NVMe vs SATA SSD: Real-world performance benchmarks

NVMe and SATA SSD both beat spinning disks, but they’re not the same. Here’s what we see in real workloads.

Throughput and IOPS

NVMe uses PCIe and can hit hundreds of thousands of random IOPS and multi-GB/s sequential. SATA SSD is capped by the SATA interface (typically ~550 MB/s, ~100k IOPS in ideal conditions). For databases and log-heavy apps, NVMe’s lower latency and higher IOPS matter.

Real-world impact

We benchmarked PostgreSQL and Redis on both. NVMe cut query latency and improved throughput under load. For static sites or light apps, SATA SSD is often enough; for DBs and high I/O, NVMe is worth it. All Oneraap VPS instances use NVMe or high-performance SSD so you get the former without thinking about it.