Nintendo asks for tariff-refund class action lawsuit to be dismissed

According to Nintendo, consumers got 'what they bargained and paid for'

In March, Nintendo sued the U.S. government over President Donald Trump's illegal collection of tariffs for a refund, with interest, of what it had paid the administration since the tariffs were enacted. Shortly after, in April, two customers filed a class-action lawsuit against Nintendo arguing that they were likewise owed refunds. Nintendo hiked prices on some hardware due to the Trump administration's tariff policies that have been giving us all headaches for the past year and change.

Essentially, the plaintiffs argued that the refund should be passed onto to consumers who paid higher prices as a result of those tariffs. "American consumers paid higher retail prices for consumer goods reflecting the economic burden of those tariffs," their filing stated (via Game Developer).

Now, as spotted by Game File, Nintendo is trying to have the class-action lawsuit against it thrown out, saying it has no legal obligation to refund customers. "Plaintiffs are not entitled to a rebate simply because of intervening legal developments related to tariffs," the company's filing in the case said. Any customers who purchased Nintendo goods after the announced price hikes, which raised the prices of Nintendo Switch 2 accessories and other hardware, "received exactly what they bargained and paid for."

Nintendo argues that, like so many of "its market peers," it raised its prices to reflect tariffs and other rising costs. "Unlike many of its market peers, however, Nintendo did not simply increase each product’s price by the amount of tariffs it paid on that product or impose an across-the-board tariff surcharge," Nintendo said in Monday's filing.

"Instead, Nintendo imposed modest and selective price adjustments, and it chose to bear the costs of tariffs on some of its most popular products of 2025, including its flagship console, the Nintendo Switch 2." That echoes Nintendo's previous comments that the tariffs did not affect the Switch 2's $449.99 launch price.

Nintendo says that it was the consumer's choice to pay the elevated prices, and therefore they're not owed anything back. Consumers could have "abstain[ed] from purchasing the product or [sought] out competing products."

It's up to the courts now to decide whether to throw the lawsuit out or to let it proceed.

Tariffs, unfortunately, aren't the only thing that affects hardware pricing. The computer component crisis is wide-sweeping, and is likely the reason why Nintendo is about to raise the Switch 2's price by $50 on Sept. 1. PlayStation and Xbox prices have also gone up this year.