Hard Drive Prices Rose 22% in the First Half of 2026
$24.46 to $29.86 per terabyte, median. But four models more than doubled and six got cheaper, so the average is the least useful number here.
The Short Answer
Don't panic-buy, and don't assume everything went up. The median tracked hard drive costs 22% more per terabyte than it did in March, but the increase is wildly uneven. Four models more than doubled. Six got cheaper. All prices below are as of September 1, 2026 and move constantly, so check the live table before buying.
| Pick | Drive |
|---|---|
| Best value | Seagate IronWolf Pro 12TB at $17.72/TB, or the 20TB at $18.79/TB. New, CMR, 5-year warranty — and the only major line that got cheaper this year. |
| Cheapest per TB | Toshiba MG 14TB at $16.50/TB, used. Underpriced because the brand has less mindshare, not because it is worse. New, the same drive is $33.57/TB. |
| Best big drive | Exos 26TB Recertified at $22.69/TB, factory recertified with warranty. Rose 5% while its new equivalents doubled. |
| Avoid today | WD Ultrastar 20TB and 22TB at ~$60/TB, and WD Red Plus 14TB at $45/TB. All up more than 125% since March. Wait, or buy something above. |
Full list of ten best-value drives ↓
What Actually Happened
Between March 15 and August 28, 2026 we took 24 price snapshots of every drive in our catalogue, across eBay, Amazon and Newegg. The figures below use the 24 hard drives that carry a price on both the first and last snapshot — the same drives on both dates, so neither catalogue growth nor drives dropping out can move the number. Their median price per terabyte went from $24.46 to $29.86, a 22.1% increase in five and a half months.
Storage has gotten cheaper per terabyte almost every year for four decades. This is a reversal, not a blip.
But that single figure hides which market moved. Splitting the same data by channel — Newegg, which sells only new retail stock, against eBay, where new and used compete — separates them:
New retail took the hit. Newegg's median went from $29.12 to $39.75 per terabyte, up 36.5%. The eBay median, where used and recertified stock competes with new, went from $23.75 to $28.90 — up 21.7%, and from a starting point that was already $5/TB cheaper.
The gap between the two is what buying secondhand saves you, and it widened: around $3/TB across the opening month, near $8/TB across the closing one. It is noisy — the two briefly met in early April — but the direction is consistent. The squeeze landed hardest on new production, and the secondhand market absorbed only part of it. That is also why seven of the ten best-value drives below are not new.
The Drives That Moved Most
The average hides the real story. Here are all 24 drives in the cohort, sorted by change:
| Drive | Mar $/TB | Aug $/TB | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| WD Ultrastar DC HC560 20TB | $24.00 | $60.00 | +150% |
| WD Ultrastar DC HC580 22TB | $20.86 | $51.93 | +149% |
| WD Red Plus 14TB | $19.64 | $45.02 | +129% |
| Seagate Exos X20 20TB | $18.50 | $39.49 | +113% |
| WD Red Pro 20TB | $17.65 | $29.80 | +69% |
| Toshiba MG08 16TB | $16.81 | $27.44 | +63% |
| WD Ultrastar DC HC550 18TB | $16.67 | $25.50 | +53% |
| Seagate IronWolf 12TB | $24.92 | $35.83 | +44% |
| WD Red Pro 22TB | $26.79 | $36.32 | +36% |
| Seagate Exos X18 18TB | $28.28 | $37.64 | +33% |
| Seagate Exos 24TB Renewed | $19.12 | $23.75 | +24% |
| WD Red Plus 8TB | $22.50 | $27.50 | +22% |
| Seagate Exos X18 16TB | $26.78 | $31.37 | +17% |
| WD Ultrastar DC HC550 16TB | $19.81 | $22.44 | +13% |
| Seagate Exos 26TB Recertified | $21.54 | $22.69 | +5% |
| WD Red Pro 8TB | $30.00 | $31.25 | +4% |
| Seagate Exos M 30TB | $29.30 | $30.00 | +2% |
| Seagate Exos X20 18TB | $30.00 | $30.28 | +1% |
| WD Red Plus 10TB | $28.40 | $28.00 | −1% |
| Seagate IronWolf Pro 24TB | $21.62 | $19.77 | −9% |
| WD Red Plus 12TB | $32.92 | $29.92 | −9% |
| WD Red Pro 16TB | $31.25 | $26.56 | −15% |
| Seagate IronWolf Pro 20TB | $25.00 | $18.79 | −25% |
| Seagate IronWolf Pro 12TB | $27.95 | $17.72 | −37% |
The drives that spiked hardest are mostly enterprise models: Ultrastar, Exos, high-capacity Red Pro. The drives that fell are mostly IronWolf Pro. That split points at the cause.
