The Nintendo Switch is now the developer’s longest-running reigning console.
Per VGC, the home/handheld hybrid has been around for 2,687 days (or seven years, four months, and just shy of two weeks). The console originally released March 3, 2017, and beat out the Famicom’s (or NES in the west) streak by just a single day.
As the outlet notes, distance between other Nintendo consoles has gotten progressively shorter outside of those two. Using global launches, VGC determined the span between the Nintendo 64 and Nintendo Gamecube was 1,909 days, while the Nintendo Wii and WiiU had a gap of 1,892 days.
Meanwhile, the WiiU and Switch had the shortest leap of the bunch at 1,566 days. It’s also worth noting this just concerns home consoles; when it comes to handhelds, the Switch falls behind the original Game Boy, which went 4,352 days before it was usurped by the Game Boy Advance.
Long live the Nintendo Switch
The Switch’s long tail can be owed to launching right out the gate with Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and 1-2-Switch. Each year saw at least two major first-party launches like Super Mario Odyssey, Metroid Dread, or Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.
Each of those games (and plenty more) went on to be strong sellers and awards darlings. Nintendo’s released first-party games at such a cadence that even with an eventual successor on the way, it still has time to put out a few more Mario games.
Switch sales have recently slumped, which is only natural for a console nearing a decade old. But even though we know a new console is coming relatively soon, it’s going out with a pretty big bang.
As of this past May, the Nintendo Switch is also Nintendo’s best-selling home console ever. Whatever happens with the company’s future, this one has already proven itself as one of its most definitive systems for years to come.