Nintendo Switch 2 Under Fire After Tests Reveal 120Hz Display Is Too Laggy For 60Hz

Now that the Nintendo Switch 2 has made its way into millions of gamers’ hands, reviewers have been putting the hardware through its paces. Generally speaking, the Switch 2 has acquitted itself well, delivering the performance fans were hoping to see with challenging games such as Cyberpunk 2077 running well and original Switch games getting welcomed improvements. However, it seems as if Nintendo completely whiffed when it comes to configuring the device’s screen.

One of the first people to perform an analysis on the Switch 2’s display is Chinese review site Chimolog. During their testing, they were able to log an average response time of 17.06ms, although it managed to be as slow as 27.46ms in some cases. For context, one frame at a 60Hz refresh rate is 16.67ms. These results indicate that the display isn’t even capable of delivering a competent experience at 60Hz, giving it no chance of meeting the demands at 120Hz.


Moreover, there have been confirmation of these findings by others, such as Hardware Unboxed via their display-centric Monitors Unboxed channel. After running several tests, they found that the display on their Switch 2 unit only managed an average response time of 33.3ms, which is even worse than what Chimolog encountered. Hardware Unboxed didn’t hold back, calling it “very, very slow for a modern LCD panel,” and that these are “atrocious results.” It somehow manages to be worse than the original Switch’s display, as we mentioned in our review roundup.

So why is the display performing so poorly in this aspect? Hardware Unboxed believes it’s because of battery life. Nintendo appears to be sacrificing screen performance in order to give gamers more time while playing on battery. The company is likely achieving this by eschewing a feature known as LCD overdrive, which uses extra voltage to drive LCD screens to more rapid response times (albeit at the risk of overshoot, which can cause ringing artifacts.)

Battery life was always going to be a struggle on the Nintendo Switch 2, given that most hardware upgrades in recent years have been achieved by scaling up power consumption. While it’s understandable that Nintendo wants the Switch 2’s battery life to be as good as possible, it looks as if the company may have been a bit too aggressive in its efforts by eschewing LCD overdrive. Hopefully the company can do something to improve the situation through software or firmware updates.