast as SSDs. This is also a good option if you cannot go with the SSD but want something better than HHD. Due to its combination of SSD and HHD, it is a bit cheaper than SSDs. So many laptop manufacturers are considering SSHD over SSD as it keeps the price within common people’s reach.
Difference between Internal Storage vs External Storage
Internal storage is the device we have been discussing above in this post. It works as an internal part of any laptop or desktop machine. On the other hand, an external storage device is a device where we can store the data externally and can use it with any machine. It works on plug n play method. People use pen drives and external SSDs/HHDs as external devices.
FAQ
CPU: Intel Core i5 or AMD equivalent.
GPU: GTX 1050 Ti/1050, RX 570/580.
RAM: 4GB or more DDR4 SDRAM.
Storage Space: 128GB or more SSD.
Display: 15.6” FHD or 4K.
Conclusion
It is always to be remembered that the amount of storage you need in your gaming laptop is as per need. If you usually install new titles and want to keep the old one with you, it is strongly recommended to go with 1 TB but if it is not an option then one should consider 500 GB of SSD variant at least for good performance and to be a future-ready.
Thank you 🙂
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