The Nintendo Switch 2 is off to an incredible start, selling 3.5 million units globally in just its first four days on the market.
Nintendo is selling as many Switch 2 units as it can make, but the massive hardware launch doesn’t seem to translate to huge game sales, at least for non-Nintendo games. The Game Business reports that in the US, 62% of physical game sales for the Nintendo Switch 2 were for first-party Nintendo games, not including Mario Kart World.
In the UK, once again without including Mario Kart World, 48% of physical game sales were first-party Nintendo games, and with Mario Kart World included in those sales, that number bumps up to 86% of physical game sales going to first-party, Nintendo-made titles. Though you might think this leaves out a big piece of the picture by only focusing on physical sales, in cases where games were available digitally and physically, “over 80% of Switch 2 game sales came from physical retailers,” according to data shared by publishers to The Game Business.
A third-party publisher also told The Game Business that their sales numbers were “below our lowest estimates” for what they expected to sell on the Switch 2. The only third-party game that seems to have had great success on the Switch 2 so far is Cyberpunk 2077, which Circana reported was the third best-selling game in the US during the Switch 2’s launch week.
So, at least on a global scale, it looks like third-party publishers aren’t having the best time on Switch 2, with first-party Nintendo games swallowing up all the attention. But at least regionally, according to Circana analyst and executive director Mat Piscatella, third-party game sales for Switch 2 games are doing much better than they were compared to the Switch 1’s launch.
“Third party unit share of Switch 2 physical software during week 1 just reached shy of 40%,” Piscatella writes on BlueSky. “For month 1 of the Switch launch it was less than 20%.“
“It’s far too early to claim best or worst this or that or whatever when it comes to Switch 2.”
Third party unit share of Switch 2 physical software during week 1 reached just shy of 40%. For month 1 of the Switch launch it was less than 20%.
— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 2025-06-19T17:15:19.742Z
As Piscatella also points out, the Switch 2 has not even been out for a month. We’ll have a better look at sales numbers in due time, and there are also plenty of other factors to consider.
For example, the number of Switch’s available at launch in 2017 is nowhere close to the number of units Nintendo was prepared with for the Switch 2’s launch. There are simply more consoles out in the wild, for people to buy games on.
And that’s before getting into the fact that people buy Nintendo consoles to play Nintendo games. It’s only with the Switch that third-party publishers saw more success on the platform. Piscatella also pointed out in a separate post that as of March 2025, “approximately half of all US owners of either the PS5 or Xbox Series also owned a Switch.“
Someone who has never played Cyberpunk 2077 because they don’t have a console or PC to play it on is more likely to buy it now that it’s on Switch 2 than someone who bought their Switch 2 to play Mario Kart, and already played Cyberpunk on their current-gen console or high-end PC, and that goes for all third-party titles that are essentially ports to the Switch 2 for games that couldn’t run on the Switch.
Again, as Piscatella pointed out, it’s far too early to really say how third-party games will perform on the Switch 2. With the new hardware being capable of more ‘impossible ports’ like the Witcher 3 running on the original Switch, and more new games potentially releasing on Switch 2 alongside PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions, the Switch 2 could still be a good platform for third-party games to thrive.
Though, seemingly that’s contingent on whether Nintendo has a new Mario game out for the console at the same time.
