The Nintendo Switch successor, Switch 2, will be backwards compatible. The Nintendo President, Shuntaro Furukawa, officially confirmed this. The top executive announced the news on the official Nintendo handle on X. While the news is a relief for older Switch owners who plan to buy new gaming titles this holiday season, there’s a catch. Here’s everything you need to know.
Nintendo Switch 2 Will Be Backward Compatible, But There’s a Catch
The brand announced the original Nintendo Switch in 2015. To recall, earlier this year, Furukawa announced that the successor to the Nintendo Switch 2 would be announced within this fiscal year before March 31, 2025. Switch fans’ most common concern was whether the latest model would be backwards compatible with the original. The company has now confirmed that it will indeed be backwards compatible.
古川です。本日の経営方針説明会で、Nintendo Switchの後継機種ではNintendo Switch向けソフトも遊べることを公表しました。また、Nintendo Switch Onlineも後継機種で引き続きご利用いただけるようにします。これらNintendo Switchとの互換性を含む後継機種の詳しい情報は、後日改めてご案内します。
— 任天堂株式会社（企業広報・IR） (@NintendoCoLtd) November 6, 2024
However, there’s a catch here. While the social media post confirms that the Nintendo Switch software will be playable on the successor, it doesn’t mention anything about the physical media or cartridges. The last line in the post about compatibility with the Nintendo Switch raises some questions.
The post hints that the original Switch cartridges may not be fully compatible with the new Switch 2. This means that the successor will continue to support the downloadable games. Additionally, Nintendo confirms that Switch Online will “continue to be available on the successor device.” Nintendo has promised more details about the Switch 2 at a later date.
According to the company briefing for the fiscal year ending March 2025, the company wants to ensure the success of Switch 2 by ensuring that the 100+ million active Nintendo Switch users can carry over their games to the next console. Nintendo also mentions that users will be able to play their existing games and choose from new titles released for the successor.
The Nintendo Switch 2 is rumoured to have an 8-inch LCD screen with a 120Hz refresh rate, a custom NVIDIA processor, DLSS 3.5, and AI Ray Reconstruction for ray tracing. A recent rumour revealed that the console might feature 12GB of RAM, 2x 6GB LPDDR5X modules capable of 7,500MT/s transfer speed, and 256GB of UFS 3.1 internal storage.
