There should be enough Nintendo Switch 2 consoles to go around, but accessories and physical games may be scarce at launch.
After all this time, Nintendo’s launch plans for the Nintendo Switch 2 feel strangely underprepared. The April showcase wound up omitting a lot of important info, that fans have had to scramble to find on their own, including the price of the console and its games.
As if that wasn’t enough, on the same day as the showcase, Donald Trump laid out his long-promised global tariff plans, which wound up forcing Nintendo to delay Switch 2 pre-orders in both the US and Canada.
Even nearly two weeks later, there remains a lot of uncertainty, especially since Trump’s plans seem to keep changing, but reports suggest that Nintendo has got ahead of things and will have enough console stock to go around.
Ahead of the Switch 2’s reveal, Nintendo said it was taking countermeasures to avoid stock shortages, namely by simply manufacturing a lot of consoles.
While there are no official numbers, it’s claimed that, in the US at least, the Switch 2 should be relatively easy to come by once it arrives on June 5.
On X, Nintendeal (who shares Nintendo related deals and is believed to have contacts at certain retailers) has said GameStop stores are expecting to receive about 100 consoles each. If so, that is a healthy amount of stock.
However, the same may not apply to physical copies of games and Switch 2 accessories. That wouldn’t be too surprising since analysts warned months ago that Trump’s proposed tariffs would be detrimental to the physical games market and push companies into prioritising digital releases.
These claims come after Bloomberg published a report saying Nintendo had already foreseen the effect tariffs would have on and managed to stockpile a lot of Switch 2 units in the US in February.
As a reminder, Nintendo moved some of its console production out of China to Vietnam (since Trump was very public about imposing stronger tariffs on the former) and according to Bloomberg’s data, February 2025 saw Nintendo ship over 725,000 Switch 2 consoles from Vietnam to the US.
That’s more than what was shipped in the previous six months combined. Not to mention it’s the vast majority of Nintendo’s global shipments, with only around 60,600 units going elsewhere.
This doesn’t necessarily mean Nintendo is out of the woods though. Vietnam is still facing tariffs of 10% (which is down from the original 46%) and, according to a Nikkei Asia report, its shipments from China are expected to be subject to tariffs of a whopping 145%.
There were reports of tech goods like smartphones and PCs being exempt from the tariffs, but it’s since been stated that any Chinese-made electronics will instead be moved to a different tariff ‘bucket’ (via BBC).
Even though these tariffs are from the US, this is going to have ramifications for the rest of the world. In fact, Sony has already raised the price of the PlayStation 5 here in the UK as well as Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.
As such, it wouldn’t be shocking if the Switch 2 saw a price hike too, though whether it will do so immediately or at a later date is unclear. But as unfair as it is, console manufacturers would prefer to raise the price by a smaller amount in all countries than increase it by a lot in only the US.
Pre-orders have opened in the UK at select retailers, but they keep selling out almost imediately. Nintendo’s own online storefront still hasn’t made pre-orders available to the public, instead prioritising those with long-standing online subscriptions.
This is part of the company’s efforts to counter scalpers, although it hasn’t been entirely successful since listings for Switch 2 pre-orders have popped up on eBay.
Over in Japan, retailers are so eager to minimise scalping that they’re asking for members of the public to suggest countermeasures. According to Automaton, some ideas include making customers sign a warranty under their name, writing customers’ names inside the Switch 2 box, and even quizzing potential customers on their Nintendo knowledge.
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