Japanese Charts: Switch 2 Crushes PS2 To Become Fastest-Selling Console Ever

What can I say? Well done. I remember the SNES days with the Players Choice stickers on the box indicating sales of 1 million+ as a big feat. Must seem humorous now considering how many games blow that out the water, including MKW nearing it in first week in Japan alone

Woohoo! Woohoooo!

Well deserved, in my opinion. All I needed was a more powerful and smoother Switch, and we have that for the next generation. I'm good.

It'll be harder for Nintendo to stock up than smash Japanese sales records. If you thought Nintendo dominated Japan before...

That's an impressive feat considering the stock shortages that have been reported about Japan. Seems Nintendo really did stockpile Switch 2s.

Ohhh my, Nintendo is doing well! I love my S2 also, and I hope everybody that wanted one is enjoying it! Besides World I also did not find the other releases very tempting. I did get Kunitsu gami, which is a lovely game so far!

Amazing numbers. Will definitely be curious if it can maintain sales over the coming weeks.

@JohnnyMind Mario Kart World is almost at 800K, not 80K

That's good to hear, and I'm glad to see that Nintendo stock piled a bunch of them. The only problem I've run into on mine so far is when I put the Switch 2 in the dock while GameChat is up my controllers stop working and I have to restart the Switch 2. It's weird, but I'm sure Nintendo will fix it in a system patch.

@Olliemar28 When you say it outsold the other consoles combined, did you mean the current weekly figures (which it certainly has!), or the launch figures for the other consoles?

Either way, well done S2!!

Like it would be anything else. Nintendo's appeal to it's local market is near unmatched.

Even with Switch 2's release, the Switch 1 family still sold more than sixteen thousand units, weird but still impressive.

To be fair, a lot of those other consoles had very limited supply at launch. Who knows what their sales numbers might’ve been had they had the stock that Nintendo prepared for the Switch 2 launch?

Welcome to Nintendoland.
Population: Nintendo

@NorrinRadd
Which other consoles are you talking about?

Amazing result and one that is well earned off the back of the original Switch.

For my part I am totally sold on the console and I only hope that some of the recent announcements that haven't yet been made for Switch 2 are waiting for a Nintendo direct.

Glad to see the console and Mario Kart sold well.

Physical 3rd party sales aren't great though. Hopefully that will improve.

They delayed release to have inventory and that was the smartest move Nintendo could do - I myself wished it was out sooner but the fact they could make more and sell more more then satisfy their share holders leaving us Switch 2 in the cold reality more inventory means better for Nintendo and those looking to get one or replace their Switch 1 and for the Console warriors to bite their lips.

1. Switch 2 947,931 - NEW

2 . PlayStation 5 14,535 - 5,690,661

These two comparisons is all one needs to know. And when the one month comes in if they hit the 15mils I be surprised...

Interesting to see PS5 Slim model still able to sell 14K units despite being outnumbered by Switch 2.

Apparently sales from My Nintendo Store are not included here, so the actual numbers should be even higher.

@Anti-Matter
Playstation 5 needs to keep going a very, VERY long way.

No surprise, they basically gave the switch 2 away in Japan.

OLED Switch is nearing the 10 million milestone. Oh, and Switch 2 is obliterating the competition. Good to see.

@NorrinRadd I don’t think the Japanese population is interested in Xbox regardless if it’s in stock or not.

Love it! Nintendo is so important to gaming that it makes me happy to see the succeed (when deserved, of course). I help contribute to launch sales with one unit. Still have 4 more Switch units in my home to upgrade, hopefully all before Christmas.

I don't know whether to be happy or not for this because I still think Nintendo needs another lesson in humbling, but as a fan it is nice to see regardless.

So it’s outsold the entire Xbox Series in one week…not bad.

Inb4 Jimbo announces “actually….PS2 sold even more copies during this time…”

Also glad to see S2 do well despite the attempts of some people in gaslighting that the system would flop because “too expensive”.

Wow for the first time in ages the PS5 family (not counting PS4) in combined numbers actually beat the Switch family (not counting Switch 2) in combined numbers. That's actually impressive. Hopefully the PS5 live longer than the PS3 does. I can't wait to get back to the Mortal Kombat World again this Summer.

@TrogdorTheBurninator trying too hard. 2/10 trolling…

All hail the king! By the end of this month, the Switch 2 would have already sold 5 to 6 million units worldwide. It's amazing, what Nintendo has achieved.

