Background Nintendo released the original
Switch in March 2017, which was developed in the wake of the commercial failure of the
Wii U. The Switch was promoted as a hybrid console with handheld, tabletop, and docked configurations, with
Joy-Con controllers that can be separated from the main unit for the handheld or tabletop configurations. Compared to the other major consoles on the market at the timethe
PlayStation 4 and
Xbox Onethe Switch had less-powerful computational hardware to keep the unit's price low, but sufficient to power the type of games Nintendo typically publishes; part of the company's long-term
Blue Ocean Strategy to differentiate itself from the other console manufacturers. By December 2025, the Switch became Nintendo's best-selling console and the
second best-selling gaming console overall, following the
PlayStation 2. At the time of the Switch 2's announcement in January 2025, over 146 million Switch units had been sold worldwide.
Development Nintendo began pre-production of its next console shortly after the Switch's release, with a team reviewing the performance limitations of the Switch and identifying what hardware changes could be made to address them. This also provided enough time to plan out the hardware so as to be able to ship
software development kits (SDKs) to game development partners. Formal development of the Switch 2 (codenamed "Ounce") started in 2019, led by producer Kouichi Kawamoto, hardware director Takuhiro Dohta, and technical director Tetsuya Sasaki. and
backward compatibility was a key part of the design; Nintendo said, "Nintendo Switch is played by many consumers, and we decided that the best direction to take would be for consumers to be able to play their already purchased Nintendo Switch software on the successor to Nintendo Switch". The name was partially influenced by the backward compatibility. Nintendo also considered "Super Nintendo Switch", similar to the
Super Nintendo Entertainment System following the
Nintendo Entertainment System, but decided this would diminish the compatibility feature. The capability of the Joy-Con to be used as
computer mice was an idea introduced by Kawamoto who also played games on
personal computers, as mouse control would not only allow the Joy-Con to help replace the screen's touch controls when the console is docked, but also could be used to introduce new forms of gameplay. Kawamoto said this idea represented
Gunpei Yokoi's concept of "lateral thinking of withered technology" that has been part of Nintendo's approach for several decades. The GameChat feature was developed to minimize the use of system resources that would take away from game performance, and some functionality is based on the same streaming service
Wii U Chat that was developed for the
Wii U and
Wii U GamePad.
Industry rumors Industry rumors began as early as 2019 of a high-end model of the Switch, often nicknamed the "Nintendo Switch Pro" in the media; many of the speculated features became part of the
OLED Switch model, released in 2021. Nintendo confirmed it was working on its next gaming system during a call with investors in October 2020.
Digital Foundry said that Nintendo may have been working on a "pro" model for the Switch, but by December 2022, it appeared to have fully transitioned all development towards the Nintendo Switch successor. Court reports from the 2023
FTC v. Microsoft case, which challenged
Microsoft's
acquisition of
Activision Blizzard, included reference to Activision being briefed on the "Switch NG" in December 2022.
Video Games Chronicle reported in July 2023 that Nintendo had sent out SDKs for its next console to development partners and that Nintendo wanted to avoid the shortages that the
ninth generation consoles, the
PlayStation 5 and
Xbox Series X/S, had suffered at launch. Nintendo showcased the Switch 2 in a private presentation during
Gamescom in August; among the
tech demos were a version of the Switch game
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017), running at a higher
frame rate and
resolution, and the
Unreal Engine 5 demo
The Matrix Awakens (2021). While Nintendo officially acknowledged the development of the Switch's successor by May 2024, rumors and leaked photos of a new console persisted through 2024, as well as a data breach from
Game Freak on the development of the next
Pokémon game for the Switch's successor. At the 2025
Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in early January, several third-party vendors showcased accessories scheduled for the Switch successor, leading Nintendo to issue a statement that none of the mock-ups used at the show were official. Nintendo filed a lawsuit against
video game accessory company Genki in May 2025 for using detailed renders and a 3D printed model of the Switch 2 in their CES presentation; Genki settled with Nintendo in September 2025, paying an undisclosed sum and agreeing to avoid similar marketing approaches in the future.
