Nintendo Switch Game Cartridges Face Potential Phase-Out

November 6, 2026, 8:03 am | Read time: 2 minutes

A major manufacturer of memory chips is gradually exiting the ROM memory business. For fans of physical Nintendo games, this is a warning sign, but it does not mean an imminent end to Switch cartridges.

Macronix Scales Back ROM Production

The Taiwanese memory manufacturer Macronix plans to gradually phase out the production of ROM chips. The company is one of the key suppliers of memory chips for the first Nintendo Switch game cartridges. New ROM products will no longer be developed in the future.

The main reason is economic development. Macronix’s ROM sales dropped by 39 percent within a year. In the third quarter of 2026, only five percent of total revenue came from this business segment. In the second quarter of 2025, it was still 26 percent. For the chip manufacturer, the traditional ROM business is becoming increasingly unattractive.

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Will also become significantly more expensive for consumers: Demand for RAM far exceeds the manufacturers' production capacity.

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Data Centers Become a Lucrative Business

Instead of ROM memory, Macronix wants to focus its capacities more on other products. These include especially NOR flash solutions for data centers and NAND memory. The business with data centers is apparently becoming lucrative for the company. For the third quarter of 2026, Macronix reported a record net profit of approximately $337 million.

However, there is no need for Nintendo players to panic. Macronix is not the only manufacturer of such memory chips. Moreover, the Nintendo Switch 2 is unlikely to be directly affected by the withdrawal: Its game cards use NAND flash memory from ROHM Semiconductor. Therefore, an acute shortage of physical Switch games cannot be inferred from Macronix’s decision.

Digital Games Put Pressure on Physical Modules

For fans and collectors of physical games, the development is still noteworthy. At the same time, the share of digitally sold software at Nintendo is increasing. Between April and June 2026, digital content already accounted for 61.5 percent of the company’s software sales.

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The classic cartridge will not disappear overnight. However, the withdrawal of an important memory manufacturer highlights how the gaming market is changing. Digital sales are gaining importance, while the business with physical media is shrinking. For collectors, it will be crucial how long Nintendo and its partners can keep the production of classic game cartridges economically viable.

This article is a machine translation of the original German version of TECHBOOK and has been reviewed for accuracy and quality by a native speaker. For feedback, please contact us at info@techbook.de.