Nintendo is going to make a resounding case again that power & having all the trendy bells and whistles isn't everything. There was so much speculation that they'd be stuck behind the times without supercharging the Switch 2 because of all the superior powered Switch-likes that have come out in the last seven years. Nevermind that the Game Boy and both DS lines proved that point already, but hey maybe people will remember it this time.

Japan usually accounts for anywhere between 20-33% of total sales for games/hardware. So if the hardware prediction for Switch 2 is supposed to be ~20 million worldwide by 31Mar2026, that means it could possibly surpass the PS5 in the Japanese market in under a year. Practically 1 million new consoles sold in the first weekend is a very strong start for the Switch 2 to hitting projections.

Waaaaaaahooooooo.

3d Mahreo. Announce it Nintendo

It's crazy the numbers the Switch 2 is pulling rn. Definitely shows Nintendo's dominance over Japan's gaming sphere. Only surprise here is that SF6 isn't on the charts considering how it's big in Japan rn, but I guess if Capcom counts it as digital sales at retail, maybe Famitsu doesn't track it because I would have to assume that's doing very well for Capcom.

Keep in mind, there were over 2 million confirmed people that signed up for the My Nintendo lottery. If Nintendo had the stock it could've just as easily been double what it did...😲

@WiltonRoots 2/10? You’re being generous

@Fighting_Game_Loser I was thinking the same, concerning SF6 being considered digital.

@AmplifyMJ I know I know, but the sun’s out and I’m in a good mood…finished work early too…

@WiltonRoots ha ha well I’m very happy you’re in a good mood 😊

@AmplifyMJ Thursday’s the new Friday! 😃

Someone on here is just needs time out from NL and internet and just play some decent games on Switch 2.

With Nintendo store sales it should be over a million.

Maybe this will silence that weird group of people on social media who seem heavily invested in the Switch 2 launch being a total failure. Probably not, though.

@JohnnyMind I'm so glad Rune Factory is doing relatively well. I feel like this new entry was a bit of a risk, and it seems to be paying off!

@Keman

"He's ruining this site."

oh good lord just ignore him already 🙄

@Pak-Man Love to see it. I agree though, they will keep spinning the yarn of it being a failure for a little while longer best they can. Kinda unwravelling by the day though.

@TheExile285

I got Cyberpunk physical. I would have bought Street Fighter VI physical, but it's a game key card. I'd rather just buy a digital version than a game key card.

@Yosher I don't know whether to be happy or not for this because I still think Nintendo needs another lesson in humbling
What are you referring to here? Please elaborate how their console comes in far less then the competitors price hikes on their own system now?

@Pak-Man It'll just get them to goal post move. "It'll flop" will turn into "It'll fall off" which will turn into "it will only do as well as 3DS/GBA" will turn into "it won't beat the Switch so its a failure". And if it manages to beat the Switch it'll be "it hasn't outsold Wii and DS put together ".

These people always just blunder ahead ignoring what they said before. The Switch 2 would have to sell a quarter of a billion and break all records year after year before they'll run out of ways to pretend it isn't a success.

Super impressive numbers. Nearly 1M in a single week is nuts.

@Crecca Yeah because the GC, WiiU and Virtual Boy didn't happen.

Maybe get over yourself and accept they've once again just made a good console people want to own?

@Johnny44 honestly he is just part of the furniture around here and most who have been here for a while have learned to ignore/tolerate his ways.

I wouldn't put much stock in any of it.

Most people don't even bother reacting.

@Dr_Lugae Exactly how it played out with the Switch. Passed all their previous home consoles: “yeah but it’s a handheld! It should be judged against the 3DS. Wii doesn’t count. Lightning in a bottle. Microsoft won that gen!!!”

Passes 3DS: “yeah but it will never catch the Wii!” (even though they said it didn’t count)

Passes the Wii: “It’ll never pass the PS4!” etc etc rinse and repeat….

Gets close to the PS2: Jim Ryan magically finds a few million more PS2s in his sphincter…

@WiltonRoots it’s funny because I was late outta work and I had to walk home in the POURING rain here, then go back down the street to get my daughter 😆 I’m playing MK8D on my Switch 1 while every single person currently online on my Friend List is playing there shiny Switch 2s… but I’m in a good mood too regardless 😊

@Crecca go on mate. Smile. Give your face a treat. 😀

wow. sony needs to change their strat if the got outsold by a console thats a friggin week old.

