If you ask camera owners about the best SD Card, most of them would tell you that SanDisk is the best SD Card brand. This is also obvious on Amazon’s best selling memory card list with SanDisk claiming the top 3 spots. They offer a variety of SD Card options for different kinds of users. SanDisk also has a very reputable image in terms of reliability and durability.
One of the best SD Cards that they offer is the SanDisk Extreme. It is a budget-friendly memory card that packs great features. The SanDisk Extreme model has over 80% five-star customer ratings on Amazon and 39,000 reviews.
The large number of customers for this card is certainly a guarantee. But despite the large number of positive feedbacks the Sandisk Extreme received, we decided to test it for ourselves and find out whether what others say it’s true.
Keep reading to find out whether this card would be the right choice for your device.
Sandisk Extreme: Specifications
The 128 GB variant of the SanDisk Extreme is a great deal in terms of price/performance. It has a manufacturer lifetime warranty and can record 4k videos.
SanDisk is known to deliver great performance on their memory cards. It has been the go-to card for most professional photographers and ordinary camera owners.
Let’s see how the SanDisk Extreme performs when it comes to Read and Write speeds.
Write Speed
The SD Card’s write speed determines the capacity of a card to accept information from the camera at a given speed. For example, a GoPro camera that records video at a resolution of 4k 60 FPS would transfer data on an SD Card at a rate of at least 7.5 MB per second. So, if your memory card cannot keep up with the transfer rate of the camera you would encounter SD Card errors.
You wouldn’t want to find your self missing once in a lifetime moments and not being able to record it right? In this case, you should definitely consider getting an SD Card with good write speeds.
The SanDisk Extreme is advertised to have 40 MB per second write speed which is a reasonable speed given its price. Camera Memory Speed tested the SanDisk Extreme’s performance on real-world scenarios.
Discover what is SD card speed class and how to pick up the one that fits your needs: SD Card Speed Classes (How to Choose Guide).
Check out the results.
| SanDisk Extreme | Seq. Write 1000MB MB/s | Rand. Write 512KB MB/s | Rand. Write 4KB MB/s QD1 | Rand. Write 4KB IOPS QD1 | Rand. Write 4KB MB/s QD32 | Rand. Write 4KB IOPS QD32 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SanDisk UHS-1 Card Reader | 79.879 | 41.651 | 2.409 | 588.2 | 2.543 | 620.9 |
| Hama USB 3.0 SD Card Reader | 87.352 | 51.654 | 3.390 | 827.7 | 3.391 | 827.8 |
| Lexar Professional SR2 Card Reader | 87.813 | 51.595 | 3.407 | 831.7 | 3.409 | 832.3 |
| Lexar LRWM04U-7000 UHS-II Reader | 87.389 | 51.468 | 3.379 | 825.0 | 3.397 | 829.4 |
| Hama USB Type-C 3.1 Card Reader | 88.064 | 51.359 | 3.400 | 830.0 | 3.401 | 830.4 |
| SanDisk Extreme Pro SD UHS-II Reader/Writer | 87.134 | 50.113 | 2.500 | 610.3 | 2.651 | 647.2 |
Read Speed
After recording videos and taking pictures on your camera, you are likely to transfer those files to your computer. This is where SD Card read speeds are important. Read speeds determine the transfer rate that an SD Card can handle while moving files on a computer or another storage.
Transferring large files to your computer may take some time especially if they are high-resolution videos. You could end up waiting for hours for the file transfer to finish.
SanDisk Extreme has a read speed of 90 MB per second on average. It is quite decent considering its price. This is also one of the reasons why SanDisk memory cards are the best because they offer all-around performance on all their cards.
Some brands that offer budget memory cards tend to have good write speeds but lack fast read speeds which most SD Card buyers tend to overlook.
Take a look at this benchmark results from Camera Memory Speed
| SanDisk Extreme | Seq. Read 1000MB MB/s | Rand. Read 512KB MB/s | Rand. Read 4KB MB/s QD1 | Rand. Read 4KB IOPS QD1 | Rand. Read 4KB MB/s QD32 | Rand. Read 4KB IOPS QD32 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SanDisk UHS-1 Card Reader | 152.987 | 116.663 | 3.545 | 865.4 | 3.790 | 925.2 |
| Hama USB 3.0 SD Card Reader | 99.269 | 91.046 | 5.685 | 1387.8 | 5.857 | 1429.9 |
| Lexar Professional SR2 Card Reader | 99.269 | 90.831 | 5.730 | 1398.9 | 5.857 | 1429.9 |
| Lexar LRWM04U-7000 UHS-II Reader | 99.259 | 80.164 | 5.683 | 1387.4 | 5.843 | 1426.6 |
| Hama USB Type-C 3.1 Card Reader | 98.978 | 80.044 | 5.888 | 1437.6 | 5.884 | 1436.5 |
| SanDisk Extreme Pro SD UHS-II Reader/Writer | 98.969 | 82.349 | 4.501 | 1098.9 | 4.904 | 1197.2 |
You can check writing and reading speed of your SD Card with a special tools: 5 Best Free SD Card Speed Test Tools.
SD Card Sizes
SanDisk Extreme is available on the following storage options:
- 32 GB
- 64 GB
- 128 GB
- 256 GB
- 400 GB
- 512 GB
- 1 TB
There is also a 128 GB + 64 GB bundle available on Amazon. This bundle can be really convenient if you needed to get a backup SD card for your camera.
Before choosing your SD Card read about its capacities:
If you consider purchasing bigger SD card and want to know its capacity read:
- How Many Pictures a 32GB SD Card Can Hold for my GoPro
- How Many Pictures a 128GB SD Card Can Hold for my GoPro
- How Many Pictures a 256GB SD Card Can Hold for my GoPro
Devices that You Can Use with Sandisk Extreme
Most SanDisk memory cards are advertised to be compatible with most devices that use SD Cards. In specific, you can use the SanDisk Extreme model on the following devices:
- Handheld Consoles – portable consoles like the Nintendo switch and the famous Playstation Portable way back uses SD Card for game storage. the SanDisk Extreme model has a decent read speed that is important for loading up games.
- Smartphones – given that smartphones usually are not picky in terms of SD Cards, the SanDisk Extreme would surely work on any smartphone that has expandable storage. It is great for storing movies, photos, music, and games.
- Cameras – the SanDisk Extreme model would provide decent performance for most cameras. It would work well for individuals who are looking for budget-friendly memory cards for their cameras.
- Dash Cams – more and more car owners buy dash cameras for protection. Dash cams are great for providing proof when you met an accident and provides security not only for your car but also for you. Given that Dash Cams are not that demanding on memory cards and usually record footage at 720P resolution, the SanDisk Extreme model will surely perform well on most Dash cameras without even breaking a sweat.
Should You Get a Sandisk Extreme for Your Camera?
As we’ve seen from its specs above, SanDisk Extreme SD Card is a good compromise between specs and price. If you are an ordinary user that doesn’t need ultra-fast transfer speeds and don’t mind waiting for several minutes while transferring files then you should definitely consider SanDisk Extreme.
For the price that you are paying you would be able to record 4k videos, while having a decent 40 MB per second write speed, lifetime manufacturer warranty, and the reliability that SanDisk cards offer.
But, for users that use their camera a lot, like photographers/videographers, then it’d be better to look for SD Cards that offer better performance with higher read and write speeds, like Sandisk Extreme Pro.
Also, for today’s standards, it is advisable to get an SD Card with at least 64 GB storage capacity. With cameras today shooting 4k and 8k videos the file size of that recordings also increase.
To give you an idea, a 32 GB memory card would only record one and a half hours of video on a 1080p resolution. Last thing, the 64 GB model is just priced $4 higher compared to the 32 GB model which will give you double the storage.
>>Click Here to check out our comparison between the SanDisk Extreme Pro and SanDisk Extreme.
>>Click Here to learn SD Memory Card Comparison: SanDisk Ultra Plus vs Extreme
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- 7 Best (FAST) Sandisk Micro SD Cards
- 8 Best sd cards for gopro hero 8 [GoPro Recommended]
- Memory Card Battle: Samsung Evo Plus vs SanDisk Extreme
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