Western Digital will release its first HDD with HAMR technology two years later than Seagate – but immediately 44 TB

Western Digital spoke about the intention to begin production of hard drives with magnetic technology with Hamr heated by the end of 2026. The use of this technology will allow the vendor to organize serial production of high -capacity hard drives – by 2030 it is planned to reach 80–100 TB.

Image source: Jandira Sonnendeck / Unsplash

The first hard Western Digital wheels based on HAMR technology will be represented in 2026. We are talking about 36 TB models for disks made using traditional magnetic recording technology (CMR), and 44 TB for disks with improved Ultrasmr magnetic recording. The company expects that by the end of 2026, these discs will be tested by its customers from among the providers of the data of cloud data centers, after which Western Digital will begin their serial production. Wendor intends to start supplying his Hamr Discoves in the first half of 2027.

«The plan is to switch to HAMR, starting with 36 TB with CMR recording technology and 44 TB with Ultrasmr. We plan to complete the qualification tests of this HAMR product by the end of the 2026 calendar year, and then we will begin its serial production in the first half of 2027. We are not just starting work on Hamr today. We have long been interacting with our clients in this direction, ”said the general director of Western Digital Irving there during a recent speech to investors. He also added that currently two major clients of the company are already testing Western Digital Hamr disks.

Image source: Western Digital

The manufacturer expects that hack Hamr hard drives will develop for several years. The company plans to start the production of Hamr CMR discs with a capacity of 80 TB and Ultrasmr with a capacity of 100 TB in the area of ​​2030. This development will be facilitated not only by HAMR, but also by other company technologies, such as Optinand. Thus, by the end of the decade, HDDs should appear that can accommodate three times more information compared to the models that are presented on the market now.

Note that the main competitor of WD in the person of Seagate is already supplying harsh disks with HAMR technology to the market – the company announced the release of the world’s first serial hard drive in December. It has a capacity of 32 TB and uses tile magnetic recording (SMR), while a similar version with CMR has a capacity of 30 TB. 32 TB wheels also have WD, but they use EPMR, not Hamr.