Breath of the Wild Switch 2 Edition: What It Adds

Nintendo's own store copy for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – Nintendo Switch 2 Edition promises "improved framerates, faster load times, and enhanced resolution and textures." Count the numbers in that sentence. There are none.

That is not a complaint, it is the shape of the decision. The performance half of this release is unquantified by the publisher, so the only part you can judge before paying is the feature half — and the feature half is almost entirely one thing: ZELDA NOTES, a service in the Nintendo Switch App that Nintendo has locked to the Switch 2 Editions of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom.

So here is what the Switch 2 Edition costs by route, what it adds that you can actually enumerate, and the three restrictions that are easy to walk into.

What the Switch 2 Edition is

It launched June 5, 2025 on Nintendo Switch 2. It is the same game — same map, same 120 shrines, same 900 Koroks — running on new hardware with a companion service bolted onto your phone.

Physically it ships as a complete box containing the base game plus an upgrade pack. Because that cartridge is a Nintendo Switch 2 Edition cartridge, putting it in an original Nintendo Switch plays the original game, not the enhanced one. The upgrade is what does the work, and it can also be bought on its own from the eShop or as a redeemable code on a card.

Four ways to buy it

The Upgrade Pack's own card art carries the condition in print: "Full version of the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild game required to use this content. Sold separately."

Two things fall out of that table. If you already own Breath of the Wild on Switch, the ten-dollar upgrade is the route, not the seventy-dollar re-buy. And if you already pay for Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack, the upgrade costs nothing for as long as that membership is active — Nintendo's wording is "at no additional cost," tied to the subscription rather than granted permanently.

Save data transfers from the Nintendo Switch version to the Switch 2 Edition, so an existing file is not stranded by the move.

The numbers Nintendo did not publish

Across the US store page, the Upgrade Pack page and the regional product pages, Nintendo's claims for this release are: higher resolution, improved frame rates, HDR support, faster loading, enhanced textures. No target resolution. No target frame rate. No load-time figure. The one hardware caveat Nintendo does state is that HDR in TV mode requires a compatible display.

Treat any specific number you see attached to this version as somebody's measurement, not Nintendo's specification, and check who measured it.

The second save file is a one-way door

The Switch 2 Edition adds one more save file, giving you two concurrent adventures instead of one. Useful if you want a completionist file and a fresh run without wiping either.

The catch is directional. Nintendo's Upgrade Pack page states that the second saved data file created in the Nintendo Switch 2 Edition cannot be transferred to the original Nintendo Switch version. Data flows Switch to Switch 2; the extra slot does not flow back. If you plan to keep playing on original hardware as well, keep the file you care about in slot one.

Note that this is separate from Master Mode's save behaviour. Master Mode keeps its own file and runs on a single autosave slot — the Master Mode guide has that breakdown.

Zelda Notes is the actual addition

ZELDA NOTES is a free service inside the Nintendo Switch App on a smart device. Nintendo published it as nine features across both Switch 2 Editions. Breath of the Wild gets eight of them; Autobuild Sharing is the one it does not get, because Autobuild is a Tears of the Kingdom ability and there is nothing in Breath of the Wild for it to carry.

Three access rules, all of them stated by Nintendo:

• A Nintendo Switch Online membership is not required to use ZELDA NOTES. Nintendo says this in the store description, on the UK service page and in its own support article. The membership matters for the free upgrade path and for Save Data Cloud backup, not for the app.
• Persistent internet and a compatible smart device are required. This is a phone-and-console pair, not an offline menu.
• The game must be on the latest update for ZELDA NOTES features to work. Nintendo attached that line to the Ver. 1.8.2 patch notes.

The 125 Voice Memories are not the 13 Memories

These are two different things with similar names, so it is worth separating them. Breath of the Wild's Captured Memories are the in-game photo quest — twelve pictures in Zelda's Sheikah Slate album plus a thirteenth on Impa's wall, all mapped in the memory locations guide. Voice Memories are a separate, additional set that live in the app.

There are 125 Voice Memories in the Switch 2 Edition. They follow Zelda on a pilgrimage across Hyrule in the century before the game opens, warning people about the coming Calamity and working on her sealing power. Nintendo describes them as "stories from Princess Zelda that were not in the original game." They play through the app when Link reaches the right spot, and their locations can be found via the Navigation feature.

The count matters if you are chasing medals: the Voice Memory Seeker medal runs Bronze at 20, Silver at 60, Gold at 100, and Master at all of them.

Navigation turns the map into a checklist

Navigation is a mirror of the in-game map rendered in the app, synced to your position and updating as you discover things. Its point is the inverse of the in-game map: it shows you what you have not done. Shrines you have not cleared, Koroks you have not found, and other points of interest sorted into categories including Locations, Koroks, Enemies and Treasures. Voice Guidance then talks you toward the one you pick.

