The 970 Evo has V-NAND with 64 layers and the new 970 Evo plus has V-NAND with 96 layers. There is a 20-40% increase in performance for writing and IOPS. From 2'500 MB/s to 3'300 MB/s with Turbowrite, after the 42GB Turbowrite it is then 1'200MB/s with the Evo and 1'700MB/s with the Plus version with 1TB.
The surcharge is definitely worth it.