The 9 Best External BD RW drives (2023 reviews)

Plethora7 line of drive come in a pretty wide variety of styles, so you can definitely find one that suits your individual preferences and needs. The PowerDVD player that is part of the Cyberlink software suite will play Blu-ray movie disks. It works on both Windows and MAC platforms. It is larger than necessary, but would enable carrying a number of discs along with the drive. It is best for archiving and long term data.

The flip-top burner is top notch and portability is perfect with the right case. It should also easily burn a Blu-Ray disc also. This needs no external power and transfers at a far quicker rate. The drive is great and the fact that it comes with a protective case is a bonus.

Why We Like This:

Not too much vibration unless you've got bad disks
Great little light weight portable blue ray player/recorder
Speed just as spec'ed, no hitches/glitches

Best For imac: OWC External BD RW Drive

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Owc line of drive come in a pretty wide variety of styles, so you can definitely find one that suits your individual preferences and needs. This owc is amazingly solid, reliable, and snappy. It comes with a sleek, durable aluminum chassis, and high-speed usb 3.0 interface, and mercury pro delivers reliable performance that matches its good looks. It fits snugly, with no obvious gaps around the front bezel. The drive tray has a second, smaller recess, half-size, to accommodate smaller disks. It does not switch off the power brick, which will continue to consume a small amount of electricity, even with the drive switched off.

This drive is supported by windows xp and later, so as long as you have a usb connection, it will function. Its construction and appearance are very impressive. This case is very thoughtfully designed.

Why We Like This:

Sturdy case, works well with blu-ray drive
Easy to put everything together and get up and working properly
Solid, good looking, and nice heavy feel
Requires external power, no problem, cord included

Best With MS Windows: Asus External BD RW Drive

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If you often find yourself scrambling for appropriate and satisfactory drive, asus external bd rw drive is your solution. It is a powerful blu-ray disc drive that can write up to 16x bd-r format. It is designed to easily streamline the burning process. The fact that it has a concealed drive door flap makes it double protected from dust entering the drive internals. It is heavy and uses a regular AC outlet. It does a good job at preventing any kind of vibration during ripping which enabled no data loss or skips due to its solid build and weight.

Intuitive, bundled software called cyberlink power2go 8 simplifies the disc-burning process and offers optional encryption functionality to protect your private files. It is windows and mac compatible, and comes with a cloud backup solution for android devices. It comes with built-in blu ray player software.

Why We Like This:

You can convert movies for playback on android and ios devices
Reads quickly depending on the disk and contents
Full-size housing, external power supply with inline transformer, usb-3 cable

Best For Ipad: Archgon External BD RW Drive

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Archgon offers a variety of drive for personal choice and yet maintaining quality in all the variants. If you have a GEN 8 CPU or higher with a video card that supports 4K and higher this DVD player will work really well. It has both standard USB and USB-C attachment cables. It comes with two sets of cables and a very nice padded zippered carrying case. It's a great tiny drive for 4k content.

The product comes with two cables and it is important to use the cable most compatible with your computer to burn Blu Ray discs correctly, although it burns DVD media fine using either cable. It's a single command and takes about 30 seconds. The drive doesn't play the movies, it just reads the data and sends it on your computer. It's lightweight, yet feels very high quality.

Why We Like This:

Fast, runs quietly, and so far very stable device
Noticeable, quiet hum/whine while reading a bluray disc
Plays cds and dvds out of the box with media player or vlc

Best For Chromebook: Mthstec External BD RW Drive

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If you are searching for a satisfactory drive for your daily usage, mthstec external bd rw drive is the ultimate decision. The Mthstec Blu-ray drive can bring more convenience and happiness to your work and life. Its compact size and lightweight make it perfect for carrying around. The design incorporates a nice touch of thin faint LEDs that cycle through Red-Green-Blue. The top surface has a very slick finish with some cool added lighting that changes color on the top which gives it some type of space alien look.

It does have cool lights that change color on the top which gives it some type of space alien look. This thing is silent, no vibration, no noise, spins up fast and so far has been absolutely perfect in all regards. The operation is smooth and at an acceptable volume for a portable drive.

It comes with this bluray dvd burner, you can watch HD movies, play games, install software, listen to music, burn files and movies to cds/dvds/bds.

Why We Like This:

Easy to use, versatile, and very portable
Delivers what they promise

Best For archiving photos: Produplicator External BD RW Drive

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We know from years of feedback from readers, customers and amazon sellers, what most people want in a convenient and appropriate drive. The produplicator external bd rw drive is exactly that - it's a simple drive that hits all the right notes. It’s basically just a drive that can read the UHD Layered Discs. It includes software bundle from cybermedia that makes it relatively easy to get started and inexpensive but immediatley hounds you to upgrade nearly every component. It can burn the 50Gig dual layer discs. It is ideal for archiving photos and older files to insure they never get deleted.

This is a nice portable recorder that can be used between laptops, since they aren't on the newer models. It has the resources to decode blu-ray video. The packaging shows it's capable of burning m-disc triple layer at 4x speeds.

Why We Like This:

Works great for dvds, blue ray, and uhd
Easy to set up and use
Covers all the formats, works great
Minimum system requirements for ultra hd 4k blu-ray playback

Best With various Operating systems: generic External BD RW Drive

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Generic has been making great drive for years, thanks to a combination of clever design and appropriate materials. It's seriously a game-changer, and the slim design and compatibility with both Mac and Windows make it a must-have for anyone who works with different devices. It works with virtually any machine. It has strong error correction ability, impact resistance, low noise, and low power consumption. It can very easily be carried in a backpack or briefcase or whatever.

It is compatible with both mac and windows operating systems, and it can connect to devices via both USB 3.0 and type-c ports. There is NO external power supply needed. It has design and is a real eye-catcher.

Why We Like This:

Blu-ray and dvd's play without issues
A truly workable cd / blu ray burner
Has a convenient built-in 2-way cable (usb-c and usb-a) which is nice

Best tech Support: Pioneer External BD RW Drive

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Pioneer offers a variety of drive for personal choice and yet maintaining quality in all the variants. This is the important part, you do NOT need an intel CPU to enjoy UltraHD movies on your PC. It can handle 4k perfectly and has libre support. It is compatible with m-disc, a special disc that is treated with a super hard coat to prevent scatches and resist fingerprints for long-term data protection. It can be used as a tv blu-ray player.

This is the fastest and probably most stable portable drive out there. The drive comes with a stand and rubber pads for operating in a vertical orientation. This is a great burner / player for people who need to be able to use multiple formats, including archival quality blu ray discs.

Why We Like This:

Well designed, portable and very quiet
Powerful external disc burner in a small form factor
Works on an m1 mac, and is super quiet
You can store a lot of data and playback 4k ultrahd content

Best Feature: Easy To recognize: Bunud External BD RW Drive

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The bunud external bd rw drive's material feels more premium than its price would suggest. It is very convenient to carry a external blu ray drive when going on business trips, tourism, etc. The external blu ray drive is very light and thin, easy to carry and store, and also, with embedded cable design, you don’t have to worry about the loss of wires, it is very easy to organize. It is equipped with advanced type c and usb 3.0 super high speed interface, provides high speed data transfer up to a maximum of 5gbps and stable performance with strong fault tolerance for you.

It has an independent sd / tf card slot, 2 usb 3.0 ports and micro usb ports. The rear of the unit has 1-standard size sd card slot, 1-microsd (tf) slot, 2-usb 2.0 ports, and 1 microusb slot for additional power if your pc doesn't supply enough amperage through the usb port. It is also backward compatible with usb 2.0 and usb1.

Why We Like This: