Nintendo’s results for the quarter ending June 30, 2026 put digital at 61.5% of its software sales, which leaves 38.5% for boxed games. Depending on which headline you read in August, that was either proof that cartridges are safe or a sign that they are on the way out. The detail sits somewhere in between, and it is kinder to physical than the raw split looks.
What sits inside the digital figure
Nintendo’s definition of digital sales is broad. It includes full-game downloads, and it also includes download-only titles that never had a box, DLC and expansion passes, paid Switch 2 Edition upgrade packs, and Nintendo Switch Online subscriptions. None of those has a physical equivalent to compete with. Take them out and look only at games sold in both formats, and the boxed share is higher than 38.5%. Nintendo does not publish that narrower figure, so nobody outside the company can say by how much.
Where Game-Key Cards land
A point that has been widely skipped: a Game-Key Card is sold in a box, through a retailer, so it counts as a packaged sale. As more third-party Switch 2 releases move to key cards, the physical percentage can hold steady while the number of complete games on cartridges falls. For collectors, the headline percentage is therefore becoming a weaker signal each quarter. What we would like to see reported is the share of boxed releases that ship with the full game on the card, and only sites that track releases title by title can currently answer that.
Why it still matters
The August coverage drew the comparison with Sony, which has been moving away from discs, and the contrast is fair. More than a third of software revenue is too large for Nintendo to walk away from, and retailers depend on it. The company kept a card slot in Switch 2 and kept Switch 1 cartridges working in it, and those decisions look deliberate.
Our takeaway is simple. Boxed Nintendo games are not going anywhere soon. Boxed games that contain the game are the part to watch, and that is decided publisher by publisher, release by release. The sales figures will not tell you which is which; the back of the box will.