Why This Is Happening
Datacenters are buying the drives you want.
AI infrastructure needs somewhere to put training data, model checkpoints and inference logs. That means high-capacity nearline drives, exactly the 16TB-to-24TB enterprise class that data hoarders buy second-hand or on sale. Hyperscale contracts get filled first, and retail gets what is left.
We record prices, not orders, so treat that as the best available explanation rather than a proven one. What it does not change is the buying advice: whatever is draining supply, the drives it is draining are the ones in the top half of the table above.
Aside: SSDs Are Not in the Numbers Above
Everything on this page tracks hard drives. We track SSDs too, and NAND is under related pressure — the Samsung 870 EVO 4TB went from $172.50 to $413.53 per TB (+140%) over the same period, a steeper rise than any hard drive in the cohort.
It is quoted here for contrast only. SSD prices are far more volatile than HDD prices, and mixing the two would make the median meaningless. Of the six SSDs we tracked across the whole period, two got cheaper while the 870 EVO more than doubled — a spread too wide to summarize in one number, and a separate article.
A Caution About Very High Prices
When channel supply tightens, marketplace sellers list at opportunistic prices, and those listings sometimes win the buy box. We've seen the same SKU at $630 on one retailer and $1,200 on another on the same day. If a price looks absurd, it may simply be a third-party seller rather than the retailer's own stock. Always compare across retailers before buying. That is what our comparison table is for.
The Best Value at September 1, 2026
These are the best prices per terabyte in our catalogue on September 1, 2026, across both new and used listings. Every one is below the March median, which means value still exists if you shop by $/TB rather than by habit. Prices change daily and this list does not — the live comparison table is the one to buy from.
Read the condition column before the price column. Seven of these ten are used, recertified or renewed, and that is the finding rather than an asterisk: at current prices, the cheapest way to buy capacity is mostly not to buy it new. The Toshiba MG 14TB at $16.50/TB is a used eBay drive; the same model new is $33.57/TB, more than double. The Ultrastar HC550 16TB is $22.44/TB used against $40/TB new.
The exception is worth naming. The IronWolf Pro line is the only place where new drives compete with used ones — the 12TB at $17.72/TB and the 20TB at $18.79/TB are new, in-warranty, and still beat most of the used market. That is what makes them the standout buy of this period.
| Drive | Condition | Capacity | Price, Sep 1, 2026 | $/TB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Toshiba MG 14TB | Used | 14TB | $230.99 | $16.50 |
| Seagate IronWolf Pro 12TB | New | 12TB | $212.69 | $17.72 |
| Seagate IronWolf Pro 20TB | New | 20TB | $375.80 | $18.79 |
| Seagate IronWolf Pro 24TB | New | 24TB | $474.39 | $19.77 |
| WD Red Pro 12TB | Used | 12TB | $249.99 | $20.83 |
| WD Ultrastar DC HC550 16TB | Used | 16TB | $359.00 | $22.44 |
| Seagate Exos 26TB Recertified | Recert | 26TB | $589.99 | $22.69 |
| Seagate Exos 24TB Renewed | Renewed | 24TB | $569.99 | $23.75 |
| Toshiba MG 10TB | Used | 10TB | $249.00 | $24.90 |
| WD Ultrastar DC HC550 18TB | Used | 18TB | $459.00 | $25.50 |
Buy Now
- IronWolf Pro, any capacity. The only major line that fell this year. On September 1 the 12TB sat at $17.72/TB and the 20TB at $18.79/TB, the two best deals on the board, and both are CMR NAS drives with a 5-year warranty.
