Aside from processor and battery, storage is one of the things Filipinos prioritize when buying a phone. For 2025, we recommend getting at least 256GB storage for the casual user and 512GB if you’re a power user. Aside from storage capacity, consumers should also look at the type of storage used. Oftentimes, you hear the term UFS storage, along with different versions of it.

We understand that not everyone does not know what UFS means, and we explain it in this article to help you have more informed decisions in buying a phone.

What is UFS?

Short for Universal Flash Storage, UFS is introduced in 2011 as an evolution of eMMC. Making it different is that it is a full duplex design that allows simultaneous read and write operations–unlike with eMMC’s half duplex design that can’t do simultaneous read or write operation. Think of it as the SSD of your phone, and this is why you can multitask with ease on your phones just like as you would do with your computer.

What are the Different Versions of UFS?

UFS has four major versions, with 1.0 giving you a maximum read and write speeds of 300Mb/s. UFS 2.0 was introduced in 2013 alongside flagships chips  like the Snapdragon 820, Kirin 950, and Exynos 7420.UFS 2.0 introduced two lanes for a higher bandwidth of up to 1200Mb/s. As a result, it also improved read and write speeds to 850MB/s for the current 2.2 iteration.

UFS 3.0 was introduced in 2018 and debuted alongside flagship chips like the Snapdragon 855, Exynos 9820, and Kirin 990. This iteration pushed maximum bandwidth to 2900Mb/s, allowing for read and write speeds of up to 2100Mb/s with the current 3.1 iteration.

The latest version is UFS 4.0, which was introduced in 2022 alongside flagship chips like the Dimensity 8300, Dimensity 9200, and Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, has a maximum bandwidth of 5800Mb/s, which is roughly at par with PCIe 3.0 SSD storage speeds used in older laptops. We have yet tried a phone that uses UFS 4.1, but UFS 4.0 storage should get you read and write speeds of around 4000Mb/s.

While we expect the UFS 4.0 standard to evolve further, Samsung is reportedly working on UFS 5.0 storage–though we’ll have to wait until 2027 for that, and flagship devices are expected to debut it first.

How does UFS storage benefit you?

Aside from better multitasking performance, UFS storage allows for quicker access to data, which results in faster load times for your apps especially with newer iterations. Being a solid-state type of storage, UFS is also energy efficient, which helps in maximizing the battery life of your phone.

To put it simple, having newer UFS storage on your phone means you’ll wait less for apps to load, and transferring loading huge files (ie. 4K videos, photos shot in RAW, editing photos) should be faster as well. With gaming, faster UFS storage means that your phone can load multiple assets faster–which is crucial especially with demanding titles.

What UFS storage you should look for in every price segment?

Let’s keep this simple: if you’re looking for a budget phone (Php 10,000 and below), you should look for at least UFS 2.2 storage. For midrange phones (Php 10,000 to Php 34,999), the most ideal is UFS 3.1 even if there are several brands that still use UFS 2.2 at that price segment. Anything above Php 35,000, UFS 4.0 is a must-have and UFS 3.1 is the absolute bare minimum.

If you’re a power user (ie. heavy on content creation or gaming), we highly recommend looking for phones using UFS 4.0 storage and only settle for UFS 3.1 IF processor and battery is your higher priority.

That summarizes everything you need to know about UFS storage, and we hope this explainer will help you with your decision making when buying a new phone.