Nintendo will shut down smartphone racer Mario Kart Tour this September, after seven years of service.
A notice posted on social media this morning revealed that the iPhone and Android game will cease operating on September 29 at 11pm Pacific time. The game originally launched in September 2019, and is one of Nintendo’s few remaining mobile games still in operation.
“We sincerely thank the many players who have loved and supported the game since service began so long ago,” Nintendo wrote in a blog post with a few more details on the game’s demise. “Thank you for playing Mario Kart Tour.”
Nintendo shutting down its smartphone games is nothing new — many of them have now been scrapped. But Mario Kart Tour lasted longer than most, fed into development of tracks for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe’s Switch expansion pass, and was — for a while, at least — extremely lucrative.
The financial success of Mario Kart Tour was initially marred in controversy, however, as it relied on gacha-style mechanics to unlock new karts and characters. After significant backlash, Nintendo replaced this system with a more standard item shop in 2022, as well as a subscription service.
Today, the sale of in-game currency has now been suspended, as have automatic renewals for the game’s Gold Pass subscription. All players will soon be able to enjoy subscription-level benefits for the remainder of the game’s life.
However, unlike the shutdown of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, Nintendo is not preparing a standalone offline edition of the game for players to switch over to after Mario Kart Tour’s servers shut down. “An offline version is not scheduled for release,” reads an extremely brief FAQ page on the matter. It’s a shame, as this will leave several Mario Kart tracks unique to the game unplayable forever.
Perhaps the lack of an offline version is down to the fact that Mario Kart World is seen as a key driver for the uptake of Switch 2 — and Nintendo would much rather you purchase a console to play that, whereas an all-new Animal Crossing game still seems years away.
Regardless, with Mario Kart Tour shutting down, Nintendo’s smartphone game catalog will shrink further. Fire Emblem Heroes and Shadows remain operational, as does Super Mario Run. And then there’s Pikmin Bloom, which is largely run by Pokémon Go developer Niantic.
Still, Nintendo has not abandoned its smartphone ambitions entirely. Earlier this year it launched Pictonico!, an app that lets you turn images from your camera roll into WarioWare-style minigames.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at [email protected] or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
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