While Nintendo has never truly been on the verge of financial ruin (despite the beloved Nintendo is Doomed memes), it’s not hard to look at the company’s previous home console, the Wii U, and its handheld, the 3DS, and not see quite a downturn. The Wii U was an outright flop, and while the 3DS sold well, it was sharp drop from the DS. Nintendo chose instead to create a hybrid in the Switch, and well, it seems to have worked out.
As was reported earlier today, the NPD confirmed that the Switch was the best selling hardware of September 2020 in the United States. Going all the way back, the Switch has been the number 1 hardware since December of 2018, making that 22 consecutive months. That breaks the previous record of the Xbox 360, which was #1 hardware for 21 months from August 2011 to April 2013 (thanks to NintendoEverything for those stats).
It’s very likely the Switch will also take the #1 spot in October as well, and some analysts have even predicted that Switch could still be on top on the holiday seasons due to stock issues with the launch PS5 and Xbox Series consoles. That means it’s within the realm of possibility we could see a continued streak of 24-25+ months with the Switch at #1 in the US. There’s also rumors floating around that Nintendo is planning another, more powerful, revision of the system for early 2021, so don’t expect Nintendo to go anywhere soon.
