Remember when a digital camera’s memory card could barely hold a dozen photos? Fast forward from 2000 to today, and SD and microSD cards can now store terabytes of data. That’s enough for entire game libraries, hours of 4K video or thousands of high-resolution photos.
This year, the (SDA) is celebrating a major milestone: 25 years since the launch of the SD memory card, and 20 years since the debut of microSD. If you’ve ever popped one into your camera, drone, smartphone or Nintendo Switch, you’ve experienced just how essential these little cards have become. Short for Secure Digital, they’re the go-to storage option for saving photos, videos, apps and more.
Since the first SD card hit the market in 2000, more than 12 billion cards have been sold worldwide, according to the SDA. And they’re far from obsolete. SD cards have evolved alongside our devices, keeping pace with rising demands for speed and capacity.
From an early 8 MB capacity (yes, megabytes) to today’s 4 TB (yes, terabytes) Secure Digital Ultra Capacity (SDUC) cards, that’s a staggering 500,000 per cent increase. Transfer speeds have leapt from 12.5 megabytes per second to nearly 4 gigabytes per second with the latest SD Express technology, letting users offload high-resolution video or massive game files in record time.
Despite that leap in performance, SD cards have remained remarkably simple to use—plug-and-play friendly and backward compatible. No complicated setups, no adapters—just reliable, swappable storage that continues to work across generations of gear. Unlike many tech standards that force users to upgrade everything, SD cards still work in older devices, a rare win for consumers.
That convenience, plus their compact form factor, is why SD and microSD cards remain dominant in the removable memory market.
MicroSD deserves its own round of applause. Introduced 20 years ago, this fingernail-sized powerhouse transformed mobile phones by giving users their first real storage upgrade. Suddenly, people could take more photos, record video and carry music on the go without maxing out internal storage or constantly offloading to the cloud.
That shift helped fuel the mobile content revolution—selfies, videos, music libraries and mobile gaming, all made more powerful thanks to removable storage.
To put today’s data needs in perspective: a zettabyte equals one billion terabytes. If every person on Earth—roughly eight billion people—had a 128 GB smartphone filled, it would total just over one zettabyte. That’s only a fraction of the 394 zettabytes of data the world is forecast to generate by 2028, according to the International Data Corporation.
For everyday users, that explosive growth means more data to store—from ultra-high-definition videos to AI-powered apps—and portable storage like SD cards will remain vital in helping consumers manage the load.
To mark these milestones, the SDA says it’s giving back. It has partnered with OneTreePlanted and the Morino Project to plant 25,000 trees worldwide, helping fight climate change and promote sustainability.
It has also donated $25,000 to the Audiopedia Foundation, which uses microSD cards to deliver life-changing audio content to women in remote African communities, empowering them with health, financial and educational resources using basic mobile phones.
SD technology is now embedded in everything from drones and action cameras to medical devices, gaming consoles, IoT systems and even space exploration. With AI and edge computing pushing devices to store and process more than ever, SD Express cards are ready to meet the challenge with SSD-like performance in a portable, flexible format.
So here’s to 25 years of SD—still small in size, with an outsized impact.
Greg Gazin, also known as Gadget Guy or Gadget Greg, is a Troy Media columnist with deep expertise in technology. He’s also a respected speaker on communication, leadership, and tech-related topics. Beyond writing, Gazin is a versatile professional who works as a facilitator, blogger, podcaster, and author. His broad range of skills and insights has made him a prominent and influential voice in the tech community.
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