Is 512GB Enough? (2024)

Hi all, I have just preordered the new M2 MacBook Pro 14" and cannot wait for it to arrive! I went for the base model as quite frankly that is all I could afford, therefore it coming with just the 512GB of storage.

My main question is, is 512GB enough?

Now I know most will say "It depends on what you use it for", and while that is a valid argument, I just wanted to gauge whether people who have 512GB have run into any storage space issues?

As you already mentioned, only you will know. It depends on what you're using your computer for. Do you have a lot of photos and videos to store? Or need space for VMs? Do you have/use an external drive to store data on?

How big is your current drive and how much of it is currently used. Have you ran into space issues there? That is going to be your best indicator.

iStorm said:

As you already mentioned, only you will know. It depends on what you're using your computer for. Do you have a lot of photos and videos to store? Or need space for VMs? Do you have/use an external drive to store data on?

How big is your current drive and how much of it is currently used. Have you ran into space issues there? That is going to be your best indicator.

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I currently only have a desktop so have plenty of storage on there, so just wanted to see others experience with a 512GB drive and if they had experienced any issues etc.

Mainly will be browsing with the occasional VM use and possible Photoshop etc. So can't imagine I will run into any issues tbh.

astorre said:

I had doubts like you when I ordered mine M1 pro, first base version, canceled that, then 16GB 1TB version, canceled that, finally 32GB 1TB version for 3000€
no ragrets, because I know that later I would be cursing myself for ordering just 512GB

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Have you found that you have gone over the 512GB mark with having 1TB?

Madhatter32 said:

Gauge this: I have no issues. I do offload iOS backups though because -- why not?

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Thanks for the reply

TechRunner said:

That question has a different answer for nearly every user. For example, 256GB is more than enough for me. I use both cloud and external storage for various things, so I tend to pay for the minimum in local storage. I've only used 48GB of my onboard SSD in over two years on my Mini.

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I understand it is unique to the user. Just wanted to see if users had run into the issue of struggling for space with the 512GB, but thank you for your insight

tygurr said:

I understand it is unique to the user. Just wanted to see if users had run into the issue of struggling for space with the 512GB, but thank you for your insight

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Enjoy your new MBP! They're great machines.

Edit: My original reply to you probably sounded snotty, which wasn't my intention. I apologize if it came off that way!

TechRunner said:

Enjoy your new MBP! They're great machines.

Edit: My original reply to you probably sounded snotty, which wasn't my intention. I apologize if it came off that way!

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Thank you, cant wait for it to arrive!

No no you're all good

tygurr said:

Hi all, I have just preordered the new M2 MacBook Pro 14" and cannot wait for it to arrive! I went for the base model as quite frankly that is all I could afford, therefore it coming with just the 512GB of storage.

My main question is, is 512GB enough?

Now I know most will say "It depends on what you use it for", and while that is a valid argument, I just wanted to gauge whether people who have 512GB have run into any storage space issues?

Click to expand...

Depends what you are doing.

richard13 said:

My last 4 computers have/had 512GB storage. I have an iMac and MBP and my data is spread across them. I also have lots of external storage to lean back on if necessary. So, for me 512GB works ok. Would I like to have 1TB drives anyway? Sure, why not? It would be nice to have that extra storage and not be concerned. But for the price of the upgrades to get there, it may not be worth it.

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Thanks for your reply Richard. This was my exact thinking with if needs be to get external storage and the extra price is annoying but what can ya do? Just wanted to see if it was likely to get away with not needing to buy the extra external storage etc.

tygurr said:

My main question is, is 512GB enough?

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If you're doing pro video production or Big Data, nothing is enough but that might mean that you have to rely on external storage anyway.

For more general use I'd say:

256GB is ok for "personal productivity" use (email/WP/web browsing) especially if you keep data in the cloud and expect hot and cold running internet wherever you work - but install a couple of Pro apps, start messing around with virtual machines, or any sort of media creation and it's going to be tight & its a joke to have so little on anything in the Mac price range.

512GB is far more satisfactory if you have a few Pro apps, dabble in audio or regular compressed high def (i.e. maybe not high-bandwidth pro formats or 4k) or for coding etc. and don't want to carry around (say) a movie/TV show library. Be prepared to "curate" what you keep on your hard drive and offload less frequently used stuff to external drives. I think there's a good argument on a desktop for having a super-fast 512GB system drive for systems and apps and keeping your data on external or networked storage. For one thing, Apple SSDs live and die with the machine they're embedded in and you may not want too many eggs in that basket. Also, unless you're editing multiple streams of 4k video or something, as long as the system, swap and temporary files are on the super-fast Apple SSD, slower, cheaper external (USB or networked) storage will likely be perfectly adequate for your "documents".

On a laptop, though, it's nice to be able to have everything in one place without faffing around with external storage.

1TB should be the sensible minimum for any computer with "pro" in the name, but Apple prices and base specs make it difficult. I have a 1TB drive on my Studio and its about half full (not too bad since I've got XCode installed, mess around with Logic & recording audio, and have a couple of Linux VMs) but I do shove "archive" material off onto external storage from time to time. So I could cope with 512GB + external with a bit of discipline.

512's been plenty for me - after years of 80-120GB drives, it was nice to get to a point where I had space to just...leave stuff on there. Finally unified my iTunes library onto my primary machine for the first time in forever (about 90GB total), etc.

I think you'll be fine - you'd know if you needed more than that much space, and there's always ways to manage space if things start getting tight.

If you have a fileserver or "main computer" of some sort and don't need to store your entire life inside the laptop, 512 is likely enough. Heavy generalisation, though.

I have gone over half of my 1TB drives but that's when I've allowed myself to consolidate video media to the laptop as temp storage. Could have totally done that with an external drive. Just lazy luxury.

512 is enough for me. Most of my stuff lives in iCloud, in the case of Music, and all my other essential files mostly live on my NAS.

1TB would be nice to have for some projects I work on, but for now, 512 does fine for my use case.

Madhatter32 said:

Gauge this: I have no issues. I do offload iOS backups though because -- why not?

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Is there a way to automatically offload iOS backups? Or do you manually move them?

iOS and iPadOS backups are the only reason I get a 1TB SSD.