Best CFExpress Type-B Memory Cards – Benchmarks

The latest CFexpress Type-B memory cards are some of the fastest and most robust types of media you can use for your cameras today. But just how fast are they?

This guide will look at the different performance metrics of the various brands of memory cards.

Best CFexpress Type B Memory Cards

Testing Method

For these benchmarks, I tested all the cards using a PC with USB 3.2 gen 2×2 which gives 20Gbps speed, using the Angelbird 20Gbps reader. This also ran a lot of cards slightly faster than when I tested everything with Thunderbolt 3 on the Macbook Pro using the OWC reader.

What you should pay attention to is the Sustain column as this shows the card’s performance after thermal throttling and after its cache is exhausted. Many of these cards will use a faster type of flash as a short cache to give you their rated speeds. But often this cache can be very small. I test using 4GB file sizes which is about all you would ever shoot in a single burst for the initial USB speeds. Then I check the sustained speeds where I write 64GB files three times to exhaust any cache the cards might have and to engage thermal throttling.

CFexpress Type B Memory cards typically use a TLC type of flash but they can use an SLC cache.

The software used was AJA System Test for Windows 11. Resolution: 5120×2700 5k Red / Test File Size: 4GB / Codec Type 16bit RGBA, Single File.

Click the plus button to see rated read and write speeds as well as the rated sustained speeds – not all brands of cards advertise their rated sustained speeds, although they should all write it on their cards as Prograde now does since that’s the only spec that matters for videography.

Using The Fastest CFexpress Type B Memory Card Reader

CFexpress Type B cards can be very fast with USB 3.2 2×2 readers which run at 20Gbps, or Thunderbolt 3 which also runs at 20Gbps.

Mac Computers, even the new M2 Pro and M2 Ultra machines do not support USB 3.2 2×2. Even the new computers that use USB4 are only backward compatible with USB 3.2 10Gbps, but they do use Thunderbolt 3 or 4 at 20Gbps. PCs can be found with motherboards that support USB 3.2 2×2, look for this rating on your motherboard if buying or building a new PC.

All USB-C CFexpress readers you buy for Mac will only run at 10Gbps, even though some advertise 20Gbps. For 20Gbps speeds on Mac you can buy Thunderbolt readers, there are only a few on the market.

Top 3 Best CFExpress Cards – The All-Around Best Brands For 2023

After benchmarking all the different cards in all the different cameras there have been a few brands that have stood as being better than others.

For Nikon shooters, my top picks of brands would be Lexar or Delkin, also the Prograde cards can be a nice option.

Nikon shooters should stay away from OWC and Angel Bird cards since they are a little too thick for some Nikon card slots and can get stuck.

Sandisk has a new Pro Cine card but it’s still not that great. Sandisk has always been a trusted brand but their CFexpress cards are underperforming still.

The Sony Tough card still has a very small cache to make them a good recommendation.

Why some cards were so much slower?

There are now a lot of options for CFexpress cards and some are intentionally designed slower to make them cheaper. These are great for photographers that are only concerned with casual photographers or low-bitrate video recording. Not everyone needs the fastest CFexpress card, especially if you’re on something like a Nikon Z6 II that only records video at 150Mbps.

Some cards have very aggressive thermal throttling profiles or a very small cache or no cache at all which becomes more apparent with the large file size tests vs smaller file size tests.

I performed these tests using the AJA System Test using 4GB file sizes. The reason I chose 4GB is that this is about the buffer we see in some of the best cameras like the Sony A1 or A9. The Nikon Z9 and Z8 only look to have about a 2GB buffer. This makes sense, it’s using faster CFexpress Type-B cards instead of Type-A cards.

Best CFexpress Type-B Memory Card Reader

The best CFexpress type B reader depends a lot on the spec of your computer. If you’re an Apple user you won’t gain anything from a 20Gbps reader unless you go with Thunderbolt. On PC you can take advantage of USB 3.2 2×2 20Gbps, but you’ll also need to make sure you have fast drives to copy to. Many PC’s only have 1 USB 3.2 gen 2×2 port, so if you’re trying to transfer to an external drive, you will be limited to the speed of your other ports.

Also, many cameras now offer CFexpress Type B + UHS-II, so having a reader that supports both formats can be very useful.

See the Best CFexpress Type B Memory Card Readers for more information.

USB-C CFexpress Type-B Readers

These are the readers I have and use. They all work great. Some can be slightly faster than others depending on what card is used, but for the most part they are all very close in speed.

Lexar CFxB + USB-C Reader – Amazon / B&H

If you can’t take full advantage of USB 3.2 setup or need UHS-II, the Prograde UHS-II + Cfexpress reader is only slightly slower, most would never notice the difference.

Prograde UHS-II + CFxB Reader – Amazon / B&H

The Prograde readers all now support the faster Sandisk interface so a lot of those UHS-I cards now run properly at the 170MB/s read speeds.

Angelbird CFxB Reader – Amazon / B&H

You’ll need an Angelbird Reader to upgrade the firmware in Angelbird Cards.

ThunderBolt Readers

OWC Thunderbolt 3 Reader – Amazon / B&H

OWC also has a few Thunderbolt 3 docs with a built-in CFexpress reader.

ProGrade CFxB + XQD Thunderbolt 3 Reader – B&H

Fastest CFexpress Type B Cards Bottom Line

Now that the CFxB space has matured, there are a lot of great options for cards at various prices. You don’t always need the fastest CFexpress card and can save a lot of money buying a card that only has the specs you need.

Keep an eye on thermal throttling with the higher-end cameras and cards as that’s going to be a better benchmark to look at compared to RAW speed if shooting video is the primary use of the camera.