A USB Flash Drive, also known as thumb drive, pen drive and jump drive, among other names, are currently one of the most common, easy-to-use, most compatible forms of portable storage available on the market. These products connect to a USB port available on many devices and provide a means for storing and moving information between systems. USB flash drives come in many different stoage capacities, from 64MB drives used to store tiny firmware files or presentations up to 2TB drives which rival conventional hard drives in terms of total storage space.
For affordability 16GB, 32GB and 64GB cards are most popular. USB Flash Drives come in many different colors, with or without caps. Sometimes the USB connector is retractable, sliding inside the drive housing for protection when not in use, or covered by a cap of swivel. USB flash drives are very popular in the promotional and educational spaces where customer logos are printed on the drive. The first USB Flash Drive patent was filed in 1999 by Israeli company M-Systems, a business later acquired by Sandisk. The first USB Flash Drives sold in America were made by IBM.