The Nintendo Switch 2 has officially been announced

Nintendo shared the first details about the Nintendo Switch 2 in a video published Thursday. Nintendo isn’t giving a specific release date for the console other than “2025.”

The console is very similar to the original, but it is larger. In the video, the Joy-Con controllers are black with colored accents, and they attach to the side of the console instead of sliding on and off. The Joy-Cons seem to click quite easily – leaks have suggested they could be attached via magnets.

There’s a new button below the home button on the right Joy-Con that had appeared in leaks. The video also appears to show the Joy-Cons being used in the same way as a mouse. And the SL and SR buttons on the Joy-Cons are larger than on the original Switch.

On top of the Switch 2, there’s a new USB-C port next to the 3.5mm headphone jack. The stand has a new design — it’s more U-shaped. The dock for the Switch 2 has a more rounded design. And just like with the original Switch, there will also be a separate controller grip that you can snap the Joy-Cons into.

The only game shown is what appears to be a new one Mario Kart title. But the console will be backwards compatible with both physical and digital Nintendo Switch games — though the video warns that “certain Nintendo Switch games may not be supported on or fully compatible with Nintendo Switch 2.”

Nintendo is promising to share more details in a Nintendo Switch 2-focused Direct on April 2, 2025. The specific time will be shared “at a later date.”

The first Switch was also a massive sales hit. The company says itso far, it has sold 146.04 million units, making the console its second best-selling video game system behind the original Nintendo DS, which sold 154.02 million units. The Switch’s sales figures also mean it has surpassed the Nintendo Wii (101.63 million units), Game Boy (118.69 million units) and Nintendo 3DS (75.94 million units).

While we’ve been waiting years for a true Switch sequel, the console received mid-term hardware updates along the way. The Nintendo Switch Lite was a great way to play Switch games on a smaller device, and the Nintendo Switch OLED added a beautiful screen and a handful of other nice upgrades.

Beginning in December, alleged information about Nintendo’s next console began to leak out from accessory manufacturers. Dbrand, for example, gave us what it believed to be actual dimensions of the hardware and said its “understanding” was that the Joy-Con controllers would be magnetically attached. And at CES 2025, Genki showed off a 3D-printed mockup of what it thought the Switch’s successor would look like.