New Nintendo Switch comes with 2 256 GB storage. It is eight times higher than the original switch and four times higher than the switch OLED. But better performance of the new console means that some games will hog a ton of this place: Cyberpank 2077 For one, a 59GB is downloaded Fiction of partition Check in 69 GB. Other titles are not so large – especially those that Nintendo has developed by itself – but the chances are that you will eventually want to add more rooms to this device.
When you do, you will need a MicroSD Express card. These are Not The standard microSD cards you may have purchased for the first switch or other gaming hands hand, as they are new, fast and significantly more expensive. But if you want more space, they are your only choice. If you want to catch someone today, we have kept the best microSD card for Switch 2 and what you should know before buying.
Best MicroSD Card for Switch 2 (and why you want to wait to buy)
Sandesk MicroSD Express Card and Lexar Play Pro. (Jeff Dunn for Angjit)
Switch 2 is the first mainstream device that requires a microSD express to extend storage, so there are not many options available to buy right now. Here is a list of every microSD Express card that we have seen in retailers at the retailers at the time of writing.
128 GB
256 GB
512 GB
1tb
Nintendo says the switch supports cards with a technically up to 2TB, but we have not yet seen any microSD express model. It is also worth noting that the game stop and wool (internal electronics brand of Walmart) are not manufactures, so it is not clear who is making its own card.
The stock for these cards remains somewhat complicated, especially with high capacity options. But many 128GB and 256GB of Model Switch 2 launch 2 appear permanently available as per week. Just be warned that in some cases you may have to deal with the expansion times of the ship. Sandsk’s microSD Express card has also increased in price as it has increased for sale for the first time in February. In fact, it costs $ 45 for 128GB and $ 60 for 256GB.
In any way, all these cards are much more important than traditional microSD options. For example, the cost of Samsung Pro Plus is $ 17 for $ 17, 256 GB for 256 GB 25, $ 43 for 512 GB and $ 90 for 1TB according to this writing.
Remember: You’re looking for MicroSD Express“Not extreme”, as Branding Sandesk uses its traditional micro SD cards. A micro -SD Express card will have a big “former” logo hidden on it – if you see, you should be nice to go.
This “former” logo will raid them in all microSD Express cards. (Nintendo/Angijit)
We have already tested the Sandesk Express Card and the Lexer Play Pro for our broader guide for the best microSD cards. Between the two, the Sandesk card has a fast reading – up to 899 MB/S vs. 712 MB/S in the Christalds Mark, naming a benchmark – which makes theoretter better lace to reduce load times.
Play Pro is faster for writing sequences (up to 720 MB/S vs. 650 MB/Sec), which is available in high size and whenever it is in stock, it should be cheaper at 256GB. (Sandesk says that the 128GB version of his card has to write slowly compared to the 256GB model.) Random performance is equal, so both should be specialized in maintaining major sports. Mario Cart World Easily running.
Although we mainly tested these cards on Windows PC and Mac. It is yet to be seen how they perform on the original switch 2. Nintendo did not send a preliminary review unit to press, and we only received our own retail model. So we will need a few more days to finish the test.
For now, however, we cannot say whether the console offers all the microSD express card at a similar speed. The matter with the first switch was largely: Once (regular) microSD cards target a certain range of performance, there was not such a practical difference between it and other alternatives. Switch 2 is working with a different standard, but if something should happen, the “best” microSD express card will be the most affordable than the well -known brand in your capacity.
This brings us to an important part of our advice: If you can stop buying any of these things soon, this is probably a good idea. This is not just about the lack of testing – from the truth, we will be surprised if any of these cards are really “bad”. This is more about the value: Except for more tariffs, all these cards are as expensive today as they are likely to receive. The switch 2 is already popular and will continue, thus will need to create more microSD express card and prices (eventually) will come down. Try to use all the 256 of the baked gigabytes in the first switch 2, whether it means deleting the game or two. But if you are sure you want more space right now, the above cards Should Be good enough
What are MicroSD Express Cards?
On the right side a microSD express card has another row of pins on the back of the card. (Jeff Dunn for Angjit)
Most microSD cards are based on a standard called Ultra High Speed (UHS), three of which are: UHS-I, UHS-II and UHS-III. The majority of the cards you have purchased in the past use UHS-I. They have a row of pins in the back and 104 megabytes per second (MB/S) theoretical data transfer speed. (Although many cards are able to cross this limit with proprietary tech and card readers.) The original switch has the UHS-I microSD slot, as has other gaming hand hands like valve’s steam deck.
UHS-II cards increase the second row of pins and can reach 312 MB/s. These are Pricers and less common than UHS-I-based cards, but they have doubled the UHS-II in the theory (624 MB/S), in the meantime, but no microSD card is actually used.
The UHS-I cards have maintained in the past years because they are cheap, widely endorsed and the Enough of the things that most people need to do is: record 4K video, stash photos, etc. But with switch 2, Nintendo needs more. The new console is dramatically more powerful, allowing it to run demanding games that are originally made for strong hardware like PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X or Gaming PC. The device also uses UFS 3.1 storage internally, which is much faster than the EMMC storage used by the original switch. –
Nintendo Switch 2. (Sam Ruder Ford for Enjat)
Therefore, SD Express. This standard has been technically going on since 2018 but mostly has not gone anywhere until the switch 2 has arrived. It also uses other pins, but it allows microSD cards to benefit from the PCI Express (PCIE)/NVME interface, which is the basic tech used by modern SSD. As a result, it can produce quite faster reading and writing speeds with existing theoretical maximum 985 MB/second.
As written above, the real world performance will not be so fast. Even if it was, the best microSD Express cards used by PS5 and Xbox would be much slower than NVME SSDS. –
But they are still significantly improved compared to the old UHS-I cards, and ideologically, when the game level, asset restoration, recovery or copying sports in outdoor storage, they should be faster than some old SATA-based SSD when they have to retrieve sports, recover or copy sports. While the Sandesk’s microSD Express card can produce reading speed around 900 MB/second, Lexar’s professional silver plus selects UHS-I in the top of our general microSD card guide-just over 200 MB/s, and it’s with a proprietary reader. (On the first switch, it would be close to 100 MB/Sec.) Sorting writing and random pace was three to four times better, and sometimes even more depends on what we used.
It remains to be seen how well these express cards will remain with expansion use, and there is no way to know when their heavenly prices will be low. The non-switch 2 devices that support the microSD Express are still extremely rare, and this standard itself is not compatible with the backwards with the UHS-II, so if you want to use your card with another device you will be limited to the speed of UHS-I (unless you buy a valuable reader). Nevertheless, while growing costs and limited choices are disturbing, the tech itself seems to be worth the next generation switch.
