Skip to main content

Nintendo’s Miitomo app shuts down two years after its launch

Miitomo fans, we have some bad news for you. Nintendo has shut down the social app just two years after its launch.

Miitomo was the Japanese game giant’s first smartphone app, but despite the hype that surrounded its March 2016 arrival, as well as the backing of an outfit like Nintendo, it failed to win the hearts of the masses.

Nintendo said it stopped selling Miitomo coins on January 24, and disabled the app on Wednesday, May 9, disabling all of its features.

Attempting to sign into the app and link your Nintendo account will now result in you receiving an error message noting that Miitomo is undergoing “maintenance.”

Sidekick Mii characters have been deleted, unless you chose to save them as a QR code prior to May 9. You can then transfer them to Mii Maker on the Nintendo 3DS or the Wii U, Nintendo said.

Any Miifotos that you wanted to keep also must have been saved to your smartphone prior to the shutdown. Nintendo recently released the winning entries in its final “Miifoto” contest on Twitter, showing users’ best memories with the app. The winners include silly shots with friends, as well as more heartfelt and sentimental images reflecting on good memories with the app. We swear we’re not tearing up over here.

The Kyoto, Japan-based company didn’t offer a reason for why it ended support for its avatar-based social app, but evidently, it now wants to put its resources into its newer mobile game offerings such as Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp.

In our review of Miitomo soon after its launch, Digital Trends found the app “interesting and fun,” but we certainly weren’t bowled over by it, calling it out for its “lack of any dedicated purpose or utility in the real world.” We also found that it drained our phone’s battery much faster than other apps, and used up a lot of storage space, too.

While Miitomo made some gains with a big update in November 2016, that and subsequent improvements clearly weren’t enough to propel the app to great heights, leading to Nintendo’s decision to discontinue it.

Updated on May 10: The app has been shut down. 

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
The Fitbit app just got its biggest update in years
Fitbit app explore workouts in the Coach tab.

If you’re still a loyal Fitbit user, big changes are starting to roll out to users today. The app has gone through a major redesign that is aimed at making things simpler than ever before. The new design also focuses on three tabs -- Today, Coach, and You  -- to bring the health and wellness data that you actually care about front and center.

With the new Fitbit app, you can track your physical activity with or without a device. This means that you don’t even need a Fitbit device or Google Pixel Watch to count all the steps you take. Thanks to improved communication with your smartphone’s sensors, your phone will do the step counting instead, and the counts are going to be more accurate. You can even track a walk, run, or hike with just the app.

Read more
One of the biggest podcast apps is shutting down in August
Stitcher app on iPhone 14 Pro.

Stitcher, once a popular podcast curation app that also dabbled with live radio stations, is shutting down. Owner SiriusXM has announced that it is focused on “incorporating podcasts into its flagship SiriusXM subscription business” and is looking forward to serving a revamped listening experience in the coming months.

Stitcher was making waves until the pre-pandemic era when it had some popular titles like Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, SuperSoul Conversations from the Oprah Winfrey Network, and Freakonomics Radio — all of which were also shifted to Pandora after the acquisition. Stitcher also had its own slate of originals such as Sold in America, Just Between Us, and Wolverine: The Lost Trail featuring the Marvel comics character.

Read more
It’s not just you: the Apple Weather app is down
Cloudy weather showing in iOS 15's weather app.

Stop trying to force quit apps or restart your phone, it isn't going to help. It's not just you, Apple's Weather app is down right now. There were some sporadic issues yesterday, but it seems more widespread this morning.

Whether it's on an iPhone, iPad, or Mac -- the back-end service running Apple's Weather app seems to be having issues loading data. Sometimes the home screen widget won't work; other times you'll get one or two locations in your list to update, but not the rest. Other times it all looks good, but the hour-by-hour forecast details aren't working. That's frustrating!

Read more