Nintendo’s latest device hits shops in March, and it’s not what you think

Nintendo has announced that its hot new device will arrive in shops in March, but it’s not the Switch 2 announcement we’re all waiting for.

Back in October, Nintendo caught everyone off balance by announcing its own £90 / $100 novelty alarm clock device, called Alarmo. However, it was only available to Switch Online subscribers.

Now Nintendo has announced that the Alarmo will be available “in stores at participating retailers in March 2025”. No Nintendo Switch Online membership will be required, but Nintendo does indicate that stock may be limited.

Here in this country, Nintendo UK has taken to X to announce that from mid-March, the Alarmo “will continue to be available only on #MyNintendoStore in the UK and Ireland”.

The Alarmo features a compact circular screen that offers a number of scenes and accompanying music from your favourite Nintendo games and characters. It also has a motion sensor that detects when you stir, which allows you to wave away your tuneful wake-up call.

Said motion sensing facility also allows the Alarmo to serve as a rudimentary sleep tracker, offering up stats on the time you’ve spent in bed and how active you’ve been in your sleep.

It may not have been the Switch 2 announcement that everyone was craving, but the Alarmo’s arrival in October felt like a reassuringly Nintendo thing to have happened. No other company in games – and certainly no other console manufacturer – has retained such a capacity for playful surprise.

Of course, there’s very little surprise about Nintendo’s next big reveal. The Switch 2 console is tipped to be launching later this week, with a availability likely set for April.

Relatively little about the console is unknown at this point, thanks to a series of hardware, schedule, and even logo leaks. This is unusually – and reportedly most perturbing – for a company that has always worked its particular brand of magic in relative privacy.