In brief: Western Digital’s 5TB My Passport Ultra is one of our top picks for large-capacity portable storage, and the company recently released the HDD’s first significant update in years. Although SSDs are more or less standard now, HDDs can still provide large amounts of cold storage at relatively low prices.
Western Digital’s portable 2.5-inch HDDs are now available in 6TB variants. The new models are the highest-capacity portable HDDs currently on the market, as WD’s offerings have maxed out at 5TB since 2017.
The company offers the new 6TB capacity in seven variants: the My Passport, My Passport Ultra, the Mac editions of those two, the USB-C My Passport, the WD_Black P10 Game Drive, and the G-Drive ArmorATD. The different drives feature similar specifications with minor connectivity and compatibility differences.
The Ultra editions include USB-C connectivity out-of-the-box with bi-directional USB-C cables at a $20 premium compared to the standard models. The standard Mac version also ships with a USB-C adapter, but its cable is USB-A.
Although only some models carry Mac labels, all of the drives can support macOS. However, the Windows My Passport and My Passport Ultra must be formatted to work on Macs. Using the Mac editions on Windows only requires downloading an HFS+ driver, with no reformatting required. The standard Windows model also supports Chrome OS.
Meanwhile, the USB-C edition, named “Works with USB-C,” supports all three operating systems and includes a USB-C adapter for nearly the same price as the standard variants. The primary difference is that it ships pre-formatted to exFAT.
The Game Drive supports Windows, macOS, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series consoles, but only includes a USB-A to Micro-B cable. Users can install and run PS4 and Xbox One games directly from the drive, but PS5 and Xbox Series console titles can only be stored. 100GB games are standard nowadays, so 6TB of storage can help users hold and transfer dozens of modern titles without needing to re-download them.
Finally, the SanDisk Professional G-Drive Armor ATD is the most expensive model due to its durable outer shell, Thunderbolt 3 compatibility, and two included cables. One is bidirectional USB-C and the other is USB-C to USB-A. It supports macOS out of the box and must be reformatted for use on Windows.
All of the 6TB drives feature a roughly 130MB/s sequential read performance and a 5Gb/s transfer rate. The 6TB My Passport and My Passport for Mac retail for $184.99. The Game Drive and USB-C variant are $189.99. The Ultra editions cost $204.99, and the Armor ATD is $229.99. Less expensive versions of all the drives offer 1TB, 2TB, 4TB, or 5TB of storage.