For Korok hunting specifically this is a different tool from anything the base game gives you. The Korok seed guide makes the case that 441 of the 900 seeds is the number that actually buys you inventory slots — Navigation does not change that maths, but it does make the remaining 459 findable if you want the Korok Seeker medal, which only maxes out at all 900.

Item Sharing: 100 slots, and where it stops

Item Sharing is a box you deposit into from the game and withdraw from as a QR code. The limits Nintendo and Zelda Wiki put on it:

• The box holds up to 100 items, and unlike your inventory, materials do not stack — every single item takes one of the 100 slots.
• It unlocks after your first shrine, the same gate the amiibo rune uses.
• It cannot be used during mini-games or boss fights.
• In Breath of the Wild specifically it is also disabled on Eventide Island and during the Trial of the Sword — both of which strip your gear on purpose, and neither of which Nintendo was going to let you smuggle a Royal Guard's Claymore into. The Master Sword guide covers the Trial's own rules.
• Items can move between the two Switch 2 Editions, but Nintendo notes that some Tears of the Kingdom items convert into other items when received in Breath of the Wild.

Daily Bonus and the extra amiibo scan

Daily Bonus is a roulette you spin once per day per game. It has 12 slots, and a single bonus can occupy more than one of them, which raises that bonus's odds. Winning does not hand you the effect immediately — you redeem it in-game from the Key Items screen. Nintendo's description of the payouts is "hearts, weapons, or other effects." Two named results appear in Nintendo's own patch notes, Health Recovery and Hearty Meal, because Ver. 1.8.2 fixed a bug that blocked both for players who had increased their hearts to the maximum number.

The amiibo feature is the more concrete win. In the base game most amiibo can be scanned once per day, the rune unlocks after one Great Plateau shrine, and it is disabled inside shrines, on Eventide Island and in the Sword Monk's Shrine. Zelda Notes tracks your scans and, in Nintendo's wording, "when you scan an amiibo five times, you'll get an additional bonus use of that amiibo for a second scan that day." That is a second roll on a figure's drop table each day, which matters if you are farming a specific amiibo chest.

The 19 medals in My Play Data

My Play Data is the statistics page, and its medals are the closest thing Breath of the Wild has ever had to an achievement list. There are 19 in the Switch 2 Edition, each at four ranks. Several of them are only reachable by finishing a collection outright.

Read the Master column and the Switch 2 Edition's completionist ask becomes clear: every shrine cleared, all 900 Koroks, every location visited, every quest cleared, all 125 Voice Memories, and 100% of Navigation destinations. Shrine Seeker Gold at 100 is the one that stops just short — the shrine guide sorts the full 120 by what each one actually pays out.

Spinner Devotee at Master is 100 Daily Bonus spins, and the Daily Bonus is once per day, so that medal has a floor of 100 days no matter how you play.

The Expansion Pass is still separate

The Switch 2 Edition does not include The Master Trials, The Champions' Ballad, or any of the Expansion Pass bonus content. To get Master Mode, Hero's Path, the Trial of the Sword, the Travel Medallion, the Korok Mask or the Champions' Ballad story pack, you buy the $19.99 Expansion Pass on top, exactly as on the original Switch.

The NSO + Expansion Pack membership does not help here either. That covers the Switch 2 upgrade. It does not cover the game's own DLC, despite the unfortunate collision of the words "Expansion Pack" and "Expansion Pass."

Patch history and why it matters

Nintendo has kept patching a 2017 game, and the Switch 2 lines in these notes are the ones to read.

Ver. 1.8.0 landing two days before the console is the tell: the Switch 2 Edition is delivered as an upgrade layer over the same base software, which is exactly why the Upgrade Pack is 9.6 GB rather than a full 24.1 GB reinstall.

Quick Action Checklist

• Own Breath of the Wild on Switch already? Buy the $9.99 Upgrade Pack, not the $69.99 edition.
• Pay for Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack? The upgrade is included while the membership is active. Check before you spend anything.
• Update the game first. ZELDA NOTES features need the latest update data.
• Install the Nintendo Switch App on a phone. Persistent internet and a compatible device are required, but a Nintendo Switch Online membership is not.
• Keep your real file in Save File 1. The second slot the Switch 2 Edition adds cannot be transferred back to the original Switch version.
• Do not expect DLC. The Expansion Pass is a separate $19.99 purchase, and the membership does not cover it.
• Spin the Daily Bonus every day if you want Spinner Devotee at Master — 100 spins, one per day, is a hard floor of 100 days.
• Scan your amiibo through Zelda Notes. Five cumulative scans of a figure earns a bonus second scan of it in a day.
• Turn on Navigation before a Korok run. It lists what you have not found, which the in-game map will not do.