How Much Storage Do You Need for Gaming in 2024

Game Size Breakdown

Game sizes can vary significantly depending on the type of game, graphics quality, and additional content like expansions and downloadable content (DLC).

• Indie Games: 500 MB to 5 GB
  • Indie games are usually smaller  due to less complex graphics and smaller worlds.
• AAA Titles: 50 GB to 150 GB
  • AAA games like Call of Duty, Assassin’s Creed, and Red Dead Redemption, will need at least 50GB because of the high-resolution textures, detailed open worlds, and immersive gameplay features.
• MMORPGs: 20 GB to 100 GB+
  • Massively multiplayer online games like World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV, or Elder Scrolls Online tend to be large due to ongoing updates, expansions, and vast online worlds.
• FPS (First-Person Shooters): 50 GB to 120 GB
  • First-person shooters like Call of Duty: Warzone and Destiny 2 require significant storage due to high-resolution textures, multiplayer maps, and additional content updates.
• Open-World Games: 70 GB to 150 GB
  • Open-world games like Grand Theft Auto V, Cyberpunk 2077, and Red Dead Redemption 2 have large maps and detailed environments.

Storage Needed for the most popular games

The following table includes the minimuze size required for each game listed on each of their officials websites as well as the maximum size (this is a more realistic measure) which is the space that you need after updates, downloadable content and expansions.

You can use the table above and add up how much storage you will need in total. For example, in my case, I made a small table for the games I personally play down below.

If you add the fact that you may need to install software like Windows 10, Zoom and other everyday software for Work and school as shown below:

So Id say you need a total of 1200GB to play several AAA titles as well as installing basic software. If you cant afford to have 2TB on your computer, there are ways to make it work if you want to have access to all these games quickly without having to install and uninstall.

How to Manage Storage Space for Games

a. Uninstall Unused Software & Games

Install everything you dont need first. Go to Add & Remove software and remove every software you don’t need anymore. That should free up about 10GB.

b.  Install an additional Drive

If you have a GAMING laptop chances are you only have 512GB. Most gaming laptops allow for an additional drive and most modern gaming laptops will let you install 1TB on the additional storage slot. (with some exceptions). Check out my post here if you want to find out how much storage and what kind of storage your laptop supports.

After you find out how much storage your laptop supports, you can go ahead and go through the upgrade process as shown in my post: How to Upgrade Your Laptop Storage. Its most likely going to be an additional SSD as opposed to an HDD since modern laptops can all accomodate SSDs.

C. Use an External Device

This is my favorite trick. Because my website talks about computers , software and games. I need to test and run DOZENS of heavy titles and this can all accumulate to over 10TB (50 titles). So What I do is use external devices…

Now I dont mean you are going to run the game out of your external device but rather keep all installed files and your games folder into an external device then pull it out (copy and paste it) to your laptops internal storage when you feel like you need to play that game. You want to do this for games you play from time to time because it requires you to move files. This is a much faster process than downloading and reinstalling the game, trust.