UPDATE 8.45pm UK: Eurogamer sources can now corroboate the earlier reports that the Switch 2, once destined for release later in 2024, is now set for Q1 2025.
The console’s launch moving into early next year – but still within the coming financial year – is designed to ensure Switch 2’s launch line-up features as many titles as possible, Eurogamer understands.
Separately, VGC has also now reported on the move to Q1 2025, with publishing sources saying Nintendo recently briefed third-party game companies on the move from late 2024 to early 2025.
ORIGINAL STORY 6.15pm UK:
A report claiming Nintendo Switch 2 will now launch in Q1 2025 is spreading online.
Brazilian games journalist Pedro Henrique Lutti Lippe has stated Nintendo is now looking to release its next console in early 2025, though still within the 2024 financial year. The report is based on development sources now targeting that quarter for launch.
Eurogamer has heard similar whispers of an early 2025 launch from industry sources this week, though has not been able to concretely substantiate them. Nintendo Switch 2 had previously been widely tipped to arrive later this year. A move to the other side of Christmas into early 2025 would mean more time for the console’s launch line-up to be readied, while keeping the financial benefit of Switch 2’s launch within Nintendo’s upcoming financial calendar.
VGC reported this afternoon that two development sources working on Switch 2 games were indeed aiming for a Q1 2025 launch, though could not confirm this was because of a delay.
Currently, Nintendo has only a handful of games still set to release for the existing Switch in 2024: a Princess Peach title in March, and ports of Luigi’s Mansion 2 and Paper Mario: A Thousand Year Door.
Nintendo also still lists Metroid Prime 4 for launch as a Switch 1 game, though with a “TBA” date.
Eurogamer reported last year that Nintendo demoed Switch 2 hardware capabilities to developers around Gamescom last August, with partners shown tech demos of how well the system is designed to run.
This followed the sharing of early Switch 2 details with key publishing partners at the end of 2022 – a fact discussed by Activision Blizzard boss Bobby Kotick in an email published online last year as part of the FTC’s court case concerning the company’s acquisition by Microsoft. The emails showed Activision execs discussing Switch 2’s ability to run Call of Duty, following a conversation between Kotick and Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa.
In a newspaper interview last November, however, Furukawa dubbed these reports as merely “rumours”.
Regardless, a GDC industry report published last month found that hundreds of developers were now working on projects set to launch on Switch 2.
Eurogamer has contacted Nintendo for comment.