The Nintendo Switch 2 won’t be coming any time soon despite the console’s declining sales
It looks like Nintendo Switch sales are starting to slow as its maker reports slight gaps in sales targets for handhelds.
For the last fiscal year, Nintendo revised its sales targets for the Nintendo Switch to 18 million units sold, up from the original 21 million. Still, it looks like the company narrowly missed its revised target, shipping 17.97 million consoles in a 12-month period (thanks, VGC).
Now that the results are available, Nintendo’s projection for the current fiscal year is for 15 million Nintendo Switch consoles to be pushed over the next 12 months. With that in mind, Nintendo seems to have recognized that the Switch, which has sold over 125 million units since launch, is finally starting to lose its popularity.
However, this does not mean that the Nintendo Switch 2 will be revealed any time soon. AND Bloomberg Report states that Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa has confirmed that the company’s next-gen hardware is not available for the current fiscal year.
When will the successor to the Nintendo Switch come out?
Looking ahead, with Furukawa’s statement in mind, we probably won’t have any hardware news from Nintendo until April 2024 at the earliest. Whatever this new console will be, the most likely earliest time for its reveal will be next year’s preview season (between June and July).
Another possibility would be to reveal during a Nintendo Direct in September 2024, the month that Nintendo typically airs its pre-recorded teaser show. Either scenario could mean a potential 2024 Christmas launch for the Nintendo Switch successor.
Many, including myself, hoped the Nintendo Switch 2 (or Nintendo Switch Pro) would launch with the highly anticipated The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Realm, which will be released this week on May 12th.
Long awaited The breath of the wild the sequel is likely to be ranked as one of Nintendo Switch’s best games, and thus could really benefit from running on upgraded hardware. However, this may not be a huge problem, given Nintendo EPD’s achievements in Polish language, combined with the technical magic of co-developer Monolith Soft. Even so, it’s still amazing to me that it’s so stunning Xenoblade Chronicles 3 it may not work at all on aging Switch hardware.
