Choosing a microSD Card for Nintendo Switch
Most of the numbers on a microSD card are irrelevant to a Switch. Two of them are not.
The short answer
The Nintendo Switch benefits from UHS-I microSD cards rated A1 or A2 for random access performance, but does not support the faster UHS-II bus, so paying for UHS-II cards provides no benefit. Sequential read speeds above roughly 100 MB per second exceed what the console can use, making capacity and brand reliability more important than headline speed figures. Counterfeit high-capacity cards are common and are the single largest practical risk.
Verified and last updated August 12, 2026.
- Time needed
- 10 min
- Difficulty
- Beginner
- Read time
- 2 min
Buying a microSD card for a Switch involves ignoring most of the marketing on the packaging.
The console has a fixed interface speed. Cards faster than that are simply not being used to their potential, and the money is wasted.
Counterfeits are the real risk
Fake cards report a capacity they do not have and corrupt data once you pass the real limit. This surfaces weeks later as failed saves. Buy from the manufacturer or a major retailer.
What matters and what does not
The A1 and A2 ratings describe random read and write performance rather than sequential throughput, and that is what game loading actually depends on. A card with a huge sequential figure and no A rating can perform worse in practice than a modest A2 card.
Capacity: the only real decision
Our verdict
256GB for most people, 512GB if you buy digitally
128GB is enough for a mostly physical collection. 256GB is the comfortable middle. 512GB stops you ever thinking about it again, and the price gap has narrowed considerably.
Modern Switch titles range from a few hundred megabytes to over ten gigabytes. The practical issue is not any single game but the accumulation, since a larger card removes the habit of uninstalling things.
Moving to a larger card later
Copy the contents to a computer rather than trying to transfer card to card in the console. Insert the old card into a reader, copy the entire Nintendo folder to your desktop, then copy it onto the new card formatted by the Switch.
Save data lives in the console's internal storage rather than the card, so the transfer moves games and not saves. That is worth knowing before worrying about losing progress.
The Switch 2 upgrade guide covers how storage carries across when moving to newer hardware, which is a separate process with its own rules.
What works
What doesn't
Key takeaways
Frequently asked questions
Does a faster microSD card reduce loading times?
Barely, because the Switch's card interface caps out well below what a good modern card can deliver. Moving from a slow card to a decent UHS-I A2 card produces a noticeable improvement; moving from a decent card to an expensive one produces almost none. The console, not the card, is the limiting factor.
Is UHS-II worth buying?
No, because the Switch does not support the UHS-II bus and will run such a card at UHS-I speeds. You would be paying a premium for capability the console cannot access. Save the money and buy more capacity instead, which does provide a real benefit.
How much storage do I actually need?
For a mostly physical collection, 128GB is comfortable. For someone buying digitally, 256GB is the sensible middle and 512GB removes the problem entirely. Modern Switch titles range from a few hundred megabytes to over ten gigabytes, and the temptation to keep everything installed grows with capacity.
How do I avoid counterfeit cards?
Buy from the manufacturer's own storefront or a major retailer rather than a marketplace seller offering an unusually large capacity cheaply. Counterfeits report a false capacity and corrupt data once you exceed their real size, which typically surfaces weeks later when saves start failing. The price difference is not worth the risk.
About the author
PC Hardware & Performance Editor
Marcus has been building, breaking and repairing gaming PCs since 2011, first as a weekend favour for friends and then for eight years as a bench technician at an independent repair shop in Portland, where roughly a third of the job was diagnosing machines that "ran fine yesterday".
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