How to transfer an Animal Crossing: New Horizons island from one Switch to another

Transfering your Animal Crossing: New Horizons island from one Switch to an OLED Switch (or another one) is incredibly important. It's a game that players can easily sink hundreds of hours into, whether it be collecting items and creatures, or creating the perfect island for them and their villagers to reside on. With that in mind, nobody wants to have to leave all of that work behind and start anew just because they’re using a new Switch. Let’s look at how you can transfer your Animal Crossing: New Horizons island from one Nintendo Switch to another.

How to transfer Animal Crossing: New Horizons island from one Switch to another

Here are the steps you need to take in order to transfer Animal Crossing: New Horizons island from one Nintendo Switch to the other. Be aware that you’ll need to have access to both the source and target consoles in order to do the transfer.

Download the Island Transfer Tool on the source console
Transfer user data from the source console to the target console
Download the Island Transfer Tool on the target console
Open the Island Transfer Tool on both systems
On the source console, select “Source” and then confirm the information
On the target console, select “Target”
On the source console, select “Continue”
On the target console, select “Proceed”
Select “Transfer Data” on the source console, and then “Proceed” on the target console

This will initiate the Island Transfer. A message will appear on both consoles to notify you when the transfer has been completed. Once this is done, the Animal Crossing: New Horizons island data will have been deleted from the first Switch, and made available over on the new Switch. Boot the game up on the new system to ensure that everything worked properly.

How to transfer one player from an island to another island

For users that have multiple players on a single island, it's possible to move one player off an island and onto another island on a different Nintendo Switch. Note that the island representative cannot move off the island. To transfer a player to a new island:

On source console, load up Animal Crossing: New Horizons
Press the – button on the main menu
Choose “Move to new island”
Select “Move me off the island”
Select “Yes”
Select “Yes, I’m ready”
On target console, load up Animal Crossing: New Horizons
Select the user who is transferring the player
Speak with Timmy & Tommy and choose “I’m moving”
Select “Yes, I have”
Choose “Start the process” and then confirm the correct player and island
On source console, select “I want to move”

Once the process is done, your character from the source Switch will be on the target Switch. If you’re the first person playing on this Switch, you will be the new island representative. At this point, you will get to choose where your house goes. The process of moving the house will take a day, so you get to sleep in a tent overnight! If you want to move a different resident, use the above steps but instead of selecting “Move me off the island” choose “Move another resident”.

Users can also utilize the cloud saves system to backup islands in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. That’s how you can transfer your Animal Crossing: New Horizons island from one Switch to another, as Nintendo detailed on its official website.