From the phone-focused SanDisk Creator Phone SSD to compact Kingston and established WD models, these 1TB drives offer fast, practical backup for photos and videos.
Diwali and other festival seasons can quickly overwhelm a phone’s storage, especially when photographs, short videos and social clips accumulate in a matter of hours. For readers looking for a simple off-device backup, News18 has highlighted five 1TB portable SSDs priced under Rs. 20,000, with options from WD, SanDisk, Kingston and Crucial. The appeal is practical: a one-time purchase, faster transfers than a conventional hard drive or pen drive, and enough space for years of family memories.
Among the more established models, the WD My Passport SSD remains a strong all-round option. Tom’s Hardware and Tech Advisor both note its 256-bit AES hardware encryption and transfer speeds that reach roughly 1,050MB/s for reading and around 1,000MB/s for writing over USB 3.2 Gen 2. The drive also includes both USB-C and USB-A compatibility, which can make it easier to use across older laptops and newer phones. Digital Camera World adds that it carries a five-year warranty, although it also points to concerns about the short cable and the drive’s less-than-robust casing.
SanDisk’s standard 1TB Portable SSD is positioned as the lower-cost choice on News18’s list, while the SanDisk Creator Phone SSD is aimed more directly at mobile users. The creator-focused model is designed to attach magnetically to MagSafe-compatible phones and cases, and News18 says it supports ProRes recording on iPhone 15 Pro and 16 Pro models. That makes it the most phone-centric drive in the selection, especially for users who shoot large video files and want to move or record them directly to external storage.
For buyers prioritising size and speed, the Kingston XS1000 offers a compact footprint with claimed transfer rates of up to 1,050MB/s. It is the most pocketable of the drives News18 selected, and that makes it useful for people who want something small enough to carry every day. Crucial’s X9, meanwhile, is presented as the most reviewed option in the round-up, which may matter for shoppers who prefer a widely used model with a long track record in consumer storage.
The broader lesson is that portable SSDs have become a sensible middle ground between cloud backup and laptop storage. They are fast enough for large video folders, simple enough for most users to handle, and compatible with common file systems such as exFAT across Windows, Mac and Android. As News18 notes, the safest approach is still to keep at least two copies of important files, with one on the SSD and another in cloud storage or on a computer, so that a lost or damaged drive does not take the only copy of your pictures with it.
Disclaimer: This content is intended for informational purposes only. Readers are advised to exercise their own judgement, conduct due diligence, or consult a qualified expert before acting on any information provided.
