Toshiba MG08ACA16TEY 16 TB failure rate and reliability

D Grade D: Below average

Backblaze logged 19,015 drive-years on the Toshiba MG08ACA16TEY from Q1 2023 to Q3 2026, with 4,767 in service at the end of that period. In that time 554 drives failed, an annualised failure rate of 2.91%.

That is 92% higher than the 1.52% average across every drive in the same data, which earns it grade D (below average).

Among the 8 graded 16 TB hard drives it ranks 8 of 8 for reliability.

Failures have risen: 4.35% over the latest 8 quarters against 1.34% before. Rising rates often mean a model is ageing.

Failure rate / year: 2.91%
Average, all drives: 1.52%
Drives in use: 4,767
Drive-years: 19,015
Failures: 554
Capacity: 16 TB
Type: HDD
Model number: MG08ACA16TEY

Failure rate by quarter

Quarter	Drive-days	Failures	Failure rate / year
Q1 2023	470,414	1	0.08%
Q2 2023	470,668	0	0.00%
Q3 2023	480,826	18	1.37%
Q4 2023	473,012	39	3.01%
Q1 2024	475,970	10	0.77%
Q2 2024	464,010	22	1.73%
Q3 2024	477,111	32	2.45%
Q4 2024	475,327	18	1.38%
Q1 2025	464,361	19	1.49%
Q2 2025	466,977	33	2.58%
Q3 2025	462,943	215	16.95%
Q4 2025	449,560	51	4.14%
Q1 2026	435,063	26	2.18%
Q2 2026	439,243	46	3.82%
Q3 2026	435,102	24	2.01%

Single quarters with few drive-days swing widely; the overall figure above is the dependable one.

All 16 TB hard drives compared

Grade	Model	Type	Size	Failure rate / year	Drives in use	Drive-years	Failures
A	Seagate ST16000NM002J	HDD	16 TB	0.56%	463	1,607	9
B	Western Digital WUH721816ALE6L4	HDD	16 TB	0.60%	26,751	87,781	529
B	Seagate ST16000NM001G	HDD	16 TB	0.62%	35,594	117,216	725
B	Toshiba MG08ACA16TA	HDD	16 TB	1.03%	38,772	121,800	1,260
B	Toshiba MG08ACA16TE	HDD	16 TB	1.14%	6,170	22,458	257
C	Toshiba MG09ACA16TE	HDD	16 TB	1.71%	1,009	703	12
C	Western Digital WUH721816ALE6L0	HDD	16 TB	1.81%	2,896	10,953	198
D	Toshiba MG08ACA16TEY	HDD	16 TB	2.91%	4,767	19,015	554
–	Seagate ST16000NM000J	HDD	16 TB	2.23%	171	269	6
–	Seagate ST16000NM005G	HDD	16 TB	0.00%	25	94	0
–	Toshiba MG11ACA16TE	HDD	16 TB	0.00%	76	34	0