A new picture of what appears to be the dock for the upcoming Nintendo Switch 2 has popped up online. Courtesy of Laura Kate Dale – who has works in the gaming industry as a consultant – the photo of the Switch 2’s dock doesn’t reveal much in the way of details, aside from some information on the kind of power it will take, and the fact that it has more rounded corners than the original Switch dock.
The key detail revealed in the picture is the fact that the Switch 2’s dock seems to require higher voltages for its input when compared to the original Nintendo Switch. For context, where the current Switch dock has an input of 15 V at 2.6 A and an output of 15 V at 1.2 A, the picture indicates that the Switch 2 dock will have an input of 20 V at 3 A, and an output of 15 V at 2.8 A.
This would also mean that the Switch 2 might end up having greater power demands owing to its hardware being capable of higher graphical fidelity than the original Nintendo Switch. While we don’t know just how big of a difference in visual fidelity will end up being, we can expect more powerful and efficient hardware in the newer console to run good looking games at stable framerates while still also maintaining a decent battery life when the system is used portably.
“This is a new photo I have received from a trusted source showing a Switch 2 Dock, featuring visible input and output voltage information (other information obscured),” posted Dale on social media platform X. “In addition, I have learned that the Switch 2 ships with a 60W charger for use with the dock.”
This essentially means that the USB-C charger for the Nintendo Switch, which also plugs into its dock, won’t be usable with the Nintendo Switch 2, thanks to it being tuned with lower voltages in mind. Dale makes a similar observation in a follow-up post.
“As a result, to my understanding, the current Switch mains charger cable won’t be suitable for use powering the Switch 2 when docked,” Dale posted.
This picture of what purports to be the Switch 2 dock is the latest in a series of leaks of the console that have been happening recently. Earlier this week, pictures of what appears to be one of the JoyCons for Nintendo’s upcoming console made their way online. The pictures indicated that the Switch 2 would feature similar local multiplayer capabilities with its controllers.
A patent application was discovered earlier this month which indicated that the Switch 2 would feature its very own methods of upscaling images in the vein of Nvidia’s DLSS technology. While not too many details about how this image upscaling would work were revealed, we did learn that the console will be able to output lower-resolution visuals at resolutions of up to 4K thanks to AI-based upscaling.
Nintendo hasn’t officially announced a successor to the Nintendo Switch. However, the company has stated that it will be unveiling the console some time before April, with launch not too long afterwards. This would mean that the Switch 2 might have been in manufacturing for some time now, leading to these leaked pictures.