Archive and delete Nintendo Switch games to free up space (2024)

It's pretty simple stuff. I'm not sure if it needs a tutorial.

YES, I need everything!!! Everything! Hence the 512 GB Micro SD card.

Just buy physical games! It's just better to own things, especially if they cost £50-60. Plus, when you're old, you can sell your big collection for a lot of money and buy a hover car or a robowaifu or whatever they had in the 1950s.

How do I turn off my switch?

Why choose poor Penguin Wars?

"You don't have to have EVERYTHING installed, do you?"

As mentioned earlier, I especially tend to stick with the largest ones - as it's trickier to swap and re-download them, even if there are unlimited data plans. And considering how many of them are content roamers/grinders, I tend to take my time... oh well. Things under 4Gb are easier to decide on the shelves, which is why I committed this heresy even on the most respected backlog items like Star Ocean and Disgaea. Mea maxima culpa...

As for variations, I always archive, unless it's a demo (but I haven't used them in a while anyway) or a cute but misleading game icon that shows up when you simply pick up a free piece of DLC. Otherwise, I've honestly given up on relying on the original store's unsortable redownload list to casually browse the entire collection (or pass it on to anyone who's still under the impression that "Switch has no games"™) . Vita.

@Brandende_SpydWhat if I told you that it is possible that you are running out of space on your 512 Gb card? 😎😅

@Snatcherpress and hold the power button until the corresponding menu appears.

To hell with this. I have over 250 games on my system and just upgraded to a 400 GB card. I still can't install them all, but I have most of them now because I'm usually working on 6 or 7 games at a time.

@Brummieendo90Honestly this.
The one thing I could use, though, is if the OS UI could be updated to allow "hiding" the game icons for physical games that aren't currently on the console.

I like that it shows off my collection, but ultimately it would make it much easier to find my digital games when I want to play them. My physical games ARE easy to find because I own the actual boxes of them. I don't need the UI to show them at all.

Honestly, I think the main difference between Switch and WiiU is just there. Physical games on the WiiU only showed up in the UI if they were in the actual disk space. While on Switch they always appear in the UI... unless you actively delete them.

I started out having a relatively large physical collection, and I've grown into removing games (that are physically owned) from my Switch just to make it easier to browse the UI for the few digital games which I installed at the same time.

k@Brummieendo90And if you go to places like Walmart, they drop the price by about ten dollars!

@nhSnorksame here, it's been months since I played Risk of Rain or Crash 4 but I haven't finished what I'm doing in those games yet and it's quite hard for me to delete something I haven't just finished yet played out.
Just as I had a hat in time, I have since e.g. I have done everything I want/can.

Yes, I want everything installed and I don't hear anything else!

I even archive with my 1TB microSD card. Be a little concerned about how the switch will work.

Do you think I should throw away my SD card, I mean I don't need it all, right? What's the point of an SD card if I don't need everything? I just take my 30 GB that I get with the switch itself so I can download up to 3 games at a time and every time I want to play something else I might just have to delete the next game instead of using SD bc. Idk. I don't need it all.

Come on people, what do you think the point of an SD card is for people? If people didn't need everything, they would just delete every game that takes up 10 GB. Ran over.

@Brandende_SpydHere also! I was able to get a 1TB card for my games and I /still/ can't fit everything on it.

5TB card WHEN?!

@LEGEND_MARIOIDMy 1TB card is running low on power, but I've never noticed a significant performance issue. I mean, don't install everything at once, but at least the gameplay never suffered.

I probably wouldn't file. At least not for long. If it needs to be archived, I need a larger map ASAP. There comes a point in the line where the servers go down and what you downloaded is all you want from that point on. I try to keep only large downloads as retail and small downloads as downloads. Unless the price is super cheaper digitally.

I really want everything installed now.

I really want folders...

@MasterGravehartOh, I agree that this most likely won't affect performance. It's just that I'm paranoid. Hey.

I'm not going to buy something and delete it later. I didn't even know this existed until recently. Plus, my internet is too slow to justify uninstalling something just to wait for it to be reinstalled later.

I remember there was an option to delete even save data? Or was it just through the game option itself?

@Rhum17You can always re-download an eShop if it's still there - this is the reason for the physical shopping cart itself. But if you delete it through the Game setting, the save data will also be deleted. But some do it because they need space, as some SD cards aren't big enough to hold all those game DLC/updates.

@LEGEND_MARIOID
I think reading 10% headroom was the magic number for decompressing files when necessary.
So 900 GB of used storage should be fine on that card and leaving 3 GB internal on the Switch is okay too

I used to have a 128GB SD card and just archive the games that I had no intention of replaying after I beat them, but man... it got to the point where I was just having so much trouble deciding what I had to archive lol. I upgraded to a 400GB card and so far I haven't had any issues archiving things, but man, if I come across this again I'm just going to buy more physical copies

I have a 512 GB card, but I could fill at least 800 GB. I can't justify buying a 1TB card, especially if it was going to be 80% full to begin with. It wouldn't be a problem if you could just plug an external hard drive into the dock and switch games between the hard drive and the console. It seems like a simple solution to a pretty big and expensive problem for those who download a lot of games.

@AG_FantasticYes, same here. All they need to add is an extra option in the filters so it can be ignored by those who don't want them. It doesn't have to be anything special, just basic folders that you can place games in and name them.

@OorWullie
Maybe not now, but by the end of the Switch's lifespan you'll be able to justify that 1TB
Alternatively, a backwards compatible Switch 2 might make more sense to get that format

I have a 512 GB card and I think that will be enough since I buy first party games and 9 GB+ games all physically.

@Brummieendo90I agree with this, but I've noticed that even physical games have a strange need to download extra stuff these days. Whether you want it or not. :/

It's really a shame that Nintendo doesn't allow us to use external storage like flash USB or HDD to backup our Switch games. I got a 2TB hard drive and it easily stored all my games for later use. Instead, I had to buy another 400GB microSD card if I wanted to save another batch of my game library for later playback.

Do people really need another review of this? 😱

@SourcecodeBelieve me, I did that haha. Coming from someone who hasn't had a console since NDS, I really didn't know how to delete things at first, lmao.

"You don't have to have EVERYTHING installed, do you?"
Liza Minelli... LIGT!
I need everything!!

But honestly, if I have all this money for games, I can at least invest in a decent micro SD card. I also delete games I know I'm done with and buy first party physical games and personally highly anticipated games.

@smithyoThat's why it's called Switch Basics.

I have a 500GB card on my OG Switch with about 192GB of free space left. Are you going to do a tutorial on how to switch from the old switch to Oled? I just don't want to lose my Splatoon 2 save data or Pokemon save data :/ I might upgrade to a 1TB card for the new switch 🤷🏽‍♂️ We'll see

But they never told us how to mark the option you want to archive