We’ve swept and bolstered this list of great Switch games on the cheaper end of the spectrum. We’ve also added the lowest-ever sale price to each entry, in case you’d rather wishlist ’em and wait for a bargain.
Nintendo Switch’s huge library can be overwhelming, with quite literally hundreds of incredible options on eShop. There’s always something to tempt you amongst the good, the bad, and the ugly, whether there’s one of those enormous sales on or not.
In this guide, we’ve rounded up the best cheap Switch games that cost less than $20/£20. Every single one below scored an ‘Excellent’ 9/10 rating or higher in our review.
We’ve ordered them from cheapest to most expensive with prices displayed in both USD and GBP, and we’ve included their lowest ever sale price, too. We believe that these games represent excellent value for money at full RRP, but they can often be found on sale for considerably less.
Of course, there are a bunch of free-to-play Switch games that cost nothing to download, so be sure to check them out. But now let’s take a look at a whopping 50 of the best cheap Nintendo Switch games, starting with the most budget-friendly…
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Downwell (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $2.99 / £2.69
- Lowest ever price: $0.99 / £0.89
This is an excellent port of a game that feels like it’s found a natural home on Switch thanks to a plethora of control options and the console’s natural facility with vertical orientation. Short of popping your 4K TV on its side, Switch offers the very best way to play Downwell.
Its roguelike structure and twitch platforming might not be for everyone, but you should really give it a chance. For our money, it’s a modern classic that should be in everyone’s collection.
Vampire Survivors (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $4.99 / £3.99
- Lowest ever price: $3.99 / £3.19
Vampire Survivors skyrocketed in popularity in 2022 for good reason. It’s one of the best roguelites in recent memory thanks to its gripping gameplay loop and metagame that hijacks your mind.
The Switch port only adds more to love with local co-op and updated content. It’s so easy to slip into a blissful sense of flow in Vampire Survivors’ Castlevania-inspired, comically named levels as its ripping soundtrack and satisfying sound design propel you into the horde that you’ll surely lose track of time playing it.
It’s a good thing that rounds don’t usually last more than half an hour. With the addition of free Adventures and a host of DLC, including the excellent Ode to Castlevania, this undead master is teeming with life.
Lunistice (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $4.99 / £4.99
- Lowest ever price: $3.74 / £3.74
Lunistice takes us back to the joys of mid-90s platforming in all of the right ways. Combining some fantastic level design with a low-poly visual style that appears to have been taken straight from a classic PS1 title, this is a game that is so dripping in nostalgia it becomes difficult to put down.
An initial playthrough isn’t going to require the longest of gaming sessions, but repeated runs are a must for all of the completionists out there. If 3D platforming is your vibe, this is among the top indie titles in the genre.
Also, if you’re a fan of nostalgia-driven 32-/64-bit platformers, the Toree games and Cavern of Dreams are also great.
Subsurface Circular (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $5.99 / £4.79
- Lowest ever price: $2.99 / £2.39
Subsurface Circular is a landmark moment in interactive storytelling. The elegance of its escalation is simply unmatched, as it tells a story that makes you feel like you’re in completely over your head, and yet still perfectly believable. The characters you meet along the way all feel unique with their own personality, which makes interacting with them a test of wit and cunning as you use the conversational mechanics to their full effect.
There’s nothing else quite like Subsurface Circular, and when that uniqueness is combined with the phenomenal narrative at hand, you have all the ingredients for a simply unforgettable and very special journey aboard the subway.
Florence (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $5.99 / £4.99
- Lowest ever price: $1.99 / £1.79
Florence is an evocation of the beauty, sadness, and hope that comes from any human connection we make in our lives, whether with art, nature, or another person. It’s a succinct and incredibly successful exploration of moments you’ll recognise from your own life, and the way it mirrors thoughts and feelings through small gameplay mechanics makes it one of the most affecting experiences we’ve enjoyed on Switch, or any other platform.
SEGA AGES Out Run (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $7.99 / £5.99
- Lowest ever price: $1.99 / £1.49
If you originally missed out on the 3DS port, this is about as essential a retro release as you can get. Out Run has always been an infinitely playable game, and the new unlockables and online rankings only increase its longevity further.
Those with the 3DS version will have to decide whether it’s worth buying what’s more or less the same game again in order to play it on their TV, but for everyone else with an interest in retro gaming, it’s a must-have. And if you like this, you’ll probably love M2’s masterful Switch port of Virtua Racing, too.
A Short Hike (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $7.99 / £6.29
- Lowest ever price: $4.79 / £3.77
A Short Hike is a fat-free experience from top to bottom – or should we say bottom to top? It’s the kind of game that makes us just sigh with happiness when we recall our time with it, and even having played it through to its ostensible conclusion multiple times, we know for a fact there are still things to see and do on that mountain.
What we have here is something of an apotheosis – a milestone in indie games akin to Cave Story, or Spelunky. The very best bits of multiple game genres, stripped of all padding and bloat, mixed perfectly into a delicious video game stew that only gets richer and richer the more you play. An exploration in every sense of the word, A Short Hike is cute without being twee, challenging without being obnoxious, and emotional without being cloying.
A landmark game for all ages. Don’t miss this one.
RITE (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $6.99 / £5.19
- Lowest ever price: $3.49 / £2.59
Rite is an absolute gem. Developer Pond Games nails the execution of a simple platforming concept and wraps things up before the game overstays its welcome.