- Recertified and renewed enterprise. The Exos 26TB Recertified at $22.69/TB rose only 5% while its new equivalents doubled. In a supply crunch, factory-recertified stock is the value play. Our guide to buying used hard drives on eBay covers how to check one.
- Toshiba. Consistently underpriced because the brand carries less mindshare. The MG 14TB at $16.50/TB is the cheapest storage we track, though that is a used listing — new, the same drive is $33.57/TB.
Wait, If You Can
- WD Ultrastar 20TB and 22TB. Up 150% since March, to about $60/TB on September 1. Anyone buying at that price is paying triple what the same drive cost in March. There is no version of this that is good value.
- WD Red Plus 14TB. Up 129% since March, to $45.02/TB — more than double what an IronWolf Pro 20TB cost per terabyte on the same date.
- Large consumer SSDs. If you want bulk capacity, the $/TB gap between HDD and SSD is wider now than it has been in years. Use SSDs for what they're good at and put the bulk on spinning rust.
The Strategy That Still Works
Buy on $/TB, not on brand or capacity. The single most expensive mistake right now is deciding you want a specific model and paying whatever it costs. The spread within a single capacity class has never been wider: on September 1 a 20TB drive was available at $18.79/TB and at $60/TB on the same day.
Two drives from different brands at the same $/TB are, for storage purposes, the same purchase. Pick the cheaper one that is CMR and has warranty left.
What this ranking does not weigh. We rank on $/TB once the baseline criteria are met — CMR recording and an active warranty. Noise, power draw, spindle speed and vibration tolerance do not enter the ordering. If the drive is going in a living room rather than a cupboard or a rack, weigh those yourself before buying on price alone.
Will Prices Come Back Down?
We don't know, and anyone who tells you confidently is guessing. The data does carry some signal:
- The rise has not been smooth. Prices fell between one snapshot and the next on 10 of 23 intervals, including a 9.8% drop in mid-April and 6.6% in early July. Volatility this high usually means the market hasn't settled.
- Some lines are already falling while others climb, which suggests allocation pressure on specific product classes rather than a uniform cost increase.
- Manufacturing capacity for high-capacity nearline drives is being expanded, but drive fabs take years, not months.
What To Do
Buy what you need from the value list, don't stockpile at these prices, and check the live table before you commit. We re-record every price twice a week. The next edition of this report will say whether the rise held, and this one will still be here to compare it against.
Methodology
This is the first of a recurring price report. It covers March to August 2026 and will not be rewritten later — the next edition gets its own page, so the figures here stay as a permanent record of what this period actually cost. For prices now rather than then, use the live comparison table.
Every figure comes from DiskDojo's own price tracking: 24 snapshots taken twice weekly between March 15 and August 28, 2026, covering the US market across eBay, Amazon and Newegg. For each drive on each date we take the cheapest eligible offer, then compute price per terabyte.
Condition is not filtered, and the headline +22% blends both markets. The cheapest offer is whichever is cheapest, new or used, so that figure tracks the real floor a buyer faces rather than a new-only price. It also means a drive can appear to fall simply because used stock arrived.
The new-versus-used comparison uses sales channel as a stand-in for condition, and that stand-in is imperfect. Our price history records which retailer an offer came from but not what condition it was in, so a true new-versus-used split cannot be reconstructed for this period. Newegg is a clean proxy for new — every Newegg listing in our current data is new stock. eBay is not a clean proxy for used: it currently runs roughly 30 new to 39 used, so that figure is a mixed market that leans used, not a used-only price. Read it as "marketplace" against "retail", and treat the gap as indicative rather than exact. Recording condition alongside price is the obvious fix, and the next edition should carry a true split.
Our database held 63 drives over the period and 61 carried a price on the final snapshot, but most were added part-way through. Every figure on this page uses the 24 hard drives priced on both endpoint dates — the same 24 in March and in August. That matters: the wider catalogue's median moved +28% over the same window, but part of that is drives entering the catalogue rather than prices changing, so 22.1% is the number we stand behind and the larger one is not quoted anywhere on this page.
SSDs are excluded from every median, table and count here, and appear only in the labeled aside above. Prices exclude tax and shipping and change constantly. The live comparison table is always more current than this article.