Tape Heads Having Tiered Servo Readers

The present disclosure generally relates to a tape drive comprising one or more tape head modules. Each tape head module comprises 65 data elements disposed in a first row, each data element being a write element or a read element, and at least 5 servo element pairs disposed in a second row, the second row being disposed parallel to the first row. The second row is spaced a distance in a first direction from the first row. One or more data elements and one or more servo element pairs may be unwired and non-operable. The tape drive may comprise three tape head modules, where the second tape head module is disposed between the first and third tape head modules. Each data element of the first tape head module and the third tape head module are write elements, and each data element of the second module is a read element.