Without a doubt, you should get a sturdy SSD if you want quick and dependable storage. If you choose wisely, an SSD should last you for many years. SSDs, however, have a finite lifespan by nature. Your SSD will eventually fail as the NAND flash memory that powers it has a limited capacity for write and erase cycles.

How long do SSDs truly last? What are the telltale indications to watch out for when shopping, and do you need to worry about that? In this post, we’ll go over all of that and more.

How long do SSDs last?

Many SSDs can work well for five to ten years on average before beginning to exhibit symptoms of failure. This estimate, however, may vary depending to the specific SSD in issue. An SSD’s lifespan can be affected by a number of factors, such as the kind of NAND flash memory it utilizes, the workloads it manages, and how frequently and intensely it is used.

Surprisingly, little information is available on the typical lifespan of an SSD, which is remarkable for anything that stores data. SSDs can last up to ten years, but most will fail before then. According to current research, SSD failure is more likely to occur over time than during use. In summary, it’s OK if you utilize your SSD extensively each day. Regardless of how much or how little you utilize it, time alone will continue to work.

NAND flash drives have a far lower replacement rate than conventional HDDs, citing a study by Google’s Raghav Lagisetty and Arif Merchant and the University of Toronto’s Bianca Schroeder. Some people predicted that consumer SSDs would be far less dependable than HDDs in the early days of the technology, but this was a typical misconception about PCs. However, the same study also discovered that while faulty blocks and uncorrectable mistakes are more common in SSDs than HDDs, they don’t always result in complete drive failures. More importantly, it’s about deterioration over time.

By releasing mid-year statistics, cloud storage, and backup provider Backblaze also provides some fascinating insights on SSD dependability. The company’s storage servers were equipped with an astounding 3,144 SSDs as of mid-2023. Of the 3,144 SSDs in use in the second quarter of 2023, just eight failed. The annualized failure rates (AFR) of the corporation varied from 0.36% to 1.72%.

The fact that Backblaze also determined the typical age of SSD failure may be more intriguing. The business said that 63 SSDs failed in total in the 2023 report. After accounting for power-on hours (POH), Backblaze found that SSDs were just 14 months old on average. However, this information is deceptive because the average age of all the SSDs in Backblaze’s fleet is just 25 months. The average age of SSDs at failure will probably rise over time.

Determining the exact lifespan of SSDs is particularly challenging since nearly all studies discuss SSDs in relation to data centers rather than end users. Research or not, it would be not easy to pinpoint the precise average lifespan of a consumer SSD because there are other factors at play as well, even though time appears to be the primary one.

It’s also important to remember that a lot of SSDs will never fail. If the SSD fails, you’d sooner replace the entire system. It’s difficult to forecast if your SSD will fail—some will and others won’t.

What factors affect how long your SSD lasts?

Every SSD has an estimated data capacity before it fails, even if the lifespan of an SSD may appear quite vague at first. Let’s dissect it.

TBW, DWPD, and MTBF

When looking for an SSD, you’ll frequently come across a number of specifications, such as mean time between failures (MTBF), disk writes per day (DWPD), and terabytes written (TBW), that indicate how long the SSD should last before things go wrong. While some manufacturers may offer all three parameters, others may just mention one. As a result, estimating the lifespan of an SSD is not a precise science because each of those measures has a different meaning.

The entire quantity of data that can be written to your SSD before it wears out is measured as TBW. Although it’s doubtful that you’ll ever reach that maximum, this is the most often-used statistic to indicate an SSD’s durability. Numerous top-tier SSDs on the market now have TBW ratings of 1,200TB or more. Your TBW will run out after 230 years of continuous use, assuming that you write 100GB of data every week to your SSD. This may not be much on some weeks, but it should be plenty on most weeks.

In summary, a higher TBW is preferable as it means more durability; nonetheless, it’s improbable that you would ever surpass the TBW of any SSD. With typical use, even older drives with a modest 300TB TBW will endure for many years.

Another indicator for assessing the lifespan of your SSD is DWPD. It shows the number of times the SSD’s whole capacity may be written per day for the duration of the drive’s warranty. The Samsung 990 Pro 2TB, for instance, has a DWPD rating of 0.3 and comes with a five-year guarantee. This implies that you have five years to write up to 600GB a day before you reach the maximum.

