WD How to understand WD HDD colors in their product lines

[jeyare]

this is C+P content from WD community, because I need to show you, how people can describe the “colors” definition of WD HDD:

WD Blue HDDs are mainly used for general purpose storage, they are great all-rounders, and an average user can’t go wrong with Blue.

WD Green is basically same as Blue, but it lacks a bit of performance. However, it is the most eco-friendly HDD, and it’s quite cheap.

WD Blacks are for pure performance including gaming, media, and content creation. Also one of the most expensive HDDs.

WD Red is a NAS drive. It’s optimized for NAS systems.

WD Purple is for surveillance. Advised for 24/7 operation.

WD Gold, probably the most premium of all. Made for a multitude of Datacenter-specific applications.

and back to reality:

WD discontinued Green HDD product line in 2015 (5y ago) just to be sure. Maybe someone can find them at ebay.
WD Green line was moved into Blue product line as single Blue brand for HDD.
Previous 6TB Green PN e.g. WD60EZRX has been changed to Blue PN as WD60EZRZ ... just single letter for same HW has been changed but there is really different performance between “similar 6TB pure Blue PN WD60EZAZ.

WD Black is maybe most expensive in some segment, but WD Gold or Ultrastar have better performance/cost ratio in same disk capacity. What is a space for a consideration and purposes definitions.

WD RED - optimized for NAS systems? Specially the SMR disk drives with PNs WDxxEFAX? SMR is useful technology, also for NAS systems, but hands off, when you need a RAID in your NAS. JBOD only. Don’t forget to check our WD recommendation part.

take care about such information from internet, also from specialists (VIP Member / Western Digital Beta Tester) at official vendor community. Mentioned recommendation is really far away from responsibility and current situation.