Nintendo Switch 2 is finally here. After months of speculation, leaks, and enough blurry photos to fill a Bigfoot archive, the successor to Nintendo’s hybrid marvel is available to buy and surprisingly, it hasn’t vanished into the ether just yet. Whether you’re a returning Switch owner eager to upgrade or a fresh face finally tempted by Nintendo’s handheld charms, there are no queues, backlogs, or wishlists, it’s just smooth sailing adding the console to your cart – but it might not stay that way with such high demand.
Amazon UK is offering up both a standalone unit for £395.99 and a Mario Kart World bundle that bumps the price to £429.99. This is a download code for a digital version rather than the physical cartridge, but it still saves you £33 from buying the racing game separately. Both bundles come with a set of Joy-Con 2 controllers and the charging dock, just like the original.
Nintendo Switch 2
Experience the next generation of handheld gaming with all the Nintendo exclusives past and present.
So what makes this second-gen Switch worth the leap? A fair bit, actually. The display has seen a sizeable upgrade to a 7.9-inch 1080p LCD panel, now capable of HDR10 and a silky up to 120Hz refresh rate, making handheld gaming feel far more modern. Inside, you’ll find Nvidia’s custom Tegra T239 SoC, paired with 12GB of LPDDR5X memory and 256GB of internal storage, with faster load times and smoother performance across the board.
One of the biggest quality-of-life improvements lies in the redesigned Joy-Con 2 controllers, which now snap on magnetically (goodbye rails), boast upgraded rumble tech, and even support mouse-like functionality for games and system navigation. Battery life is improved, build quality feels sturdier, and the dock has had a glow-up too, now supporting 4K upscaling when in TV mode.
You also get a few software tricks like GameChat, Nintendo’s overdue answer to modern voice and video chat. Although it does finally bring the social experience somewhat in line with what the rest of the industry has offered for years, do keep in mind that it offers a maximum of 12 people on a call, which isn’t ideal – then again, I can’t remember the last time I had 12 friends together in one digital lobby.
Best of all, the Switch 2 supports backward compatibility with most existing Switch games, meaning your library (and backlog) doesn’t have to start from scratch. You’ll still need to purchase Switch 2 Editions of existing Switch 1 games if you want the performance upgrades, such as better graphics and frame rates, but nothing’s stopping you from popping in the original and starting a new save file.
Given Nintendo’s infamous track record for understocked launches, it’s refreshing to see the UK buck that trend. That said, it’s a very different story across the pond, where Amazon US is, for all intents and purposes, pretending this launch never happened. Following a falling out, the retailer and console maker no longer see eye to eye, with no official Nintendo store anywhere on the website.
The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom was notable for breaking the stalemate between both companies as the first Nintendo first-party game sold directly by Amazon in 2024 after pre-orders for both Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD and Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door were suddenly cancelled without rhyme or reason. At the time of writing, it remains the only title to do so, as even gift cards are missing from the platform.
There are musings across the internet blaming Amazon’s overly efficient delivery pipeline seeing games land on doorsteps ahead of their release date, but neither Amazon nor Nintendo have commented on the reason why the freeze occurred in the first place. If there is a semblance of truth to that, there’s still some hope Switch 2 could join the ranks once again but I wouldn’t recommend holding your breath.
Follow Club386 on Google News to keep up with the latest tech deals, restocks, and reviews as they land. We’ll keep monitoring the situation to see if it changes and you’ll get a notification if the two whopping congolomerates come to an agreement.
