In a small amount of space, the front of an SD card or a microSD card packs in a lot of information – and that can be overwhelming if you aren’t sure how to read them. In this blog we’ll walk you through what all those different abbreviations mean, how they can impact the photos and videos you take with your device, and help you determine which pieces are the most important for the type of photos and videos that you want to shoot.
SD, SDHC, SDXC, SDUC and microSD, microSDHC, microSDXC, microSDUC
The SD here stands for Secure Digital which is a memory card format created by the SD Association. SD (or microSD) alone is the standard and lowest tier and includes cards with capacities up to 2GB. SDHC/microSDHC (the HC is for High Capacity) is the next level up and includes cards with capacities from 4GB to 32GB. SDXC/microSDXC (XC stands for Extended Capacity) cards begin at 64GB capacity and go up to 2TB. SDUC is the newest format and will include cards with capacities from 2TB+ through 128TB.
The reason this label matters is not just because it is shorthand for the capacity, but because not all cameras can read all cards. If your camera or device is only compatible with SDHC or microSDHC, it probably won’t be able to read an SDXC card. Usually, it is possible to use a lower tier card because many devices offer backwards-compatibility, but you’ll need to check your device to know for sure.
Maximum Read and Write Speeds
Read speed is how quickly data can be “read” off the card – so this speed impacts how quickly you can offload images or video, like uploading off the card to a computer. The write speed indicates how fast data is written to the card. This is important if you’re shooting anything that moves fast, like wildlife or race cars. A superior write speed will also allow you to take better burst-mode photos and capture stutter-free video.
Read speed is how quickly data can be “read” off the card – so this speed impacts how quickly you can offload images or video, like uploading off the card to a computer.
The write speed indicates how fast data … Read more
