For developers and sysadmins working with SSDs in Linux environments, monitoring write endurance is crucial for both performance tuning and hardware longevity. The SMART (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) system provides the most reliable way to access these metrics.

The primary toolchain consists of:

sudo apt-get install smartmontools gsmartcontrol  # Debian/Ubuntu
sudo yum install smartmontools gsmartcontrol      # RHEL/CentOS

For a quick overview of your SSD's health and write statistics:

sudo smartctl -a /dev/sdX | grep -E "Media_Wearout_Indicator|Total_LBAs_Written|Data_Units_Written|Host_Write_Commands"

Different SSD manufacturers implement SMART attributes differently. Here are the key attributes to check:

Intel SSDs

sudo smartctl -A /dev/sdX | grep -i "Host_Writes_32MiB"
# Attribute 225 shows total writes in 32MiB units

Samsung SSDs

sudo smartctl -A /dev/sdX | grep -i "Total_LBAs_Written"
# Attribute 241 shows writes in 512-byte sectors

Crucial/Micron SSDs

sudo smartctl -A /dev/sdX | grep -i "NAND_Writes"
# Shows total GB written to NAND

For Samsung drives (assuming 512-byte sectors):

sudo smartctl -A /dev/sda | awk '/Total_LBAs_Written/ {print $10*512/1024/1024/1024 " GB"}'

Create a bash script for regular monitoring:

#!/bin/bash
DEVICE="/dev/sda"
OUTPUT=$(sudo smartctl -A $DEVICE)

# Intel calculation
intel_writes=$(echo "$OUTPUT" | awk '/Host_Writes_32MiB/ {print $10*33.55}')
echo "Intel Total Writes: $intel_writes GB"

# Samsung calculation
samsung_writes=$(echo "$OUTPUT" | awk '/Total_LBAs_Written/ {print $10*0.0000005}')
echo "Samsung Total Writes: $samsung_writes GB"

When analyzing SSD write metrics, consider:

• Manufacturer's TBW (Terabytes Written) rating
• Current write amplification factor
• Percentage of rated endurance used
• Comparison with power-on hours

For production systems, consider setting up node_exporter with textfile collector:

#!/bin/bash
DEVICE="/dev/nvme0n1"
METRICS_FILE="/var/lib/node_exporter/ssd_metrics.prom"

# Get SMART data
DATA=$(sudo smartctl -A $DEVICE)

# Extract and format metrics
echo "# HELP ssd_total_bytes_written Total bytes written to SSD" > $METRICS_FILE
echo "# TYPE ssd_total_bytes_written gauge" >> $METRICS_FILE
echo "ssd_total_bytes_written $(echo "$DATA" | awk '/Data_Units_Written/ {print $10*1000*512}')" >> $METRICS_FILE

Linux provides several methods to check SSD health metrics including total writes. The most reliable approach uses SMART (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) data through smartctl:

# Install smartmontools
sudo apt install smartmontools  # Debian/Ubuntu
sudo yum install smartmontools  # RHEL/CentOS

# Check basic health
sudo smartctl -a /dev/sda

# Filter for write-related attributes
sudo smartctl -A /dev/sda | grep -i "written\|write"

Different SSD manufacturers report write statistics through distinct SMART IDs:

# Intel SSDs (usually Attribute 225)
sudo smartctl -A /dev/sda | grep "Host_Writes_32MiB"

# Samsung SSDs (usually Attribute 241)
sudo smartctl -A /dev/sda | grep "Total_LBAs_Written"

# Crucial/Micron SSDs
sudo smartctl -A /dev/sda | grep "Total_LBAs_Written"

Convert raw SMART values to meaningful storage units:

# For Intel SSDs (32MiB units):
total_writes=$(sudo smartctl -A /dev/sda | awk '/Host_Writes_32MiB/{print $10}')
echo "Total writes: $(($total_writes * 32)) MiB"

# For Samsung SSDs (512B LBA units):
total_lbas=$(sudo smartctl -A /dev/sda | awk '/Total_LBAs_Written/{print $10}')
echo "Total writes: $(($total_lbas * 512 / 1024 / 1024 / 1024)) GB"

For persistent tracking, consider these approaches:

# Systemd service unit example (/etc/systemd/system/ssd-write-logger.service)
[Unit]
Description=SSD Write Logger

[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/ssd-write-logger.sh
Restart=always

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

# Corresponding shell script (/usr/local/bin/ssd-write-logger.sh)
#!/bin/bash
while true; do
  timestamp=$(date +"%Y-%m-%d %T")
  writes=$(smartctl -A /dev/sda | awk '/Total_LBAs_Written/{print $10}')
  echo "$timestamp,$writes" >> /var/log/ssd_writes.csv
  sleep 3600
done

Several GUI and CLI alternatives exist:

• gsmartcontrol: Graphical SMART tool
• nvme-cli: For NVMe-specific SSDs (sudo nvme smart-log /dev/nvme0)
• diskspd: Advanced performance monitoring

Key parameters to monitor: