DWPD: Drive Writes Per Day (SSD endurance)

DWPD ties endurance to warranty length. The same total write budget looks like a higher DWPD over a three-year warranty than over five, so always check the term the rating assumes. Vendors also publish TBW (terabytes written), the absolute lifetime write budget; DWPD is just TBW normalized to capacity and warranty days.

Enterprise SSDs are commonly grouped as read-intensive (around 1 DWPD), mixed-use (roughly 3 DWPD), and write-intensive (5 to 10 DWPD). Read-intensive suits boot, web, and content delivery. Mixed-use fits general virtualization. Write-intensive suits databases, caching tiers, and logging where the same cells are rewritten constantly.

When sourcing SSDs from China, DWPD separates genuine enterprise drives from repackaged consumer flash. Ask for the model's official endurance spec and check remaining life via SMART on used drives, since a high-DWPD drive that already burned most of its writes is no bargain. Match the endurance class to your write workload rather than overbuying.