I was wondering recently what Switch's future YOY sales might look like. Of course there's no way anyone could predict that with any degree of certainty, but because we already know Switch's first year sales numbers, I thought, why not to take that number and calculate total sales against known sales curves of previous Nintendo systems. By no means it has any scientific purpose. It's more like "what-if" game, if you will, so don't take it too seriously. 

The data represents recurring sales over a period of 52/53 weeks (depends on a year), since launch(s) and their percentages. I've decided to go back as far as gen 4 as I think VGC DB doesn't have enough Nintendo systems to see any clear sales patterns or calculate averages. Gen 4, 5 and 6 numbers are rough calendar estimation of annual shipments, based on Nintendo's reports. I split them into weekly figures and shifted accordingly to match launch dates, so they won't be super accurate, but good enough for the purpose of this activity. 

 As you can see, generally Nintendo consoles split into two categories. The ones which have had their peaks in year 1 and those which haven't.

Let's put Switch's first year figure (around 15.3M) in that table and see what we're going to end up with, if Switch follows the same sales curves.

OK, let's round up the averages for those two groups and add Switch to the equation.

Based on that it's pretty much clear that if next year we see drop in sales, most likely, Switch's not going to be 100M seller (in first 6 years anyway).

So what do you guys think? In which group Switch is going to end up, or which curve is it going to follow?

Very interesting thought experiment. Of course, some consoles have been known to dip for a year or two and skyrocket because of new software. Look at the original Game Boy and Pokemon.

Thank you for the effort of putting this numbers together.

For me it is really difficult to predict how well the Switch will sell in a long run. Since it is getting obvious that the Switch is the successor of the Wii U AND the 3DS I could see them selling many units. Especially when Nintendo only has to produce their games for one system.

I would say that shipment data for Q2 and Q3 this year are more indicative of predicting the Switch's sales curve and whether or not it has any real momentum going forward ... (slowest half of the year) 

If the Switch remains flat or even just slightly down in those quarters then it'll probably be relatively flat this year for the Switch but even being able to peak in it's third year won't save it from the doom of not reaching the 100M unit milestone ... 

Considering Switch didn't get a price cut in it's first year like most of the year 1 peakers, I really doubt Switch will fall off a cliff and sell less then in it's launch year. And falling off a cliff is almost necessary to sell less, because due to supply issues the baseline of the Switch was at least 50k below (actually closer to 70-80k, but I picked 50k to iron out the spikes) what the console sells now every week. 30 weeks worth of that gap and you already have a nice lead of over 1.5M, and considering the Smash release it's pretty clear it won't loose out during the holiday season either.

The Wii U never got an official price cut to my knowledge.

Wasn't that just the Pro version? I think the standard version was already 300, and what they just did was discontinue that version and cut the Pro version to what that used to be.

So, does that really count as a price cut though? From launch there was a 300 option, and with that it was still just a 300 Euros.

Really nice thread. I didn't realize that over half of Nintendo consoles peaked in their 1st year. Since the Switch is basically going to be the handheld and home console for at least quite some time, I don't know how much one can draw from these trends. One would think that the Switch's potential is so much higher due to its hybrid nature.

It does not appear that Nintendo is interested in launching a successor to the 3DS anytime soon (if ever), so I think the chances of the Switch hitting 100m are very high.

I expect Nintendo will keep the 3DS in production for some time, as they seem to see that as a more ideal option for younger children for whom the switch is too heavy/large and/or too expensive for parents to risk a young child carrying with them. But for older kids and adults, the Switch will be both the home console and portable option going forward it appears.