alt Hacker NewsNintendo announces new product revisions in Europe with replaceable batteries
Comments
Amazes me they don't just sell it like that everywhere because it sounds a lot like a product improvement...
> The revised products will be available on a rolling basis in territories where Nintendo of Europe conducts business, either directly or through a distributor, namely: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Oman, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom.
>Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch Lite, and Nintendo Switch – OLED Model will all continue to be manufactured in 2026, and should be widely available in Europe all year.
>From mid-February 2027, almost ten years after Nintendo Switch launched in March 2017, Nintendo will no longer sell to retailers hardware in the Nintendo Switch family of systems – specifically Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch Lite and Nintendo Switch – OLED Model. Sales of Nintendo Switch hardware on Nintendo Store will also end in mid-February 2027.
Understandable, but maybe that shouldn't be buried in the FAQ...
Glad to live in the EU, but then we also have Chat Control trying to pass again.
Related page posted on 04-jun-2026: "Compliance with EU Directives and Regulations" https://www.nintendo.com/en-gb/Corporate/Consumer-Informatio... (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48402926)
Interesting, in the fineprint they actually confirm that they set the "Switch 1" End-Of-Life by Feb.2027 and stop selling it.
This means they will lose the revenue of that product-line (currently ~15% of their total hardware unit sales according to their fiscal report [0]), which may help accelerate the need for a "lite" version of the Switch2 to recover this market-segment...
...or not, because console sales is generally dropping and there's actually no competition to Nintendo in the handheld console segment...
Bleak times ahead for the gaming industry, and for the gamers...
Are the batteries in the Nintendo switch locked in anyway? Wonder if its viable that third party batteries could have an increased capacity.
Honestly, amazing stuff. For all the flak that the EU gets this is absolutely an essential regulation
So now the rest of the world will try to put a hand on these models. Lets see how this goes.
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Shameless plug: we're building an e-bike battery (compatible with Bosch controllers) that's also repairable, if some people like that idea!
"There is no difference in functionality between current products and revised products containing user-replaceable batteries."
So there was nothing "limiting" them from making it already with user-replaceable batteries, they just didn't care enough until EU forced them (like all the smartphone brands). Love EU.