How modern workloads such as AI will affect 2025 Storage Trends
The landscape of data storage has been rapidly evolving. There are ongoing technological advancements and rapidly changing application needs. There is ever rising demand for storage capacity impacted by the increasing use of IoT devices, real-time data processing, and cloud storage. By the end of 2025 the global volume of data is projected to rise to 181 zettabytes. In 2025, the supply and demand dynamics for Solid State Drives (SSD) and Hard Disk Drives (HDD) will be affected by the exponential growth of data. Artificial intelligence (AI) has become one of the main drivers of data growth. This article will explore the implications of these trends for your business.
Sources of Data in 2025
- AI-Generated Content
- Social Media and User-Generated Content
- IoT Devices and Smart Technology
- Enterprise and Transactional Data
- Scientific Research and Big Data
- Cloud Computing and the Shift to Digital Storage
- eCommerce
- Streaming
- Digital Transactions
The Rise of SSDs
SSD Technological Advancements
SSDs have seen significant advancements. The development of 3D NAND (stacking die) and QLC NAND (4+ bits per cell) technology have allowed manufacturers to increase storage densities at a chip level, reducing costs and improving performance. In 2025, we can expect further enhancements in SSD technology, including higher capacities, faster read/write speeds and improved durability.
New Interfaces and form-factor standards are emerging like the new standard, EDSFF E3. These are designed to update and replace the traditional PCIe NVMe U.2 - 2.5-inch form factor in servers and storage systems. These hot-pluggable drives are designed more optimally for flash density of the SSD and system chassis. EDSFF E3 will also accommodate the next generation of PCIe Gen 6 (x4-x16) interface allowing for increased bandwidth and data transfer speeds compared to previous generations and are ideal for demanding server and storage applications.
- EDSFF stands for “Enterprise and Datacenter Standard Form Factor”. This is a set of specifications originally developed by a group of 15 companies to address the concerns of data center storage. Now maintained by SNIA as part of the SFF Work group. SSD Form Factors.
- PCIe Gen 6, or PCI Express 6.0, is a standard that improves data transfer speeds and includes security features. This new spec doubles the bandwidth and power efficiency of PCI 5.0. See PCI-SIG for the latest news and specifications. Most NVMe SSDs today are on Gen 4.0 just moving to Gen 5.0.
- NVMe is a protocol standard for host software communication in solid state drives (SSDs) in all form factors (U.2, M.2, AIC, EDSFF). NVM Express is a non-profit consortium of tech industry leaders.
Market Demand
The demand for SSDs is expected to continue its upward trajectory in 2025. Several factors contribute to this trend:
- Consumer Electronics: SSDs are the preferred choice for laptops, desktops and gaming consoles due to their superior performance and reliability.
- Enterprise Storage: Businesses are increasingly adopting SSDs for data centers and cloud storage, where speed, power and space efficiency are critical. AI servers are forecasted to grow exponentially this year.
Supply Chain Dynamics
The supply of SSDs in 2025 will be influenced by several factors:
- Manufacturing Capacity: Leading manufacturers like Samsung, Western Digital, and Micron are expanding their production capacities to meet growing demand. Micron received $6.14bn under the CHIPS Act to construct fabs in Boise, Idaho and Clay, New York creating 70,000 US jobs across three sites.
- Tariff concerns have caused unique buying and sourcing habits. Buyers will attempt to mitigate having to pay these higher costs.
- Component Shortages: The ongoing semiconductor shortage will impact SSD production, potentially leading to supply constraints. Manufacturing of NAND is dominated by just a handful of suppliers and any upset in the supply chain -- geo-political, environmental, transportation or accidents can upset the supply and demand landscape. Earthquakes, floods and fires cannot be predicted. In the past all have affected this market in terms of supply and pricing.
The Persistence of HDDs – Not going away!
Cost-Effectiveness
Despite the rise of SSDs, HDDs remain relevant, particularly in markets where cost per gigabyte is a crucial factor. HDDs offer a more economical solution for large-scale data storage, making them a preferred choice for applications like archival storage and backup systems.
Market Demand
The demand for HDDs in 2025 is expected to remain stable, driven by:
- Data Centers: HDDs continue to be used in data centers for cold storage, where high capacity and low cost are essential.
- Data Archiving or Back-up
- Surveillance Systems: Video surveillance applications generate massive amounts of data, making HDDs a cost-effective storage solution.
- Large-scale media streaming service. Video editing, content creation or high-resolution media.
Technological Developments
HDD technology is not stagnant. Innovations such as Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording (HAMR) and Microwave-Assisted Magnetic Recording (MAMR) are expected to increase the storage capacities and performance of HDDs, making them competitive with SSDs in terms of capacity. Seagate recently announced the Exos M 32TB hard drive, with 3TB per platter density and WD is competing with the Ultrastar DC HC690 hard drive at 32TB capacity. The last of the HDD tri-fecta, Toshiba has demonstrated 30TB+ using both HAMR and MAMR methods and will be releasing their drive in 2025.
While HDDs may be less suitable for active AI processing, they can still be used for storing large amounts of archived data that doesn't require frequent access, benefiting from their lower cost per gigabyte.