No, I do not visit Push Square.

@Keman
yeaaaahhh that's why i ignored him.

Would have thought that yakuza 0 had bigger sales! The game is so good

@Medic_alert I think last time I responded to him I said “yeah we know…” after hearing his spiel for nearly 10 years it barely registers. It’s a bit like eating outdoors and you get an occasional fly hovering around, a wave of the hand and carry on.

@WiltonRoots that's exactly it. I can see why maybe he has got on people's nerves a touch recently. He has been relentlessly negative around S2 and some of us would quite like to enjoy the first new Nintendo console in 8+ years!

But to be honest, I feel a little sorry for the guy, I hope he is genuinely happy because it all seems a little forced to me in a unhappy attention seeking sort of way.

Does the Mario kart sale figures include the copies included with the console? Because it wouldn't make sense that many people bought the game.

Also, very suprising that the software sales for the switch 2 are so low overall, people basically only bought mario kart.

@Medic_alert yeah generally I just leave him be as I have no idea of his circumstances. I don’t sense any malice in anything he posts whereas there’s loads of other people on here who are just outright tools…

It may be an unpopular opinion but I think the people who whine about trolling/trolls are worse. Just ignore them and move on. I quickly utilize the ignore button on social media platforms when someone is annoying, has a bad attitude, etc... Addressing them just gives them the attention they want. People need to really compartmentalize what's important. And oh yeah, great sales numbers for Nintendo.😆

@Johnny44

"I put him on ignore about a year ago because he gets on my nerves but I still see everyone else’s comments to him so it’s no better really!"

it seems the we have something in common then: the people complaining about his posts are actually more annoying than the posts ✌️

Nintendoom in 3...2...1...

Seriously though, I'm glad to see it. I hope Nintendo has a Direct this month to keep the hype train rolling, and I hope that hype can roll the Switch 2 to 100+ million units.

@Keman

Is he actually causing any harm though? All he does is repeatedly post pro PS5 comments and express his dislike of the Switch 2. He’s not spewing hatred against any marginalised groups or using this place as a soapbox for some extremist political viewpoint. He’s not even trying to get at anyone really.

I like all the regular commenters on here, including him, even if what they say might be sometimes irksome. It’s a very colourful place! It’s like some slightly off-kilter Animal Crossing 😂❤️

👏 👏 👏 Outstanding! Switch 2 is a great piece of hardware. So far so good! 😃

@sethfranum I'm not referring about just the pricing, though that is part of it; Mario Kart World is a expensive as it is solely because it's Mario Kart and they know it sells a ton.
There's also the Welcome Tour that should've been a pack in game.
There's the fact that they release half baked games for no reason sometimes, like recent Mario sports games.
They never intervened with the whole terrible pokémon situation despite being part owner of the franchise.
They got the terrible idea of games key cards that is just terrible for the consumer.
So far, it seems like they have not addressed the joy con drift issues, if the tech is to be believed; though I'm not counting this against them yet so long as there's not mass reports of the issue popping up on Switch 2 yet.
Their monetization on the mobile market is and has been crazy predatory.
Plus they could be a bit more transparent about certain things regarding their workers, like why are we suddenly seeing their voice actors being treated like garbage; incident or is it a common occurrence? Does it happen with more people than just their voice actors?

I just miss humble Nintendo man. 😔

@Arawn93 Actually they both sold even more than Famitsu reported. They don't have access to the mynintendo store, which had over 2.2 million people apply for the preorder lottery. So that must have sold additional couple 100k at least. And back then I remember that Sony reported over 900k sold at launch because they sold about 300k through their own online store at launch whose numbers Famitsu didn't have access to.

@MoldyPasta The PS5 didn't get outsold yet though. Soon, but not yet. That PS2 number is for it's own first week.

@WiltonRoots yeah agreed. I don't think he is deliberately trolling or anything.

@TrogdorTheBurninator It's cheaper than elsewhere in Japan, but that's only because of the heavy inflation that Japan suffered and most people didn't get their wages raised enough to make up for everything getting more expensive. The Switch 2 is still more expensive than any console that came before the PS5 in Japan.

