Is PCIe 5.0 SSDs worth the upgrade for 4K video editing and 3D rendering?

[Natalie84]

I'm building a new high-end workstation for 4K video editing and 3D rendering, and I'm trying to decide if investing in a PCIe 5.0 SSD is worth the significant premium over a fast Gen4 drive for my use case. My motherboard supports it, and the theoretical bandwidth is tempting, but I'm skeptical about real-world performance gains outside of synthetic benchmarks. For others who have adopted PCIe 5.0 storage, have you noticed a tangible difference in application load times, project file transfers, or scrubbing through high-bitrate footage? What are the thermal management challenges like, and did you need to add a dedicated heatsink beyond what the drive or motherboard provided? Are there specific workloads where you'd say the upgrade is essential versus merely future-proofing?