IEEE study of 443,000 hard drives ranks HGST as most reliable

A peer-reviewed IEEE study reanalysing 12 years of Backblaze hard drive data has revealed that HGST drives recorded the lowest failure rate, followed by Western Digital, Seagate, and Toshiba.

In the IEEE study named “Are There Manufacturer Differences in Hard-Drive Reliability?” (via Tom's Hardware), economists Christoph Siemroth and Yeomyung Park analysed 443,156 enterprise hard drives from 2013 through Q2 2025. Controlling for drive age, capacity, form factor, and operating temperature, the researchers found that HGST drives fail at roughly 41% of Seagate's rate. Western Digital sits at approximately 52% of Seagate's failure rate, while Toshiba posted the highest failure rate at 107%.

Adjusting for age was necessary, as Backblaze's raw quarterly figures pit ageing units against newer drives. Toshiba drives displayed a sharp jump in monthly failure rates after passing 60 months in service, reaching five to six failures per 1000 drives per month, after 50 months of usage. Seagate showed higher early failure rates that remained steady as drives aged.

Environmental and physical factors also impacted lifespan. Each additional 1°C in average temperature increased failure rates by 2.1%, while every extra 1TB of capacity reduced failure rates by roughly 3.4%. The authors attribute this capacity benefit to helium-filled enclosures and newer head fabrication techniques. Note that, because the dataset relies on data centre drives, these results may not translate directly to consumer environments.

KitGuru says: Are you surprised by these results, or did they match your expectations?

Become a Patron!