Nintendo announced this week that it will stop selling the original Switch in Europe next February. The reason? A European regulation requiring easily replaceable batteries in consumer electronics. Rather than redesign the older models, Nintendo’s just pulling them from that market.
That got people asking: how much longer does the Switch have globally?
Ars Technica ran the numbers on Nintendo’s earnings data, and the picture is interesting. Historically, Nintendo’s bestselling hardware tends to fade to zero sales after about nine years. The Wii was barely selling anything by its ninth year — less than 1% of its peak. The Switch? It still shipped 3.8 million units in its ninth fiscal year. That’s about 13% of its peak.
Software sales tell an even clearer story. Nintendo sold 137 million Switch games last year — still 58% of the platform’s peak. Compare that to the DS, 3DS, and Wii at the same stage in their lives, all selling under 5% of their peak software numbers.
People just keep buying Switch games. It’s weird, and it’s not like anything Nintendo’s done before in the 21st century.
The Switch 2 is clearly Nintendo’s focus now — it sold nearly 20 million units in its first partial year. But the original Switch isn’t going quietly. The data suggests it could keep selling well into its second decade, even as the Switch 2 takes over.
For now, the original Switch is still available everywhere outside Europe. For how long? Nintendo hasn’t said. But if the sales trajectory holds, it might be longer than anyone expects.
