Microsoft’s Xbox Series X 1TB expandable storage priced at $ 219.99

Microsoft’s first 1TB expandable storage unit for the Xbox Series X / S will be priced at $ 219.99. Best Buy has started taking pre-orders for the accessory, revealing a final price that had recently leaked. These expandable storage cards insert into the back of the Xbox Series X / S to match the speed of the internal SSD and provide 1 TB of additional storage.

Microsoft’s expandable storage solution is proprietary, and so far only Seagate has been announced as the manufacturer. Microsoft tells me there will be more vendors and additional sizes available in the future, but the $ 219.99 price tag will still surprise many potential next-gen Xbox owners.

The Xbox Series X ships with 1 TB of SSD storage and the Xbox Series S only 512 GB of storage. Microsoft’s pricing means the $ 299 Xbox Series S jumps to nearly $ 520 if you want to add the extra storage and take it up to 1.5TB in total. That can make the larger Series X more appealing to those who need the storage, especially as games will start to require it once they’re upgraded for Xbox Series X / S. Games for Xbox Series S can be 30 percent. Smaller than X Series, which will certainly help with storage options.

Photo by Tom Warren / The Verge

An alternative to this expandable storage is to simply use any USB drive to store games when you don’t need to play them. If they aren’t Xbox Series X / S enhanced, you can even run them directly from USB storage, or you can just copy them and use drives as cheaper cold storage.

It’s hard to judge the price of these expandable storage cards, simply because there aren’t enough comparable PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSDs out there. Sony has chosen to allow gamers to insert their own drives into the PS5, but these drives will need to meet the speed requirements of the internal SSD. Those speed requirements mean that PS5 owners will need the best PCIe 4.0 NVMe drives that are starting to make their way into PCs. Samsung announced its 980 Pro earlier this week, which looks like it could be an ideal candidate for the PS5 due to its fast read and write speeds. Samsung’s 1TB option for the 980 Pro is priced at $ 229.99, but Sony has yet to reveal which units will be compatible with the PS5.

The benefits of Sony’s more open approach is that the prices of compatible PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSDs will inevitably fall over time due to competition and lower manufacturing costs. Assuming Sony certifies most of the high-end units, there should be plenty of options. Microsoft will need more manufacturers to produce its expandable Xbox Series X / S storage cards for competition to develop and prices to drop over time. It will be a game of waiting to see exactly how Sony and Microsoft handle expandable storage options in the coming months, but it’s clear from Microsoft’s price that it won’t be cheap for early adopters.