@Yosher Tell me when has Nintendo been your friend and Uncle? Never they are in the business of making money from Consoles and Nintendo games. I don't know what your trying to reform but they are not your Friend. They are a Business to make Money $$$ for their shareholders and company. We be lucky as Nintendo consumer they don't jack the prices on us. They have zero incentive to make it less and by the looks of the sales figure from EU, NA, JPN and others not reported yet - in the minority camp isn't what they aren't looking at.

@Yosher humble Nintendo never existed. They've been ruthless forever.

@sethfranum I never said they're my friend, please stop reading things I didn't type. A company can make money and still do right by the consumer. But I know they have no incentive when they're making this much bank, which brings me back to my original comment on not knowing whether or not to be happy about their success here.

@WiltonRoots They absolutely have had their humble moments, particularly under Iwata. Lest you forget the man cut his own salary to do right by his own employees and they cut the 3DS price by a lot, and gave early adopters free games as compensation. And Reggie fought to get Wii Sports as a pack in. The Mario sports games used to be chock full of content. Their controllers used to be super high quality with little to no issues across the board. Etc.

They've always been a business first and foremost, of course. They need to make money. But they can be more humble in certain aspects if they want to be. If you really think Nintendo has always been ruthless then you don't really know Nintendo.

@Keman let him post whatever he likes. You don’t like his opinions? Hit the ignore button.
Ganging up and bullying someone from the community goes against the rules and you’ll meet up with a greater force defending him than the occasional complainers like you.

What good Nintendolife has is a respectable community. We may not agree with opinions but we do not gang up on users.
This isn't IGN.

I'll openly come on here and admit comments of the past were unnecessary on occasion. No offence to the commentor in question intended and generally only intended as a bit of jest.

Anti Matter you have my apology. We are all gamers and I don't want to see anyone picked on.

Keep being you.

Edit ..... I'm not not likely to jump on the bandwagon of PS5 but 20 ish years ago, I was a demon on Dance, Dance Revolution. I'm more dad dancing these days 😃👍

Pointless comparison to be honest, as gaming wasn't as big back then as it is now. But great to see the switch 2 doing great, these sales just prove how big gaming has become. Who would have guessed this back then.

These numbers are magnificent, I'm hoping for the Switch 2 to be as successful as the first, with great games coming on a steady rate. Next month DK is gonna smash the charts, for sure

@Keman quit being dramatic and let the man do his thing, there are hundreds of other comments for you to go through.
Instead of adding anything to the community, you're spreading hate, not even related to the article.

There's a big reason why this console beat past consoles and many are not talking about it. More people play video games now than in the past, especially during PS2 era. More variety of people too. A lot more girls as well.
Of course, portability and exclusives play a big role so those 3 are what made this a hit.
Then, add the fact that most of us couldn't stand the first Switch anymore and were eagerly waiting for a more powerful unit.

This comment will be frowned upon but it actually disturbs me that Mario Kart is selling very well. This means $80 will likely be the standard price for first party Nintendo games going forward and they might even test waters with $85-$90 MSRP. Nintendo is not exactly a consumer friendly company and they tend to become arrogant when they are at the height of success. I don’t want Nintendo to fail or lose money but at the same time it might not be good for consumers if they are too successful.

Good start, but that’s not too surprising. The important part will be the ongoing sales. The die hards have grabbed theirs, it remains to be seen if the general audience will follow

So much for those boycotts...

In about 3-5 years, Sony is going to magically discover that the PS2 actual sold a few more million units

@Don I think it’s pretty safe to say that Nintendo is at its best when it’s back is against the wall. That’s kind of how nature works. Fight or flight puts organisms into superstrength overdrive.

My hope and prediction is that they are going to make the next major Mario title truly innovative. Since they didn’t do that with the hardware this time. Do it with the flagship series instead. Plus, I think there isn’t much left to do with the 3D Mario formula. I have no idea how they push it to a new level, but if they can I will have a lot of faith restored.

interesting when the ps2 came out in 2000 in japan the population in japan in 2025 has actually decreased by 3 million..

Well congrats to Nintendo! The sales are well earned.

@Yosher HUH? that makes no sense here. Believe what you want to believe they were never humble they are In the Business to make money.... End of Story.

@Crecca You can still get it for $50 (or £35 in the UK) as a pack in...which I think most people opted for. Definitely what I'm opting for.

@Yosher That was one short period out of many decades, both guys used to get slated non-stop, "Iwata should step down", "Fire Reggie" and "Nintendo should go third party" were pretty much being used as punctuation marks around these parts, not forgetting "If Yamauchi was still here he would have slapped some sense into him" but at the same time there were still tons of Nintendo lawsuits and copyright strikes flying around during that very rough patch...those were strange times.

