Best Memory Card Nikon D5500 | Buffer Test

A comparison testing in-camera all the most popular memory cards of the time so we could find the best memory cards for the Nikon D5500.

The Nikon D5500 has only a single UHS-I slot that performs at a top speed of about 28 MB/s. With this camera, UHS-II cards can work, but you will not see the speed advantage that you get from using a UHS-II card with a UHS-II camera since this camera is a UHS-I camera.

Here you can see how each memory card performs when the buffer was tested in the Nikon D5500.

The fastest UHS-II card for the Nikon D5500 is the Lexar 2000X UHS-II or Sandisk Extreme Pro UHS-I.

As mentioned earlier, you don’t need a UHS-II memory card for this camera.

Best UHS-I Memory Cards

For the D5500, all you need is a UHS-I memory card. The fastest UHS-I memory card is the Sandisk Extreme Pro 64GB. In a close second is the Kingston card.

Here are the two memory cards I recommend.

Sandisk Extreme Pro UHS-I 128GB SD Card

The Sandisk Extreme Pro UHS-I SDXC Memory Card at 128GB is rated with a 90MB/s write speed. The 256GB and larger cards are rated at 140MB/s.
Rated Write Speed: 90MB/s
Rated Read Speed: 200MB/s
Rated Sustain: 30MB/s

Amazon

Kingston Canvas Go! Plus UHS-I 128GB SD Card

Kingston CanvasGo! Plus SDXC UHS-I SD cards 128GB or higher have a rated write speed of 90MB/s and a rated read speed of 170MB/s.
Rated Write Speed: 90MB/s
Rated Read Speed: 170MB/s
Rated Sustain: 30MB/s

Amazon

Nikon D5500 Camera Specs

Sensor:  24.2MP / Processor: EXPEED 4 Image Processor
Sensor SD Memory Card Type: UHS-I
Continuous Burst: 5fps
Size of Buffer:  256 MB
Shots Till Buffer Fills 11 depending on the card.
Est. Time Taken To Clear Buffer:  – 11.5 seconds (Lexar 2000x UHS-II)

Do you need a U3 memory card for the Nikon D5500?

The key difference between U1 and U3 memory cards has to do with minimum write speeds. With a U1 card, the minimum performance of the card is 10MB/s. With a U3 card, this number goes up to 30MB/s.

What might look strange is that U3 memory cards are still performing slower than 30MB/s with the Nikon D5500. This is a misconception and not the card’s fault. Because the Nikon D5500 does not have a dual processor, it must first process each shot before writing to the memory card causing a delay between each time it writes to the card, slowing down the results.

The time it takes to write to the card is likely bottlenecked by what the camera can do, which in this case is probably somewhere around 32MB/s because the D5500 does not have a very fast bus. Because of this processing time and this bottleneck, the camera is not always writing to the card resulting in speeds that appear to be slower.

Best SD Memory Card Nikon D5500 Conclusions

While memory card write speeds are not very fast, there is a significant advantage to buying one of the faster cards especially if you do a lot of bust photography. While the difference between 21MB/s and 28MB/s doesn’t look like a big deal, it can help clear the buffer quicker so you can get back to shooting or reviewing your photos sooner.

If you don’t do a lot of burst shooting and own the D5500 for casual shooting, then any of the modern cards listed will perform great.