Nintendo Says Almost Half Of All Switch Owners Have Downloaded 'Fortnite'

Nintendo (NTDOY) on Tuesday released its second-quarter earnings report, which revealed that the famed Japanese gaming company had its biggest profit jump in eight years. The report also provided the gaming industry with an interesting piece of information: nearly half of all Switch owners have apparently downloaded “Fortnite.”

Nintendo also reported that it had sold just over 22 million Switch units since the console launched in March 2017. That means the Switch has now outsold two of its three Nintendo home console predecessors.

Neither the Wii U nor the GameCube managed to hit that figure.

Shares of Nintendo gained 5.02 percent as of 3:08 p.m. ET on Wednesday.

The degree to which “Fortnite” has penetrated the Switch install base is impressive and in line with how successful that particular game has been up to this point. It had a surprise launch on Switch in June and accumulated 2 million downloads on its first day.

However, it should be noted that merely downloading “Fortnite” is free, and just because many Switch owners have downloaded it does not mean they are all regularly playing or spending money on it.

What might be more impressive is how many Switch owners have purchased some of Nintendo’s $60 titles, as pointed out by Kyle Orland, a senior gaming editor at Ars Technica. According to Nintendo’s publicly available sales data, “Super Mario Odyssey” is owned by 53 percent of Switch owners. “Mario Kart 8 Deluxe” comes in at 51 percent and “The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild” at 44 percent.

All three of those were flagship titles for the system in its first year of existence.

“Fortnite” has been a massive success for developer Epic Games. The free-to-play battle royale shooter generates large amounts of revenue through the sale of in-game costumes, dances and other cosmetic items. Epic said the game attracted 80 million players in August, its biggest month since it sharp growth in September 2017.