There are more rumors surrounding the Switch 2 than any other console I can remember in recent memory. People are dying to know what Nintendo has planned for the successor to its most successful gaming device ever. In the first few weeks of 2025, we’ve heard so many claims about what the Switch 2 will be or what it will bring to the table that it has become nearly impossible to guess what The Big N actually has in store.
With yet another rumor stating the console will be unveiled this week, we thought it would be prudent to compile the majority of the rumors into a list and rank their plausibility with a simple rating. While the majority of internet rumors are a bunch of nonsense from people claiming to be insiders, there is usually a grain of truth to the “leaks” coming from industry insiders. That muddying of the waters is what makes determining which claim is real or not extra difficult.
So instead of speculating endlessly (especially since we’ll probably know in a few days now), here are all of the biggest and most outlandish Switch 2 rumors with a star rating on how realistic they might be. Everything will be ranked on a five-star scale with no half points because we’re not going to get extra hardcore here.
Switch 2 will be released in 2025
Honestly, this almost doesn’t feel like a rumor with how much we’ve heard from denizens online and even some peripheral manufacturers, but Nintendo has not confirmed that the Switch 2 actually will release in 2025. It would make no sense to delay the console any further, especially since the current Switch is fast approaching its eighth birthday. On the flip side, we know of a handful of Switch 1 games releasing this year, including Metroid Prime 4, so anything is possible.
Even still, this one gets: 5/5 Stars
Metroid Prime 4 will be a cross-generation game
Now, this rumor isn’t really something that is making the rounds, but there is precedent from Nintendo’s past. When the Wii came out in 2006, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess launched alongside it despite being developed as a GameCube game. It wouldn’t hit the purple lunchbox for another month, but it showed that Nintendo was willing to cater to new and old audiences by not leaving anyone out in the cold. The company would repeat that trick with The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild in 2017 on both Wii U and Switch. There’s not currently another Zelda in development (that we know of), but Metroid Prime 4 has a nebulous 2025 date and has been hotly anticipated for nearly 20 years. I’m not a betting man, but I do think it’s likely Samus’ big 3D return will be a cross-gen game.
This rumor gets: 4/5 Stars.
Final Fantasy VII: Remake and Rebirth will be released on Switch 2
This is a fairly recent rumor, but according to Nate the Hate’s podcast, Square Enix will be porting both Final Fantasy VII: Remake and Rebirth to Nintendo’s new platform sometime in the future. Considering Square Enix’s history with Nintendo’s platform this generation, that’s actually incredibly plausible. Likely the only reason Remake isn’t on the current Switch is that Nintendo’s device cannot run it reliably. I’m surprised there wasn’t a cloud version like with Kingdom Hearts, but Square Enix probably saw the dire “sales” of that collection and decided against “porting” Remake. There was likely also some exclusivity in place with Sony, which did prevent both Remake and Rebirth from hitting PC for nearly a year each.
Square Enix has also recently revealed that FFVII: Rebirth did not meet sales expectations and that the company would be pivoting away from console exclusivity almost entirely in the future. Given that video games still need to make money at the end of the day, having these two titles on more platforms is only going to be beneficial for Square Enix. In all honestly, I’m fairly certain both will be on Xbox alongside Switch 2.
Because of all of that, though with some doubt still in the air, this rumor gets: 4/5 Stars.
Switch 2 Joy-Con optical sensor will double as a mouse
Plenty of images of the Switch 2 Joy-Con have leaked online ahead of any presentation Nintendo has planned for the device. While it was obvious to assume that there would be some modification to the controllers, anything else relating to changes was pretty much pure speculation. What these images confirmed, however, is that the Switch 2 Joy-Con will utilize a magnetic mechanism to attach to the console and that there is an optical sensor on the left Joy-Con.
The popular rumor that emerged out of Reddit is that this sensor will allow the Joy-Con to double as a mouse. It’s not a completely unreal idea, though, since Lenovo actually implemented something similar in its Legion Go handheld PC. Where the issue crops up is that there is no logical reason why Nintendo would implement such a feature for its successor console. Datamining has noted that SNES mouse support is secretly hiding in the Switch Online’s SNES emulator, but Nintendo wouldn’t wait for an entirely new console to make that idea a reality. The console is also not a hotbed for FPS games, even if the Switch 2 could run those better. Gyro controls get the job done for most people.
Until we see some games that implement mouse-like control, this rumor gets: 1/5 Stars.
Switch 2’s Dock points to vastly improved performance
As with the Joy-Con images that leaked online, images of the Switch 2’s dock have made the rounds thanks to industry pundit Laura Kate Dale. She has been very reliable in the past (including revealing the existence of Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle), so there isn’t much reason to doubt the legitimacy of her photos. What we can cast doubt on, however, is that the dock reveals that Nintendo’s next console will be vastly superior to the first. This rumor got started because Dale claims the Switch 2 will ship with a 60-watt power supply instead of the 30-watt one the current Switch uses.
