Nintendo surprised everyone last week by announcing a huge new update for Animal Crossing: New Horizons. After more than five years, the beloved Animal Crossing title will be getting new content on January 15, 2026. The free update will bring many new features, including a huge hotel with new rooms to decorate and characters to befriend.
As exciting as the addition of a hotel is, there’s one even more noteworthy update in the upcoming ACNH Update 3.0. According to Nintendo’s preview video, the update will finally allow players to create multiple islands, something that fans have been requesting for years. Unfortunately, there are several catches.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons Update 3.0 Will Finally Allow Players To Design Multiple Islands
Up To Three Island Designs Can Be Saved At A Time
Animal Crossing: New Horizons had a limited form of multiplayer, courtesy of the Drowzee-like tapir character, Luna. With Luna’s help, players could upload a copy of their actual islands to the “dream world,” where other players could visit and explore it. Neither visitors nor creators could make changes to these static dream islands.
With the advent of the new free update, these Dream Islands will now be fully customizable, both alone and in multiplayer modes. Players can now create up to three Dream Islands from scratch, with full control over the island size and every tree state and decor style that goes into it.
This incredible amount of customization frees up players to experiment with fun new island designs without needing to restart their main islands. These islands also allow up to 12 friends to freely design islands together in multiplayer.
It also solves a huge problem that players have with ACNH: you can only have one island per Switch (or Switch 2) console. Players who want to redesign their islands can’t simply make a new save file; they have to completely destroy their current island. The new Dream Islands make it possible to have multiple islands without having to sacrifice hours of work on an existing island.
Multiple Island Creation In ACNH Will Be Limited To Dream Islands
A Nintendo Online Subscription Is Required
As exciting as it is to finally have a way to create more than one island at a time, there are several big limitations to the Dream Islands. One problem is that using the three Dream slots and create Dream Islands requires a Nintendo Online membership.
A basic individual Nintendo membership costs $19.99 per year or $34.99 for a family membership, so it’s not a huge additional fee. However, the online-only existence of the Dream Islands means fans will have to pay an additional fee to unlock more island designs. It also means that anyone who ends their Nintendo Online membership will likely lose access to their Dream Island designs.
The other huge problem with the one-island-per-device policy is that sharing a Switch device also means sharing an island. Being able to design multiple islands is great, but an even more important feature that’s still missing is giving every user their own individual island.
Although it doesn’t resolve all the pain points, being able to create multiple islands in Animal Crossing: New Horizonsis a huge step forward for the franchise. The multiplayer aspect is also a fun bonus, even if the entire feature comes with a price tag. This update might be a preview of what’s coming next for the Animal Crossing franchise, so hopefully, the next title in the series will come built-in with dedicated spaces for every user.
