An SS USB port, short for SuperSpeed, refers to USB 3.0 or newer, used for faster data transfer and charging compared to standard USB ports.
If you’ve ever looked closely at the USB ports on your laptop or desktop PC, you may have noticed that some are labeled with a small symbol. It looks like the letters SS, with a three-pronged icon protruding from it. That trident-shaped icon is the symbol for USB, and the two letters stand for SuperSpeed. Altogether, this indicates that the port has USB SuperSpeed capabilities. In other words, it’s the same thing as a blue USB port. Or possibly a red USB port. Things quickly get tricky to explain.
The SuperSpeed designation means a port uses USB 3.2, previously known as USB 3.0. However, SuperSpeed is no longer the fastest type of USB port — that crown is now held by the latest USB4 specification. USB4 is still relatively new, so an average computer is still more likely to have some version of USB 3.x. Over the years, there have been many revisions from USB 3.0 to USB 3.2, all of which were considered SuperSpeed. Still following? Good, because the situation gets even more complex.
SuperSpeed branding was initially created to make it easy for consumers to understand what kind of USB port a product was equipped with. However, companies rarely used that branding in practice. Meanwhile, USB ports continued to be renamed as new versions came out, creating a bizarre state of affairs in which a product labeled as having a USB 3.2 port can be slower than a product claiming to have a USB 3.1 port. Eventually, the SuperSpeed branding was discontinued. So, here’s what SuperSpeed USB means on your computer, as well as what eventually replaced it.
