In 2019, Nintendo announced a new benefit for subscribers to its Switch Online service: a pair of game vouchers, available for $100, that could be redeemed for any two Switch games on Nintendo's eligibility list. If you already knew you were going to be buying first-party games, the voucher could save you $20, or even $30, if you used it on the normally $70 The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
However, Nintendo announced today that it will soon end the program, rather than carrying it forward into the Switch 2 era. Switch Online subscribers can still buy a pair of vouchers until the end of January 2026, and those vouchers will be redeemable for up to a year after purchase, but you can't buy new vouchers after that.
The vouchers were already notably not usable to buy Switch 2-exclusive games like Mario Kart World or Donkey Kong Bananza. However, for hybrid Switch games with a separate Switch 2 Edition, you could still use them to buy a game like Tears of the Kingdom and then upgrade it to the Switch 2 edition separately. Nintendo also said on its FAQ page that new titles would be added to the eligibility list between now and January 2026, raising the possibility that upcoming high-profile hybrid games like Metroid Prime 4: Beyond or Pokémon Legends: Z-A could make the list.
"Please check the current list of titles for which game vouchers can be redeemed," the FAQ page reads. "Upcoming titles are usually added when pre-orders start on Nintendo eShop."
These vouchers could be particularly appealing to Switch players because Nintendo rarely charges anything less than the full retail price for its games, regardless of how long they have been available or whether they were a re-release of something that had debuted on an older console years ago. If you wanted to pay less than $60 for a digital copy of any first-party Switch game, this was one of the few consistent ways to do so.
The end of the voucher program also coincides with Nintendo's typical price for new Switch 2 games reaching the $70–$80 range, which encompasses the non-pack-in retail versions of Mario Kart World, Donkey Kong Bananza, and all of the Switch games with paid Switch 2 upgrade packs. Rather than leaving the price of the vouchers the same and offering players bigger discounts, or raising the price of the vouchers and leaving a similar $20- to $30-discount range intact, Nintendo is opting to discontinue them entirely.
YouTube demonetizes tons of AI & react videos with new content guidelines