I think it's too early to comment on third party title sales, despite the lower numbers so far. IIRC, third party sales on Switch 1 also took time to find their stride. But there's a lot of caveats to these numbers.

@lovesushi Apparently it's up on the eShop charts.

@Yosher I agree with everything you said, however. . . everything you described was during Iwata's stewardship. Satoru Iwata truly was a singular individual, and the entire game industry was changed for the better due to his influence.

But with that said, Nintendo certainly has been ruthless during other eras; during the NES era they were incredibly strict with software, as well as the N64 era when they pulled out the rug from underneath Sony, the sheer indignation of such an action resulting in one of the main pillars of the industry.

At the end of the day, Nintendo is wise and prescient, and they will do exactly what they need to at the given moment. Ultimately, I agree with you that a little bit of struggle would make them hustle much harder to generate good will with customers.

Unfortunately they simply don't need to do that right now.

For genuinely abusive trolls who can’t abide by the Community Rules, there’s the Report button. For those whose greatest crime is being ‘consistently annoying’, there’s the Ignore button.

If you try to ‘fix’ annoying people with abuse, you end up in the former category. Better just to use the second option and not subject yourself to their tedious, repetitive soapbox.

Anyway, still waiting for a chance to pick up my Switch 2. Haven’t even been eligible to enter the lottery because my NSO account is registered to the wrong region!

@Don
It remains to be seen how well MKW is selling for $80.
Most sales so far is probably from bundle sales.

@BTB20
It was obviously too cheap.

And they would have sold 3 million in Japan if they would have had the units to sell and that includes the 2.2 million people that signed up for pre-orders at Nintendo of Japan. But they didn't.

Makes me wonder what the production rate is right now because I thought they were producing since December and figured we would have 7 million available globally June 5th.

But we got half that. Which suggests 500,000 per month.

That backfill is going to be really tough until they ramp up.

@TrogdorTheBurninator It doesnt remain to be seen. Based on Nintendo's projections of 7million software sales from bundles and 15million Switch 2s, only 45% of systems they're going to be selling will be MK bundles.

So the sorts of figures 80-95% attach rates (95% in France) means there's lots of physical copies of Mario Kart World selling.

@Dr_Lugae
Was not asking for Nintendos projections.
Just saying that the actual sales of $80 games remains to be seen.
But let's hope you are right and that $80 games is a success.

@Thorgaer
Would you say Kunitsu gami is heavy on strategy? I don't really like strategy games but everything else about the game is very tempting to me. To make it clear I really don't like anything that asks me to produce and manage ressources and I'm not into multitasking. I'm okay with strategy as long as it's a small amount of units, and focused on combat, preferably with real time and action elements.

Hey @mlt, the strategy seems to be mostly unit placement, healing units and giving units tasks like repairing a boundary or other object. You collect units, scout the area and collect some resources during daytime. Then you fight along with and command your units during night time. There is no realtime base building. Only inbetween missions you start repairs and upgrade your units. Hope this helps!

@Thorgaer
Thanks I appreciate you taking the time to answer I understand from what you're saying that it's more my type of strategy elements so it sounds like it's going to stay in my wishlist then!

@Galaxy2IsTheGOAT
For me the best Mario games were from the NES to N64 era. I especially loved Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World. The Mario games over the past 20 years are good but feels like they reused too many things from past games, even the music constantly gets reused in the New Super Mario Bros games. I hope we get some Mario games with new enemies, Bowser and his Koopa gang are used way too many times. I wouldn’t mind if they make a sequel to Super Mario Bros. 2 and bring back enemies like Wart, Mouser, Phantos and Fryguy from that game.

@Galaxy2IsTheGOAT they can't do that, the reason they're currently saying "over 160 million units" is because it's on record that they manufactured just over 160 million and if they were to claim they made 161 million it would be an outright lie. There's apparently some documentary evidence where they inscribed the internal casing of the final machine with the production number but I've never seen it, it's only what others have said on comment sections so take that as you will.
The only way I could see them increasing the numbers is if they decided to make a mini classic console and add those sales numbers to the total, but I'm not sure they have any appetite to do that

@Dr_Lugae I mean this is probably their least creative console they've made in over 20 years but if you wanna pay 500 for an update I won't stop you