Nintendo confirmed the Switch 2’s Joy-Cons don’t use Hall effect joysticks

After several days of not providing a direct answer about the technology used in the Switch 2’s Joy-Cons, Nintendo has finally confirmed that the new console’s controllers do not employ anti-drift Hall effect joysticks.

When asked about the technology inside the Switch 2’s Joy-Cons that “feels so different to the original Switch’s analog stick” during a recent interview, Nate Bihldorff, the Senior Vice President of Product Development & Publishing at Nintendo of America, told Nintendo Life that “the Joy-Con 2’s controllers have been designed from the ground up. They’re not Hall Effect sticks, but they feel really good.”

Following Nintendo’s Switch 2 presentation last week, the company shared an Ask the Developer discussion with the console’s designers that touched on technical aspects of its upgraded controllers. According to Switch 2 producer Kouichi Kawamoto, the company “redesigned everything from scratch for Joy-Con 2… Compared to the Joy-Con controllers for Switch, the control sticks are larger and more durable, with smoother movement. We’ve also made Joy-Con 2 bigger to match the larger console.”

However, while Nintendo has confirmed that the Switch 2’s Joy-Cons aren’t relying on anti-drift Hall effect sensors, it has yet to confirm exactly what technology is in use.

Is the console still using the same potentiometer-based joysticks that contributed to the original Switch’s notorious joystick drift problems, or has it found a way to improve that technology to extend the longevity of the Joy-Con hardware? And if Hall effect joysticks aren’t in use, has Nintendo adopted tunneling magnetoresistance joystick technology that could solve joystick drift once and for all while offering several benefits over Hall effect sensors?

We’ll either find out from Nintendo itself, or have to wait until the Switch 2 finally ships and gets dissected to reveal what’s inside those controllers.