Announcement and promotion The Switch 2 was initially expected to launch in late 2024. In February 2024,
Bloomberg News and
The Nikkei both reported that Nintendo had informed publishers it was delaying the release into early 2025 to prevent console shortages and scalping.
Bloomberg reported after the console's launch that the delay was also due in part to the console designers requesting more time to perfect the games that were to be released alongside the console at launch. Nintendo's shares fell by nearly six percent following the reported delay. which was later announced as
Mario Kart World. A one-hour
Nintendo Direct presentation about the Switch 2 premiered on April 2, with
Nintendo Treehouse presentations on Switch 2 games airing in the following 2 days. Nintendo hosted a series of worldwide events from April through June to allow players to try the console before release. Furukawa said Nintendo was making preparations for the Switch 2's release to prevent excessive sales to
resellers and
scalpers, which had been a problem with previous Nintendo hardware releases. As part of the promotion for the Switch 2,
Nintendo of America partnered with
Major League Baseball and the
Seattle Mariners to have the Nintendo and Switch 2 logos be featured on the Mariners' team jerseys for the 2025 season. In April 2025, Nintendo of America released a commercial for the console starring actor
Paul Rudd, directly referencing a commercial promoting the
SNES that he also starred in 34 years prior. During the March 2025 installment of Nintendo Direct, Nintendo simultaneously announced and launched the
Nintendo Today! application for
iOS and
Android devices, intended to act as the primary news and calendar hub for delivering information on various Nintendo platforms, including daily updates related to Nintendo Switch 2 hardware, software, services and forthcoming events following the Switch 2-focused Nintendo Direct.
Pre-orders Months before the release, Nintendo stockpiled "hundreds of thousands" of units in the United States to avoid potential
increased tariffs enacted by the
Trump administration and reduce the likelihood of shortages. Nintendo also shifted production and sourcing of parts away from
China and towards
Southeast Asia, especially
Vietnam, to avoid tariffs levied specifically against China. To avoid reselling issues in Japan, a
region-locked Switch 2 is being sold at retail in the country at a reduced cost, with a region-free version to be released via Nintendo's online store only. In other regions, while pre-orders have been made available through retailers, Nintendo established a pre-order waitlist to purchase directly from Nintendo, but requiring users to have a Nintendo Account and established playtime, among other requirements. Pre-orders began in most regions on April 5, 2025. Shortly after the tariffs were announced on April 2, Nintendo delayed pre-orders in the US "to assess the potential impact of tariffs and evolving market conditions." A similar delay was also made for Canadian pre-orders as "to align with the timing of pre-orders to be determined in the US". Nintendo later affirmed that pre-orders for the console in the United States and Canada would start on April 24, 2025, with the console and console
bundle with
Mario Kart World remaining at the same price for launch, while some accessories saw an increase in price ranging from US$5 to $10. Pre-orders for the US and Canada began on April 24 at midnight. Shortly after pre-orders went live, retailers
Walmart,
Target, and
Best Buy reported widespread website errors and difficulties due to the overwhelming number of users attempting to reserve a pre-order, with console stock reportedly going out nationwide within minutes. Gaming retailer
GameStop opened preorders later that day at 11 a.m. ET with
glitches on the site being reported. Nintendo cautioned Japanese consumers that over 2.2 million people had registered for the opportunity to pre-order the Japan-only console model through the company, far exceeding their expectations, and that they would not likely be able to meet all of these pre-orders by its launch date; those not selected would be automatically carried into similar programs for later shipments of the console. Stores in Japan used lotteries and similar mechanisms to handle the limited supply of consoles during its launch period. Nintendo issued a similar caution for those in the US pre-ordering through its store. Retailers began receiving shipments in late May 2025. Some who had pre-ordered Switch 2 consoles posted footage two weeks prior to the release, though they were unusable without a day-one patch.