Storage demands of Artificial Intelligence – Big and getting bigger!
AI-Generated Content
Artificial intelligence is a massive contributor to data growth, with systems continuously generating, processing and manipulating vast data sets. Machine learning algorithms, natural language models and generative AI tools produce large volumes of data during training and real-world operations. Apps like automated content creation, recommendation systems and AI-driven analytics rely on constant feedback loops to improve accuracy and functionality- amplifying this process.
AI requires significant storage capacity to hold the massive amounts of data needed for training AI models, as well as to store the results of processing and inference, making storage a critical component for any AI system due to the large data volumes involved in both training and application phases. The size of these training data sets has grown massively over the last few years. According to FutureTech, the median size of an AI model training set in 2021 was 42 billion data points. That more than double in 2022 to 105 billion. Then that number multiplied by more than six in another year, to 750 billion data points in 2023 for the median AI training data set. Today it has clearly surpassed that - and tomorrow it will be even further.
In Western Digital's AI Data Cycle Video, “AI models operate in a self-perpetuating, continuous loop of data consumption and generation. As AI grows and evolves, it creates even more data across six distinct states.”
AI applications, especially machine learning and deep learning, require rapid data access, which SSDs excel at with fast read/write speeds. Manufacturers are developing specialized SSDs tailored for AI applications, featuring features like higher IOPS (input/output operations per second) and optimized data transfer speeds.
Per Solidigm hard drives can’t keep up with AI storage demands and are simply not as efficient. Hard drives consume much more power and space and are prone to failures. Hard drives are available in capacities of ~24TB today (soon to be 32TB). If you need 10PB of storage to train your model, just add 417 24TB drives. Solidigm recently announced a massive 122TB SSD, the D5-P5336. You would need just 84 of these to store the same 10PB. SSD will also use less power and at this capacity will take up less physical space compared to 3.5” capacity enterprise HDDs.
Edge AI
AI (and data storage) is also happening outside of the data center. Edge AI puts AI algorithms and AI models directly on local edge devices such as sensors or Internet of Things (IoT) devices. SSDs play a crucial role in Edge AI by providing the necessary high-speed data access and storage capabilities required for real-time processing of data. SSDs allow edge devices to handle AI tasks locally with low latency and high throughput due to their fast read/write speeds and lack of moving parts. Benefits include real-time feedback and insights, increased security reducing risk, efficiencies in operational costs, and added privacy as data is kept locally. Use case examples include Smart home devices, wearables, autonomous vehicles, smart manufacturing, retail analytics and energy management. These applications need to be ready for action without the delays of accessing the cloud. Harsh environments will have the additional need for specialized industrial-grade edge SSD components and ruggedized storage solutions.
Comparative Analysis: SSD vs. HDD
| SSD | HDD | Findings | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Performance | ✓ | SSDs offer superior performance compared to HDDs, with faster data access and lower latency. This makes them ideal for applications where speed is critical. SSD’s have much higher throughput with 100 times lower latency. | |
| Cost | ✓ | Low cost per GB make HDDs a more attractive option for bulk cold storage needs. Total cost of ownership could shift this advantage to SSD in certain applications. | |
| Durability & Reliability | ✓ | SSDs have a longer useful lifetime as they are less prone to mechanical failure than HDDs, with moving parts. | |
| Energy Efficiency | ✓ | SSDs have better energy efficiency for a given level of performance with a lower total cost of deployment and ownership over time. |
Economic Considerations
Pricing Trends
The prices of both SSDs and HDDs are influenced by market conditions, production costs, and technological advancements. In 2025, we expect SSD prices to continue declining as production scales up and technology advances. However, any disruptions in the semiconductor supply chain could temporarily affect prices along with supply. HDDs are a mature technology with many of the costs of the hardware fixed. There is a reason that only three suppliers remain in this market compared to the dozens 20 years ago. HDD capacities are not doubling every 2 years. Unit volumes have declined greatly due to the shift to flash in consumer/PC applications. To increase capacity per drive, manufactures must resort to using more expensive techniques such as helium to stack more platters or invest in finding new methods to increase capacity (bits) per platter such as HAMR and SMR methods or a combination. The investment into these new methods increases costs to build drives reducing the likelihood of costs/GB dropping and most feel that drive pricing has plateaued.
2025 Winner: SSDs save the day
While HDDs will continue to play a crucial role in cost-sensitive applications, SSDs are poised to dominate the market due to their superior performance and reliability. Stakeholders across the data storage industry need to stay aware of a variety of conditions in this evolving landscape to be on top of the latest happenings in the digital storage solutions space. With the rise of AI, SSDs are expected to become the dominant storage option due to their significantly faster data access speeds, which are crucial for handling the large data volumes required by AI applications, while HDDs will likely be relegated to primarily storing large amounts of cold data due to their lower cost per gigabyte but slower performance compared to SSDs; essentially, AI will drive a significant increase in demand for high-performance SSDs for data processing while still utilizing HDDs for cheaper long-term storage.
Avnet Integrated Solutions has a broad portfolio of storage components and systems products with deep relationships with our suppliers. Contact us to have a conversation on storage technology and market trends and let’s talk about how Avnet can support your business.