Best Memory Cards Nikon Z6 II/Z7 II – With Real Benchmarks

The Nikon Z6 II and Z7 II can take both CFexpress Type-B / XQD and UHS-I or UHS-II memory cards.

Slot 1 supports CFexpress Type-B or XQD memory cards.

Slot 2 can take UHS-II or UHS-I memory cards.

How fast a card you need for slot 2 depends on how you will use it, as it will bottleneck your performance when writing RAW files to both cards. If you just write RAW to the CFexpress cards and JPG to the UHS-II slot, then slower cards won’t impact performance as much.

You cannot write video to both cards simultaneously, but any UHS-I card that is U3-rated can handle the 4k 150Mbps bitrate these cameras output.

Nikon Z6 II – Amazon / B&H – Nikon Z7 II – Amazon / B&H

Top Performing CFexpress Type-B Memory Cards

I ran all the different memory cards through a benchmark using the Nikon Z7 II and got some very interesting results, with performance scores all over the place. Part of this is that CFexpress technology has evolved these last few years, and it’s going to be important that you try to get one of the newer generations of cards, which I am recommending below.

If you are buying new cards today, some top performers working well in Nikon cameras are anything by Lexar, Delkin, Nikon, and Prograde, and some of the Hoodman Steel cards are probably the best for the budget cards.

Here are the best memory cards. You won’t need the fastest; I recommend something like a Lexar Silver or a Lexar Gold. Hoodman cards are also a great value.

I have not benchmarked all the latest cards in the Z7 II, but you can see the Nikon Z8 memory cards speed test to see how they perform in a higher-end body.

Occasionally, some CFexpress cards in Nikon cameras are a little tight. I’ve had this happen with Angelbird and OWC cards.

Top Performing SD Memory Card

SD Memory cards bounced around a little between each brand. The above chart shows the best memory cards by speed class. The Lexar v60 1800x and Sony M Tough V60 cards performed very well for the V60 speed class, which is more than fast enough for video recording. Kingston, Sony, Delkin, Kodak, and Wise were all great cards for the V90 speed class.

Best CFexpress Reader

I’ve been benchmarking these cards with the ProGrade CFexpress + UHS-II reader since that’s what I think most people will use with a camera like this. However, the Lexar reader is slightly faster if you just need a reader for CFexpress cards.

Prograde CFexpress + UHS-II Reader – Amazon / B&H – This will not read XQD cards.

If you buy an Angelbird card, you should also buy an Angelbird reader so you can upgrade the cards’ firmware.

Also, see the 5 Must-Have Accessories for the Nikon Z6 II and Z7 II.

Memory Card Benchmarks

To benchmark each memory card in the Nikon Z6 II and Z7 II, a series of continuous burst images were taken until the buffer was filled. Then, the time it took to clear the buffer was calculated against how much data was written. This gave me a rough speed of how each card is performing in-camera. I ran several series with each card to rule out issues or other hiccups that sometimes occur with freshly formatted cards.

There was a lot of wild variation in the Nikon Z6 II. It seems like many V90 UHS-II cards were not engaging that second set of pins and were running at UHS-I speeds. I am told this is a problem with the camera firmware, so just stick with the cards that are posting good scores.

CFexpress & SD Memory Cards For Nikon Z6 II & Z7 II

To see how each card runs with a thunderbolt reader for faster speeds, check out the guide for the Best CFexpress Type B cards.

Using XQD Memory Cards In the Nikon Z6 II / Z7 II

You can still use your old XQD memory cards in these new cameras, but they will not run as fast as a good CFexpress card. This isn’t because the new cameras are now fully functional; rather, they have two processors, which means two data lanes.

XQD cards still function fine and are slightly faster than UHS-II memory cards. When testing the Nikon XQD memory card, it ran at 228.55MB/s.  Not as fast as the Angel Bird 256GB card that hit speeds of 332.10 MB/s but faster than the Kodak Ultra Pro v90, which ran at 203.04MB/s

Memory Cards For Video

The Nikon Z6 II and Z7 II have a bitrate of about 150Mbps, which translates to about 19MB/s. This means any U3 card, whether UHS-I or UHS-II, will work fine for video.

Since the Nikon Z6 II and Z7 II only shoot video to one card slot at a time, it might make sense to buy a larger UHS-I or UHS-II v60 card that’s designated for video since these cards can be found at a better price than CFexpress cards.

What Size Memory Card Do You Need?

Choosing memory card sizes depends on how much shooting you need, whether you clear your cards often or need a card to last you days or weeks.

I’ve moved to 128GB cards because I like to be able to go a few days before clearing off my cards. Sometimes, I leave shots on my cards even after I’ve copied them to my computer simply for short-term backup while I wait for them to transfer to my Synology backup server. This also keeps me from using the same part of the flash memory over and over, which can wear it out quickly.

Video shooters will likely want to start with 128GB cards.

You can use the bitrate calculator to understand how big a card you need for the time you want to record.

The Nikon Z 6II and Z 7II record a bitrate of about 150Mbps.