Key Takeaways
- Nintendo finally acknowledges Switch 2, successor to Switch, to be announced before March 31, 2025.
- Rumored Switch 2 features like magnetic controllers and backwards compatibility remain unconfirmed by Nintendo.
- Despite upcoming Switch 2 announcement, a Nintendo Direct airing in June will focus on existing Switch titles.
After years of speculation, Nintendo has finally acknowledged the existence of a Nintendo Switch successor, otherwise known as the Switch 2. Following the company’s earnings report for the fiscal year 2024, Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa took to X (formerly Twitter) using the official Nintendo account to announce that the Nintendo Switch successor will be announced during the fiscal year 2025.
Nintendo’s fiscal years start on April 1st and end on March 31st, meaning the new system will be announced before March 31st, 2025. However, Nintendo didn’t say when the system will actually launch.
Don’t expect the Switch 2 before June
While the tweet finally acknowledges the Switch 2, we don’t know much beyond that. Rumors of magnetically-attached controllers, a larger console, and backwards compatibility have been swirling, but Nintendo hasn’t addressed any of them.
Along with teasing the upcoming Nintendo Switch successor, Furukawa’s tweet also made an unusual reveal that the company will be airing a Nintendo Direct presentation in June. The presentation time frame itself isn’t unexpected, but Nintendo typically announces Direct presentations mere days in advance.
The reason for the early announcement is to clarify that the Nintendo Switch successor will not be featured at this Nintendo Direct, and instead, it will focus on the second half of the year for Nintendo Switch titles. Currently, Nintendo’s own first-party lineup only includes Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and Luigi’s Mansion 2 HDtwo remakes of older titles that are slated to be released before the end of June.
The original Switch continues to sell
In its earnings report, Nintendo also revealed that the Nintendo Switch console continues to perform very strongly. Seven years in, the company sold 15.70 million units of the hardware between April 2023 and March 2024, bringing the lifetime sales to 141.32 million. It’s already Nintendo’s second-best-selling system of all time.
Additionally, Nintendo forecasts selling an additional 13.5 million units of the Switch in the fiscal year 2025, which would make it Nintendo’s most successful hardware ever, and put it just below the PlayStation 2 in the overall ranking in terms of sales. How Nintendo plans to keep that momentum is still up in the air, but we’re likely to know more at the upcoming Nintendo Direct.