Now, obviously, the Switch 2 will be a more powerful system than its predecessor. Nintendo wouldn’t have a reason to sell a new console if it wasn’t improved in some manner. Much like with how docks for the OLED refresh included an HDMI 2.0 port over the original dock’s HDMI 1.4 port, though, I don’t believe the change in wattage reveals much of anything. The Switch 2 probably does consume more power, but 30-watt power supplies aren’t as common in 2025 as they were in 2017. That same thing follows with HDMI ports, with HDMI 2.0 completely supplanting HDMI 1.4 by the time the OLED model was released.
For those reasons above, this rumor gets: 2/5 Stars.
Switch 2 will have full Nvidia DLSS compatibility
Image upscaling is the big thing in PC GPUs right now and all of that was spurred by Nvidia’s implementation of DLSS with its RTX 20xx graphics cards back in 2018. Released nearly two years after the first Switch hit retail shelves, DLSS practically revolutionized how visuals are rendered by making use of specific AI tensor cores on each RTX card to take lower-resolution textures and output and scale them up to higher resolutions. Since Nintendo has a close partnership with Nvidia for the Switch and Switch 2’s APU (which is a fancy term for a CPU with integrated graphics), rumors have been hitting the internet for years that a successor would make full usage of DLSS.
This rumor was further given credence when a patent filed by Nintendo before the end of 2024 hinted at a form of image upscaling being available for the Switch 2. Spotted by Laura Kate Dale, the patent didn’t specifically refer to DLSS, but mentioned that the new device will utilize a form of AI upscaling to produce higher-resolution image output. I mean, who wouldn’t assume that is DLSS? Sony even recently entered the AI upscale market with PSSR on the PS5 Pro, which certainly points to all console manufacturers doing it in the future.
The thing is, we still don’t know if Nvidia is going to implement what we know as DLSS into the Switch 2. For one, DLSS is very power-hungry and the higher-end GPUs require ridiculous amounts of cooling to function. For two, the Switch 2 is unlikely to be a dedicated gaming box that could accommodate larger cooling, so it may not be feasible to have the exact same upscaling method on Nintendo’s platform. Then again, RTX laptop GPUs feature DLSS and they are relatively small, so who knows?
Because of some uncertainty, this rumor gets: 3/5 Stars.
Halo: The Master Chief Collection will be ported to Switch 2
Coming from the same source as the Final Fantasy VII: Remake port rumor, it has been speculated that Microsoft will be putting its premiere FPS franchise on Nintendo’s next-generation device. As Nate the Hate claimed, Master Chief will make his official Nintendo debut (if we exclude Fortnite) when Halo: The Master Chief Collection gets ported to the new hybrid console. The rumor isn’t total hogwash as Microsoft has been surprisingly willing to port games to Nintendo’s platforms. Both Ori games are available on Switch and recent ports of Grounded and Pentiment have expanded Xbox’s presence on Switch. Nintendo and Microsoft have also collaborated to get Banjo and Kazooie into Smash Bros. Ultimate as well as provide both N64 Banjo games and even Perfect Dark on the Switch Online service.
Where I start to think this isn’t likely is that the current Halo games are built on much older technology. While it’s not impossible to port these games to different platforms, other rumors regarding the future of Halo suggest that a Halo 7, or whatever its final title will be, will shift development to Unreal Engine 5 and release on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Switch 2. Being on Unreal Engine would make multiplatform development much easier and while the PS5 could likely brute force the current Halo games into running smoothly, Switch 2’s mobile architecture might not cope well.
While not entirely implausible, this rumor gets: 2/5 Stars.
Switch 2 will utilize MicroSD Express storage cards
Another rather recent rumor, images of GameStop’s inventory system have made the rounds online claiming that the Switch 2 will utilize the newer MicroSD Express storage format. The current Switch can have its storage expanded with regular MicroSD cards and even the higher capacity SDXC cards, but it cannot use the SDUC format (which is vastly higher in capacity). These cards are relatively cheap and are great for storing games, but they run at slower speeds than the Switch’s internal memory and even sometimes the cartridges. SD Express, however, can offer similar to SSD performance, with rated read/write speeds up to 3,490 MB/s.
Now, this would be a big win for the Switch 2 as gamers have gotten used to SSD speeds with the Xbox Series X|S and PS5. Both Microsoft and Sony made the move to solid-state storage for its next-gen consoles and it vastly improved loading times and general performance. The current Switch is still pretty decent, all things considered, but having speedier storage would be a big improvement. That doesn’t necessarily point to Nintendo actually making the change, but regular MicroSD cards aren’t as prevalent in 2025 as they were in 2017 (which echoes the statement I made about HDMI ports up above). SD Express is also not even that new with its first iteration hitting retailers in 2018, so it’s not cost-prohibitive to include support.
With these factors considered, this rumor gets: 3/5 Stars.
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Written by Peter Glagowski
Peter has been a freelance gaming and film critic for over seven years. His passion for Nintendo is only matched by the size of his collection.