Release and pricing {{Multiple image|perrow=2,1|total_width=275 The Nintendo Switch 2 had a global release on June 5, 2025. This included Japan and North America, most European territories, Australia and New Zealand, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru, South Africa, Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia and South Korea. It was rolled out to other territories later that month, beginning with the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand on June 26, followed by Malaysia on July 3, Taiwan on July 10, the United Arab Emirates on September 17, and Argentina on October 10. The Switch 2 release in China, originally scheduled with the global June 5 release, was delayed indefinitely. The Switch 2 was launched at in Japan, including sales taxes. In North America, the console was priced at in the United States and in Canada. In Europe, the price was in most of the
eurozone and in the United Kingdom (both of which including
VAT). In Oceania, the console is priced at in Australia (including
GST). In Japan, in addition to the regular, "international" model of the console, a second "Japan Only" version was offered for sale at the significantly lower price of . The launch price was higher than industry predictions. Prior to launch, analysts at
Bloomberg L.P. had predicted that in the US, the Switch 2 would launch at a starting price of $400 or higher, pending the impact of tariffs on foreign goods imported into the US that took effect in February 2025, yet they affirmed that the console was projected to have a strong launch aided by exclusive software and backward compatibility with the Switch library. When the Switch 2's US price was revealed as 50% higher than that of the original Switch at its launchit was criticized for being too high. Select Switch 2 games were announced to be retailing at , which drew additional criticism. The price point makes the Switch 2 Nintendo's most expensive console in over 30 years when adjusted for inflation. Nintendo of America president
Doug Bowser stated that the US price of the Switch 2 was not based on
tariffs imposed by the Trump administration on April 2, 2025, as several publications had suggested; but instead simply due to the unit being a premium console alongside the three Switch consoles it will continue to sell. Bowser stated that shipments of the Switch 2 had already been stockpiling globally for release by this point, and thus was unlikely to affect the release date of the Switch 2. Though priced relatively high in the US, other analysts have ruled out US-imposed tariffs as the major factor in the high price of the Switch 2, citing the already rising prices of video game consoles and the fact that Canada and countries in Europe also have similar price points (although, when compared on a pre-tax basis, European pricing is actually lower). Writing in
Aftermath, games journalist Luke Plunkett opined that the
inflation surge following the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent
cost-of-living crisis was likely to impact the console's sales. Some fans campaigned for Nintendo to lower the price of the Switch 2 and its games via social media platforms and in the audience text chats during Nintendo's live streams. Former Nintendo public relations managers Kit Ellis and Krysta Yang criticized the company for omitting pricing details from the reveal stream, feeling that it created confusion as consumers had to search for that information elsewhere, thus exacerbating the negative response. In one case, a
GameStop store in
Staten Island, New York, had stapled pre-order receipts to the Switch 2 box for release day customers, but due to the way the console was packed near the front of the box, the staples were able to puncture the screens. GameStop immediately replaced those units affected by this, and later held an auction for the stapler and one of the affected consoles, since repaired, to raise money for the
Children's Miracle Network Hospitals. Following the onset of worldwide tariffs by the Trump administration on August 1, 2025, Nintendo announced a price increase for the original Switch consoles and some Switch 2 accessories that will take effect on August 3, 2025, in the United States. Nintendo cautioned that price adjustments for the Switch 2, games, and Nintendo Switch Online subscriptions "may be necessary in the future". On March 25, 2026, Nintendo announced that the price for first-party Switch 2 digital titles would be priced differently compared to physical versions, which will come into effect with the release of
Yoshi and the Mysterious Book in May.
Litigation On March 6, 2026, Nintendo filed a lawsuit against the
U.S government over tariffs imposed on the Switch 2 console, which led to delayed pre-orders and increased prices on its hardware and accessories. ==Hardware==