At the price of just seven bucks, this one is a no-brainer pick-up for anyone who considers themselves a fan of tough platformers; tight controls, challenging levels, and a chill soundtrack all combine to make Rite the easiest of recommendations.
Quake (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $9.99 / £7.99
- Lowest ever price: $3.29 / £2.63
Quake returns in a feature-rich remaster that delicately updates the classic FPS, adding lots of optional bells and whistles, packing in a ton of content, and delivering the definitive way to play this masterpiece in the process.
There’s a wealth of online and co-op options here, a glorious new expansion to blast through from MachineGames, super slick performance in both docked and handheld modes, and it’s all available at a cracking price point.
This really is a stellar port of one gaming’s true greats and an absolutely essential addition to your Switch library. Also, Quake 2 is similarly epic – and cheap.
Stardew Valley (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £10.99
- Lowest ever price: $7.49 / £5.49
Stardew Valley offers its players a chance to live a second life – one where you can forget the troubles of the real world and get excited over finding a particularly rare carrot. It is a truly magical experience; games can often be enjoyable but they don’t all manage to be as captivating as this.
This is the sort of game that ideally requires a significant amount of time to be invested; the enjoyment doesn’t necessarily come from the day-to-day actions you perform, but rather from the general growth of pride, satisfaction, and sense of security as the days go by.
Fans of games such as Harvest Moon and Animal Crossing will be right at home here and, for those who aren’t, there is a decent chance this game might just surprise you.
Rogue Legacy (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £10.99
- Lowest ever price: $2.02 / £1.53
If you were to take everything that makes a good roguelike title (interesting level design, worthwhile replay loop, strong combat system) and mix it up with some writing which is big on laughs, then you might just end up with something like Rogue Legacy (or it’s successor Rogue Legacy 2, though that’s a bit too expensive for this list).
This is a game that is well aware of its genre’s fans and what makes them tick. Combining the high points of Castlevania, Dead Cells and the long line of 2D sidescrolling roguelike adventures, Rogue Legacy is strong enough to stand amongst the best of them.
Into The Breach (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £11.39
- Lowest ever price: $7.49 / £5.69
Into The Breach is a brutal, uncompromising game of making hard decisions and living with your mistakes, but the short length of battles and endless variety of playthroughs makes for an extremely addictive experience.
hough the graphics are nothing special, the gameplay is some of the very best you’ll find in the strategy genre on Switch, and we can easily recommend this to anybody who’s looking for an in-depth game that’ll make you think. Into The Breach feels right at home on the Switch, and whether you play more at home or on the go, you’re more than likely to get plenty of value out of this release.
Undertale (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £11.99
- Lowest ever price: $8.99 / £7.19
It is difficult to talk about Undertale and still be taken seriously at the end of it. If the term “RPG” sends a shiver down your spine but you remain interested in the genre nonetheless, then this could be the one for you.
The game borrows all of the tried and tested tropes of the genre before dialling it up to 11 on the weirdness scale with some excellent writing, a fantastic combat system and a series of different ways that the story can go. This isn’t all sword waving and stabbing, there is a lot more to Undertale than meets the eye.
Horace (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £10.99
- Lowest ever price: $2.09 / £1.09
Horace is something very special. If you have any interest in superb level design, excellent storytelling, terrific art, evocative music, great characters, hilarious situations and emotional gut punches, it’s a no-brainer. It’s moving without being manipulative, clever without being smug, and nostalgic without being a lazy rehash. It’s a platformer, but it’s so much more than that.
So yes, Horace is another indie masterpiece, and every gamer who enjoys quality experiences should play it; a masterpiece that owes so much to its medium, but has the strength, creativity and identity to stand alone as something very, very special. Buy this.
Gorogoa (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £11.99
- Lowest ever price: $4.49 / £3.49
The Switch’s eShop is saturated with bucketloads of high-quality content. This is great in one way, of course, but stumbling across hidden gems within it will get tougher as time goes on. Gorogoa is one such gem; a puzzle game quite unlike any other that deserves your attention.
It is a little on the short side, but the creativity that has been put into its design, and the effect it will have on you during your time exploring its gorgeous world, is something that you’ll want to experience. If you’re looking for something new to try, this would be an excellent choice.
Balatro (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £12.79
- Lowest ever price: $12.74 / £11.51
Balatro is a roguelike for gamers who don’t like roguelikes… and then everybody else on top of that. It utterly nails what it sets out to do, providing an instantly accessible, satisfying, and addictive gameplay loop that anybody can grasp.
It’s an immensely enjoyable experience from the start, but as you get deeper in, there’s really nothing else quite like it. Utterly sublime.
The Walking Dead: The Complete First Season (Switch eShop)
- Switch eShop Price: $14.99 / £12.99
- Lowest ever price: $3.74 / £2.59
Whether you played this back in 2012 or are completely new to the series, Telltale’s The Walking Dead: Season One is a masterpiece of video game storytelling.
It features some of the best voice-over performances you’ll find on any gaming platform and sets the stage for a grand, multi-season odyssey of tragic proportions. However, this is also a satisfying and poignant collection even if you never play the subsequent episodes.
Even if you lost patience with Rick Grimes and TV series adaptation of Robert Kirkman’s comic books, this remains an incredible interactive adaptation of Kirkman’s world of walkers.
