The floor is the only number a manufacturer promises
Every V90 card in this comparison states a read speed of 300 MB/s, and none of them promise it as a minimum. SanDisk, Lexar and Kingston’s V90 cards each state “up to” 300 MB/s read and “up to” 260 MB/s write. Those are ceilings.
That distinction is the whole purchase. A camera recording video writes continuously, so what it needs is a speed the card will not fall below, not a speed it can occasionally reach. The V number is that guarantee. SanDisk lists its Extreme PRO as Class 10, U3 and V90 on the same card; the U3 and Class 10 marks sit alongside the V rating rather than replacing it.
Read speed governs how fast footage copies off the card. It does not keep a recording running. Angelbird is the only brand here that publishes a sustained write figure distinct from its maximum, 260 MB/s against 280 MB/s, which is why its sheet is the easiest to compare against a bitrate. Where a brand publishes only an “up to” write figure, treat the V class as the number you can rely on and the “up to” figure as the margin above it.
Convert the bitrate before you look at a single card
Camera manuals list video modes in megabits per second (Mbps). Card ratings are in megabytes per second (MB/s). Divide by eight to put them in the same unit. A mode listed at 200 Mbps is 25 MB/s, 400 Mbps is 50 MB/s, and 600 Mbps is 75 MB/s. Take the highest bitrate you actually plan to record, not the mode you use most often.
Then compare that figure to the V number, not to the “up to” write speed, and leave headroom. A 50 MB/s mode fits inside V60’s 60 MB/s floor with a small margin and inside V90’s 90 MB/s floor with a large one. A 75 MB/s mode exceeds V60’s 60 MB/s floor, so V60 does not qualify; only V90 clears it, with 15 MB/s to spare.
When V60 is enough, and when it is not
V60 is enough when the camera’s highest bitrate, divided by eight, sits comfortably under 60 MB/s.
The trade-off is capacity against floor. If your bitrate fits under V60 with headroom, Kingston’s V60 SKU gives you up to four times the capacity per card within the same line. If it does not, no amount of capacity helps.
The 128GB V60 card deserves a specific note. Its 100 MB/s stated write is lower than the 150 MB/s of its larger siblings. The V60 floor is the same at every capacity, so the guarantee does not change, but the margin above it does. If you are buying V60 for a bitrate near the top of its range, the larger capacities give you more headroom as well as more minutes.
Capacity is minutes, not gigabytes
Divide the card’s capacity in megabytes by the bitrate in MB/s to get seconds of recording. Run the arithmetic for your own bitrate and the longest continuous take you expect, then check whether the line you are considering ships in a capacity that covers it.
The capacity ranges differ more than the ratings do. SanDisk’s Extreme PRO V90 ships from 32GB to 512GB. Lexar’s 2000x and Angelbird’s AV PRO MK2 V90 both run from 64GB to 512GB. Kingston’s V90 runs from 32GB to 256GB, and its V60 from 128GB to 1TB. Sony’s TOUGH-G stops at 256GB, the lowest ceiling of the five lines. For a shooter who wants one high-capacity V90 card rather than several smaller ones, Sony’s line is the one to rule out first.
Durability claims are specific for some cards and missing for others
SanDisk, Sony and Angelbird state an operating temperature range of -13°F to 185°F (-25°C to 85°C), and Kingston’s V60 (SDR2V6) datasheet states the same range. Lexar states a narrower operating range of 32°F to 158°F (0°C to 70°C), with the wider -13°F to 185°F range applying only to storage.
Water and dust ratings separate the set more sharply. SanDisk and Sony both publish IP68. Kingston’s V60 (SDR2V6) datasheet states IPX7, continuous immersion to 3.3 ft (1 m) for 30 minutes; the V90 SKU’s ingress rating is not in the documents retrieved.
Drop figures are rarer still. SanDisk states a drop test to 19.6 ft (6 m). Sony states drop resistance to 16.4 ft (5 m) and adds that its one-piece molded body is 18 times more bend-resistant than the SD standard. Lexar, Kingston and Angelbird publish no drop height. None of this says how any card survives a specific fall. It says which claims you can hold the manufacturer to.
Warranty length, and what is behind it
A memory card that fails takes its footage with it, so the warranty only ever covers the card. SanDisk, Lexar and Kingston’s V90 card each state a limited lifetime warranty, and Lexar specifies 10 years in regions that do not recognize lifetime terms. Angelbird states a 3-year limited warranty, the shortest in the set, but is the only manufacturer here to bundle a free data-recovery service with it.
Two more things the spec sheets reveal
The write-protect switch is published differently across the set. Angelbird states a mechanical write-protect switch and a sticker-free body intended to avoid damage to camera card doors. Sony states that the TOUGH-G has no built-in write-protect switch. SanDisk, Lexar and Kingston do not mention a switch in the documents retrieved, which is not the same as not having one.
Lexar’s 2000x is a GOLD Series V90 card under the LSD2000 prefix.
