Animal Crossing New Horizons players can now transfer their Island to another Nintendo Switch. Here’s a guide that will help you transfer to another system.
While it was supposed to be a simple process, it had been made complicated as it requires a separate application to download on two different Nintendo Switch hardware, and then both should be run by two different accounts in order to initiate the Island Transfer process.
Here’s a detailed guide on how to do this Animal Crossing New Horizons Island Transfer between two different Nintendo Switch systems. Before you can start with this guide, download the Island Transfer tool.
How To Transfer Your Island In Animal Crossing New Horizons
Transfer a Single Resident
- Make sure that Animal Crossing: New Horizons is updated to the latest software version on both systems.
- On the source system, launch Animal Crossing: New Horizons and select the user whose resident will be moving.
- Press the − Button at the title screen to open the Settings menu.
- Select Move to a new island.
- Select Move me off the island.
- It is not possible to move the island resident representative. You may wish to transfer the entire island to the new Nintendo Switch system in order to transfer the resident representative.
- Select Yes, that is correct.
- Review the details of the transfer process and select Yes, I’m ready, then Yes, I’m ready! again to send a transfer request.
- On the target system, launch Animal Crossing: New Horizons and select the user account that you want to use for your resident.
- You cannot select a user that has already played Animal Crossing: New Horizons on the target system. If you need to create a new user account, see How to Add a New User Account.
- Select I’m moving when asked by Timmy and Tommy.
- Select Yes, I have! when asked if you have already sent a transfer request.
- Select Start the process to search for the transfer request sent from the source system.
- When the island name and your resident’s name are displayed, select Yes, that is correct.
- On the source system, select I want to move to confirm the target Nintendo Switch you will be moving to. At this point, the transfer cannot be canceled.
- After the message “Thank you so much for waiting. Everything is ready!” is displayed, you can close the game on the source system.
- On the target system, you will arrive on the island and get to choose a location to set up the same house you had on the source system.
- If you are the first user to play Animal Crossing: New Horizons on the target system, you will be the new island’s resident representative. Moving a house takes some time, so you will be sleeping in a tent on your first night on the island.
- If the island is already inhabited by someone on the target system, your house will be moved over immediately.
- If you previously set up island backup, follow our steps to set up island backup again to ensure that it is re-enabled on your new system.
Transfer the Entire Island
Follow these steps if you will no longer be using the source system. These steps ensure that all your users and user data will be transferred to the target system.
- Make sure that Animal Crossing: New Horizons is updated to the latest software version on your source system.
- Download the Save Data Transfer Tool for Animal Crossing: New Horizons on your source system, if you haven’t already.
- Transfer the User Data for your user account to the target Nintendo Switch system. This will transfer all user information and save data except for Animal Crossing: New Horizons save data to the target system.
- Repeat this step for each user account. If you are transferring all user accounts, a default account named “User” will remain on the source system.
- On the target system, update Animal Crossing: New Horizons to the latest software version.
- On the target system, download the Save Data Transfer Tool for Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
- Open the Save Data Transfer Tool on each system.
- Follow the on-screen instructions and select Continue, then Let’s Begin.
- On the source system, select Source.
- Select Yes to confirm when the name of your island on the source system is displayed.
- If Animal Crossing: New Horizons has not been updated to the latest software version, your console nickname will be displayed instead of your island name.
- On the target system, select Target.
- On the source system, select Continue. On the target system, select Proceed.
- When the target system is detected, select Transfer data on the source system.
- When the source system is detected, select Proceed on the target system. The transfer will begin.
- When the transfer is complete, a message will appear on both systems. The save data is now deleted on the source system and present on the target system.
- Launch Animal Crossing: New Horizons on the target system to continue playing on your island.
- If you previously set up island backup, follow our steps to set up island backup again to ensure that it is re-enabled on your new system.