There are more than a few burning question up on the air surrounding the launch of Nintendo’s Switch 2 – how much will it cost? What is the release date? What are the launch games? But with the way console launches went over the last generation, many folks are also asking if they’ll even be able to buy one without getting burned on eBay at exorbitant prices. There are two major factors at play here – how many units Nintendo will actually be able to get stateside before pre-orders go live and the console’s subsequent release, as well as how much overtime the scalper bots will be working when listings do go live online. Nintendo has already addressed the latter, and we might have some insight on the former courtesy of some recently surfaced information from dataminers.
Nintendo has already addressed its preparations for Switch 2 scalpers, albeit in less than certain terms. Obviously the brand isn’t going to show its hand when it comes to its tactics to circumvent some of the internet’s worst trolls – scalper bots, but it at least seems to be doing everything it can to help the cause, as fruitless as it may or likely may not be.
Okay so, that’s about as good a step in the right direction as we can expect on that front, but what about manufacturing and importing?
Trump tariffs aside – that’s a whole other issue Nintendo seems to be avoiding by making use of factories outside of China, or at least that’s how it seems right now, Nintendo is going to need to find a way to get millions of Switch 2 units into the U.S. over the next couple months (if it hasn’t already) just to support the first wave of sales, never mind the lion’s share of the 6 million units most analysts say it expects to sell in the first quarter on the market – or something to the tune of 20 million in its first year.
The U.S gaming market is, needless to say, going to play a major role in achieving this goal, so getting units stateside in the early days (well ahead of launch day) is going to be an integral part of the puzzle. Or more specifically, one of the main factors in whether or not the machine is completely sold out in seconds on pre-order and/or launch day.
Nintendo Switch 2 guide – all of the price leaks, pre-orders, feature details, launch games, and more
We don’t know how many Switch 2 units are in the U.S. as of right now, but some recently leaked, or rather datamined, information from Famiboards user LiC (via Gameranx, GoNintendo) suggests there are now at least 380,000 Switch 2 units stateside courtesy of a Vietnamese manufacturing company known as HVBG – one of the sources Nintendo has tapped to manufacture Switch 2. The rumored data also mentions 41,598 standalone charging grips.
The 380,000 units in question allegedly landed in the U.S. in January 2025, slated to service both U.S. retailers and those in Canada. This number is supposedly sourced from data earlier this year, and might very well just be a small portion of the total units in North America at this time – and let’s hope that’s the case, because 380,000 isn’t going to cut it.
With experts targeting 6 million in the first quarter, Nintendo better have already found a way to get a whole heck of a lot more units stateside than this. Our guess is that they have and that number is now much higher considering we might be less than a month away from pre-orders and something like 3 months out from launch.
All told, 380,000 from just one factory by January is likely more of a good thing than not. It’s hard to imagine Nintendo completely botching its biggest product release in nearly a decade all that much, it almost certainly has more than one manufacturing running off Switch 2 units as we speak, and it heavily relies on North American sales – let’s hope they have shipped 380,000 to the US every month this year at least.
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