TOKYO, May 8, 2026, 20:01 (JST)
Nintendo said on Friday it will raise Switch 2 prices in Japan, the U.S. and Europe even as it forecast fewer console sales in the year to March 2027, a sharp turn after a strong launch year for its flagship games machine.
The move matters because Nintendo is passing part of a cost shock to consumers while trying to keep the Switch 2 early in its cycle. The company expects higher component costs, especially memory chips — parts used to store data and help run games — and tariffs to add roughly 100 billion yen to costs this financial year.
Price rises also land as hardware momentum is set to cool. Nintendo sold 19.86 million Switch 2 units last fiscal year and now expects 16.5 million, while software sales are forecast to rise to 60 million units from 48.71 million, putting more weight on games after the console’s launch burst.
In Japan, the Japanese-language Switch 2 will rise to 59,980 yen from 49,980 yen on May 25. The U.S. price will rise to $499.99 from $449.99 on Sept. 1, with Canada and Europe also getting increases; Nintendo said similar revisions would be made in other regions.
Results gave Nintendo some room to act. Net sales nearly doubled to 2.313 trillion yen in the year ended March, operating profit rose 27.5% to 360.1 billion yen and net profit climbed 52.1% to 424.1 billion yen, the company’s earnings release showed.
That step-up may not repeat. Nintendo forecast sales of 2.05 trillion yen for the current year, down 11.4%, operating profit of 370 billion yen, up 2.7%, and net profit of 310 billion yen, down 26.9%; its outlook assumes exchange rates of 150 yen to the dollar and 175 yen to the euro.
President Shuntaro Furukawa told an earnings briefing that higher component costs, exchange rates and other factors fed into the price decision, and that Switch 2 profitability would be roughly unchanged from last year after the hikes.
The risk is demand. Serkan Toto, founder of Kantan Games, said Nintendo has a price-sensitive casual audience and is “under more pressure than ever to get more first-party blockbusters out this fiscal year” to drive the system. Reuters
Nintendo pointed to a fuller slate: Yoshi and the Mysterious Book in May, Star Fox in June and Splatoon Raiders in July. It also said Mario Kart World sold 14.70 million units last fiscal year and Donkey Kong Bananza sold 4.52 million, signs the core franchise machine is still working.
Nintendo is not alone. Sony also raised PlayStation 5 prices in the U.S., with the standard model going up $100 to $649.99, while Microsoft previously lifted Xbox console and controller prices; the common thread is higher hardware costs in a market where console prices once tended to fall over time.
But the push through is not clean. Higher prices could slow adoption before Nintendo has built a larger Switch 2 owner base, and if memory costs stay high or game releases miss, the company may have to choose between protecting margins and keeping households in the upgrade cycle.
Nintendo’s shares rose 3.6% after the earnings announcement, AP reported. For investors, the day’s message was mixed: the Switch 2 is a hit, but the easy part of its launch is over.
