Xbox Series X Is Missing One Key Feature, And It Isn’t Easily Fixed

In our increasingly all-digital world, game storage has become a hot commodity, most notably fast game storage. PC gamers covet blazing-speed hardware like PCIe Gen 4 NVMe SSDs, or even drives that are purportedly being developed for Alder Lake Gen 5 technology, which is slowly but surely coming to fruition. Not to be left behind, console gamers are catching up by way of this generation’s machines, which feature solid state storage that practically eliminates load times for supported titles.

Ever since reviewing Seagate’s 1TB Storage Expansion Card, I’ve felt spoiled in terms of keeping my Xbox library ridiculously versatile, complete with insanely quick transfers between internal and external storage, as well as playing Velocity Architecture-based games directly off the plug-and-play memory card. Recently, Seagate sent over one of its newer cards for testing, a 2TB variant that costs a significant $399.99, essentially doubling the price of the previous 1TB model.

The 2TB version is an excellent addition to any Xbox setup, and as one might expect, just as convenient to use as its lower capacity predecessor. Even so, while 2TB is a nice storage bump, these cards spotlight an unfortunate Xbox Series X hardware shortcoming: You can’t use more than one of these Seagate storage expansion cards at a given time. The sentiment presumably goes for Xbox Series S as well, but I can’t reliably comment on that since I’ve never used that hardware.

Sure, the cards are hot-swappable, meaning you can unplug one and insert another without having to power down your console. This makes for pretty simple game library management, but it does require the physical act of changing out memory units and isn’t nearly as easy as, say, loading games off a parallel motherboard-mounted SSD on a computer.

I really wish Microsoft had included a second storage expansion slot on the Xbox Series X for this very purpose, and maybe a future iteration of the console will address the issue. Having been gaming on PC a lot more lately, I think the storage limitations of consoles have become a bit more apparent to me, seeing as I often keep multiple Gen 4 NVMe SSDs running simultaneously on my desktop rigs.

It’s extremely convenient to have immediate access to two or three high capacity, ultra-fast drives without the hassle of swapping components out, notably when I want to optimize my Steam or Xbox libraries. I do use much larger mechanical drives for general media and game dumping, usually between 10TB and 16TB, though some of my NVMe devices are between 2TB and 4TB and house the modern AAA games I play the most.

It goes without saying that Game Pass, with its deluge of monthly content, has made the prospect of multiple fast (and hyper convenient) storage options more desirable. I’d assume that most gamers would rather switch drives through software with the press of a button rather than fumbling with what could be a growing collection of these tiny, expensive memory cards. I’m always reminded of my PS1 days when handling them — didn’t we all have at least half a dozen of those little beauties always lying around?

I honestly love my Xbox Series X, and without access to the continually elusive PS5, it’s my go-to current-gen console. However, I would be doing it a disservice if I didn’t nitpick the things I’d like to see changed, and an additional storage expansion slot would make the next evolution of Microsoft’s platform even more streamlined. Maybe by the time the Xbox Series Next rolls around, Seagate will have released a massive 8TB memory card. God help us with the (probably) inevitable $1000 price tag.

Disclosure: Seagate provided review product for coverage purposes.