When Samsung unveiled the Galaxy Fold last week, the company confirmed that the handset would launch with 512GB of eUFS 3.0 storage, which may not immediately mean anything to you. It didn’t even detail its new eUFS 3.0 tech on stage, but it’s the next-gen storage standard that’s expected to dramatically increase storage transfer speeds on mobile devices. At one point during the deluge of Galaxy S10 rumors and leaks, we heard that the phone would come with eUFS 3.0 storage on board — but that didn’t happen. Instead, the Galaxy S10 handsets come with up to 1TB of eUFS 2.1 flash memory. That’s still fast storage, but not as fast as what the Galaxy Fold will offer: the foldable phone will need just three seconds to transfer a 3.7GB Full HD movie, which is four times faster than most of the laptop SSD memory out there.
Samsung on Tuesday announced that it’s ready to mass produce 512GB eUFS 3.0 storage modules based on the company’s fifth-gen V-NAND technology. 1TB versions will follow in the second half of the year, which makes the Galaxy Note 10 a candidate the new eUFS 3.0 flash chip.
Samsung says that its 512GB eUFS 3.0 memory stacks eight 512Gb V-NAND dies and a high-performance controller. What that means for end-users is that not only will files will be transferred almost instantly, but the speed of devices that utilize these chips should see a tremendous boost.
The 1TB eUFS 2.1 storage that comes in the Galaxy S10+ reaches sequential read and write speeds of 1,000MB/s and 260MB/s, while random read and write speeds are at 58,000 IOPS and 50,000 IOPS. Now let’s look at the same numbers for the 512GB eUFS 3.0 storage in the Galaxy Fold: 2,100MB/s, 410MB/s, 63,000 IOPS, and 68,000 IOPS. That’s a massive improvement over eUFS 2.1 that shouldn’t go unnoticed. Samsung said in its press release that eUFS 3.0 flash’s read speed is four times faster than SATA SSD and 20 times faster than typical microSD cards, while the write speed is equivalent to SSDs.
That said, the SD Association earlier this week unveiled a new standard for microSD cards that would put them in range of eUFS 2.1 when it comes to read speeds.
Samsung wouldn’t say which other devices will benefit from this massive storage speed upgrade, but it’s likely that all future flagship Galaxy smartphones will have eUFS 3.0 flash memory on board. Initially, Samsung will make 128GB and 512GB chips, with 256GB and 1TB modules to follow in the second half of the year.