In contrast, the Maximum Time Between Failures (MTBF) is a reliability statistic that expresses the interval between failures in hours. It only calculates the probability that an SSD will fail while being used normally. With an MTBF of 1.5 million hours, the aforementioned Samsung 990 Pro is predicted to function well for 1.5 million hours before potentially failing. That is 171 years, which is an absurd amount once more. However, as Samsung is obviously unable to test an SSD for 171 years before delivering it, MTBF is defined as the ratio of the whole SSD lifespan to the total number of SSD failures. Otherwise, an SSD with a 1.5 million hour MTBF operating nonstop for a year has a 0.58% annual failure rate.

It’s crucial to keep in mind that none of those metrics—which are statistical measurements—can ensure that your SSD will survive for an extended period of time. (After all, none of us would be here to see the fate of our SSDs in 230 years if not for the assistance of our robot overlords.)

It’s only an estimate, so some SSDs might not fail at all and merely need to be replaced after a year, while others might fail in a year.

Age

Apart from all other measures, your SSD’s lifespan is mostly determined by its age. A contemporary SSD’s TBW is unlikely to be exceeded, although usage and time will eventually wear it down. It all boils down to how long an SSD’s oxide layer can withstand wear and tear from repeated program/erase (P/E) cycles in NAND flash memory. Every P/E cycle that occurs in your SSDs affects the NAND cells, which will ultimately wear them down. The storage capacity of your SSD will decrease as more and more NAND cells fail.

Therefore, a drive that is used extensively is likely to wear out sooner, but an SSD will eventually wear out in some fashion. The majority of SSDs have a three- to five-year limited guarantee; beyond that, it depends on usage and luck.

Type of NAND flash memory

The lack of a standard SSD type to compare different SSDs to further complicates the estimation of an SSD’s typical lifespan. A given SSD may have an anticipated number of write cycles that is more or fewer depending on the kind of NAND flash memory utilized in it.

A non-volatile flash memory type that keeps your data stored even after you power off your computer is referred to as NAND. This sets it apart from Random Access Memory (RAM), which is volatile and loses all of its data when you sign out for the day. Another feature that distinguishes SSDs from HDDs is NAND. HDDs store data on rotating magnetic disks, which makes them slower and more vulnerable to physical harm.

The types of NAND flash memory in SSDs are:

• SLC (Single-level cell): Enterprise SSDs, like those found in data centers, are the only true places where this kind of NAND is found. With only one bit of data stored in each cell, it allows for faster data retrieval. According to Kingston, its durability is the greatest, with an estimated 100,000 P/E cycles.
• MLC (Multi-level cell): Although the name suggests that this kind of NAND may store multiple bits per cell, two bits per cell is the most popular application for it. It is simpler to create in larger quantities because of the higher data density, but its maximum lifespan is 10,000 P/E cycles. However, consumer-grade MLC SSDs could be rated lower for durability.
• TLC (Triple-level cell): You guessed it: each cell in this kind of memory holds three bits. Right now, this NAND type is the most often used in consumer SSDs because it offers an excellent balance between durability, performance, and affordability. It has a 3,000 P/E cycle capacity.
• QLC (Quad-level cell): With a rating of just 1,000 P/E cycles, QLC NAND increases storage density at a significant expense to durability by storing four bits of data per cell.

A method known as 3D NAND has been employed by certain manufacturers to boost density and storage capacity without enlarging the SSD itself. It is possible to employ this technology with both SLC and QLC NAND. Some SSD specs just state “3D NAND” without going into detail, but if you look closer, you can typically find the kind of memory on the manufacturer’s website.

These days, TLC NAND is used in the majority of SSDs, which lowers their cost but increases their durability.

Signs of SSD failure

It’s typically rather obvious if your SSD is failing. I have only seen one SSD fail over the years, and that one was obvious as day. It had to be replaced. The machine became so sluggish that it took more than half an hour to load Chrome. Examining the Task Manager indicated that even with no other windows open, the disk was operating at 100%. Fortunately, I was able to identify this before it became irreversible and obtain the data back before discarding that SSD.

Here are some signs to keep an eye out for:

• Frequent crashes, especially during boot
• The SSD switching to read-only mode
• Frequent file system errors
• Slow performance
• Data corruption
• Blue screens of death (BSOD)
• Freezes and unresponsiveness
• SMART errors, such as notices about bad data blocks or reallocated sectors

It’s critical to keep in mind that losing your SSD might result in the loss of all of your data. Because of this, creating regular backups and checking your SSD for indications of failure are both highly recommended. It’s advisable to take action as soon as you suspect a drive is failing, since this may allow you time to move your data to a different location and purchase a replacement.

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