Nintendo Switch 2 Stays at $499.99: Why Shuntaro Furukawa Rules Out Another Price Hike Despite the RAM Crunch
Two months after the controversial decision to raise its hybrid console's retail price to $499.99 in the United States and €499.99 across Europe, Nintendo Co., Ltd. has moved to reassure both holiday shoppers and shareholders. Speaking during the investor Q&A session following the company's semi-annual financial briefing, in remarks reported by Reuters, President Shuntaro Furukawa confirmed that Nintendo is not currently considering any further price increases for the Nintendo Switch 2, despite ongoing turbulence in the global memory market.
Memory Supplies Secured to Hit the 16.5 Million Hardware Target
Hardware pricing was front and center for analysts reviewing Nintendo's results for the six months ended September 30, 2026. As highlighted by the 41% year-over-year drop in summer Switch 2 shipments (2.67 million units shipped between July and September, bringing lifetime hardware sales to 26.35 million), the Kyoto giant has faced steep component inflation as artificial intelligence data centers absorb global DRAM manufacturing capacity and drive up the cost of the console's 12 GB LPDDR5X memory modules.
Addressing fears that sustained semiconductor inflation could force a second price hike in 2027, Furukawa stated that the memory supply landscape has not suffered any unexpected negative shifts beyond Nintendo's internal projections. Crucially, he emphasized that Nintendo remains in a strong position to secure sufficient quantities of memory components from its manufacturing partners to meet its production schedule.
Defending the $499.99 Psychological Ceiling Ahead of the Holidays
Having locked in its component pipeline, Nintendo is leaving its full-year hardware forecast unchanged at 16.5 million Nintendo Switch 2 units for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2027. With 6.49 million consoles sold during the first half of the fiscal year (April through September 2026), Nintendo expects to move roughly 10 million additional systems over the second half, anchored by the November 5 launch of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake.
From a retail standpoint, pushing the price any higher would have been a major gamble. Enacted on September 1, 2026, the first price adjustment already added $50 in the US (rising from $449.99 to $499.99) and €30 in Europe (from €469.99 to €499.99). While Furukawa stopped short of guaranteeing an indefinite freeze and noted that management continues to monitor exchange rates, tariffs, and supply chain shifts , including Macronix's gradual exit from Switch 2 cartridge ROM production , holding the line at $499.99 is essential to keeping mainstream family buyers on board this winter.
My Take: Nintendo Knows Breaking the $500 Barrier Would Alienate Families
Listening to Shuntaro Furukawa rule out another Switch 2 price hike reads as both a supply chain victory and a pragmatic read of the room. This summer's hardware slowdown proved that September's jump to $499.99 / €499.99 already pushed family budgets to their limit. Unlike hardcore hardware enthusiasts willing to swallow runaway DRAM costs, Nintendo's core audience weighs every dollar before putting a console under the Christmas tree. By locking in LPDDR5X inventory early and offsetting tighter hardware margins with massive first-party software sales from Mario Kart World and Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Kyoto is making the only sensible play to move another 10 million consoles by March.
Based on the outskirts of New York City, Chaya 'Chayane' spent five years studying software engineering in Montreal before returning to her home state. A Full-Stack developer and Deep Learning AI architecture researcher, she explores neural networks and algorithmic optimization while engineering data pipelines for Retrocharting and Gamescharting alongside Grimtag. A gamer for over 20 years and an avid collector of Nintendo history and The Legend of Zelda, she explored World of Warcraft's Azeroth before bringing her deep technical background to video game analysis.
