Lichii Emulator: the open-source Switch 2 emulator, explained

• Unofficial guide
• Latest: build 75 · 2026-11-05
• Pre-release
• GPL-3.0

Lichii is a very experimental, open-source emulator for Nintendo Switch and Switch 2 games, written in C++ and maintained by zortos293 on GitHub. It is a fork of the Eglantine Switch 2 emulator, which itself comes from Eden, yuzu and Sudachi. This guide explains what Lichii can and cannot do today, which official file to download, and how to stay away from fake “Switch 2 emulator” sites. (People sometimes type it as “litchi emulator”; the project is spelled Lichii.)

Official build 75 on GitHub Which file do I need?

What Lichii is today

The README describes Lichii as “an experimental, open-source Nintendo Switch and Switch 2 emulator written in C++” that “builds on Eglantine, Eden, yuzu and Sudachi, preserving their contributions while developing this fork's game compatibility and renderer fixes.” In practice that means:

• Codebase: 94% C++ by GitHub’s language count, built with CMake (3.31 or newer) as C++20. The GUI is Qt 6; the graphics backend is Vulkan, with MoltenVK on macOS. The Android source folder inherited from Eden is in the tree (Kotlin, 3.6%), but no Android build is released.
• Branch: the work happens on a branch called nx2, and release tags are numbered automatic builds (build-70, build-75), not version numbers. The repository’s VERSION file says 0.1.0-rc1, inherited from upstream Eglantine.
• Builds: a GitHub Actions workflow (release-binaries.yml) compiles seven packages for each release: Windows x86_64 (MSVC and MinGW PGO), Linux x86_64 and ARM64 (standard and PGO) and macOS ARM64.
• Fork, not a rewrite: most of the emulator core is Eden’s Switch 1 emulator. The Switch 2 work adds new CPU instruction decoding, Switch 2 executable loading, and many GPU shader and video fixes for individual games.
• Status: the maintainers list known issues for every game they mention. The README says “passing automated tests does not establish that a game renders correctly, and this project makes no universal frame-rate guarantee.”

What changed in build 75

Build 75 (c9ebb5c) was published on November 5, 2026. According to its release notes:

• The game the notes call “the green-hat kid adventure” (issue reports name it the Ocarina of Time remake) now boots, gets through the intro and plays. About 80 shaders it could not run before now translate. Known issue: outdoor areas are far too foggy, and it runs at about 12–22 fps on a Ryzen 5900X with an RTX 3080.
• Star Fox gameplay runs at 60 fps instead of 30 (Ampere GPU timestamps are now reported in nanoseconds, #84).
• The in-app updater checks Lichii’s own GitHub releases and picks the right file for your platform (#82).
• New frame-dump and shader A/B diagnostics, all off by default.

Full history on the changelog page.

Guides

How to start (official instructions)

1. Open the Releases page of zortos293/Lichii and pick the file for your system (see the download guide).
2. Windows: extract the whole zip into its own folder and run lichii.exe (or eden-cli.exe from a terminal).
3. Linux: make the AppImage executable (chmod +x) and run it, or extract the tar.gz and run ./lichii.
4. macOS: unzip and move lichii.app to Applications. It is not notarized, so the first time right-click it and choose Open.
5. Back up your saves first. The README says the rebrand keeps the existing Eden/Eglantine data folders and settings, and experimental builds can break things.

Bugs go to the official issue tracker. The README asks for the exact build, game version, CPU, GPU, driver, settings, steps, a screenshot and the log, and says not to upload game files, keys, firmware or account information.

FAQ