leef bridge

 

leef bridgeEven though phones are being to store and access larger amounts of content, physical on-phone storage space is rarely big enough unless you pay a premium to get a 64GB version of a phone. Since many of the most popular phones do not even include microSD card sots, wireless storage and cloud storage have become very popular ways to increase space on a phone, but those are not without problems.

If you want to avoid a troublesome setup and connection issues, then look no further than the Leef Bridge 3.0, a dual-sided USB stick that can plug into your computer as well as your phone or tablet.

With a sliding design, you can either have the full-size USB or microUSB sticking out. Plus, you can also choose to have neither out which is good for when you want to keep the Bridge safe when it is not being used.

Since the USB stick is small, I did find it difficult to keep track of the device sometimes, though that is not going to be an issue if you keep it in a bag or other enclosed area. Since the sliding design seems to work great, the only major downside to the USB stick’s design is that it is completely plastic and therefore slide out of your hand easily.

Compatibility is something to keep in mind when considering the Leef Bridge 3.0. It will only work with Android devices that are running 4 .1 or higher. Also, your phone will have to support USB OTG and not all of the latest devices do. As long as you meet both of those requirements, then the device does work very well and acts just like a USB stick is supposed to.

Transfer speeds are OK but nothing to brag about. When you are connected to a computer via USB 2.0, you can expect to see speeds around 9 MBps (write) and 16.5 MBps (read). Those speeds will change completely over microUSB, unfortunately. The write speeds when connected to a phone were 4.9 MBps and for read, they were 5.8 MBps. Neither of those speeds are bad but don’t expect to transfer large video files back in forth without waiting for quite a while.

Conclusion

A lack of storage space on smartphones and tablet is something that people complain about very frequently. The Leef Bridge 3.0 does address that problem and while compatibility is spotty, it gets the job done just fine as long as you are using it with an applicable smartphone or tablet. If the transfer speeds could be improved, that would be great, but microUSB is not known for being a great way to read or write.

Price

16GB – $18.99 (Direct)

32GB – $32.99 (Direct)

64GB – $56.99 (Direct)