Nintendo Switch 2 could be announced this week: The rumors (and facts) so far

With CES 2025 finally in the rearview, it’s time to move on to the next round of big hardware announcements. Rumors have swirled over the past few weeks pointing to an imminent announcement for the next generation of Nintendo’s highly successful hybrid Switch console.

In particular, the sound from the art firm Eurogamer (among others) a 16 January announcement – ie Thursday. If the really big reveal is coming this week, it points to more incremental announcements. The company will probably release a Nintendo Direct information instead of one, big keynote with specs, availability and launch titles.

We know for sure that the company was eyeing a Q1 announcement for the Switch 2 — preferably, before the end of March 2025. Another key bit confirmed by Nintendo is the device’s backward compatibility with its predecessor. That’s good news for the 150 million or so who bought the first Switch.

The biggest question at this point is how big of an upgrade we’re ultimately talking about here. Nintendo’s console names have basically hinted at major departures for each subsequent generation. With a few exceptions — like the ill-fated Wii U — things have been much less straightforward than with Sony’s PlayStation

It’s reasonable to expect that the Switch 2 will be an evolution of the existing product rather than a meaningful departure. After all, Nintendo spent some time in the wilderness ahead of the Switch’s March 2017 launch. The convertible form factor and some truly excellent titles were precisely what the company needed to re-establish itself in a dramatically different gaming landscape after the Wii U’s stumble.

There’s no doubt that the new console will best the original’s specs, but it’s also important to temper expectations given Nintendo’s history. The days of going toe-to-toe with competitors on components like GPUs are decades in the company’s past.

Other rumors include: magnetic Joy-Cons and screen size going up from 8 inches to 8 inches on the Classic Switch and 7 Switch OLED, arriving in late 2021. Between those console upgrades and the portable, budget-minded model that Nintendo introduced in 2019 with the Switch Lite, upgrades have been made along the way.

[Nintendo Switch 2 not pictured]