It’s arrived a little earlier than expected, but it’s finally here: the 3.0 update for Animal Crossing: New Horizons! With the game being out on the Nintendo Switch since March 2020, it was hardly getting stale as it continues to be highly popular. However, with the last major update being some years ago now, it’s refreshing – and also a relief – to finally get some brand-new content land in the game. We’re not just talking about new items either like furniture or clothing, but new gameplay, new locations, and new characters.
You’re probably anxious to find out if the 3.0 update is any good, or if it’s been overhyped and nothing’s really changed. We’ll go through everything that’s new with the free 3.0 update in New Horizons and what it brings to the game.
Also, along with the arrival of the 3.0 update, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is also now available on Nintendo Switch 2! If you currently have New Horizons on the Switch, you can get an upgrade to the Switch 2 version, transferring over your saved data so you won’t lose all the years of hard work you put into building up your island from scratch.
If you don’t yet own Animal Crossing: New Horizons, it’s available on Nintendo Switch for $49.99 and will be available on Nintendo Switch 2 for $54.99 from January 15th.
Island Hotel
One of the biggest additions with the New Horizons 3.0 update is the new island hotel. Situated where the pier and Kapp’n and his boat were originally stationed (and still are, by the way), this boardwalk has been greatly expanded with the new hotel. The island hotel, run by Kapp’n and his lovely family, adds several new features to New Horizons.
Guest Rooms
Being a hotel, guests can stay there to visit the island. In turn, you can decorate the rooms they’re staying in. This is heavily reminiscent of the Happy Home Designer games in recent Animal Crossing years.
When decorating a room, you are given a theme. For example, the first tutorial one has a Seaside theme. To help you with getting the theme right with the objects and decor, you’re provided with a list of items to decorate the room that match this theme. This makes it very easy to quickly put something together with the right items. Plus, you can freely change the colors and patterns on the objects.
Decorating guest rooms at the hotel in New Horizons is fun, creative, and rewarding. By having more visitors come to the hotel and your island by decorating more rooms, you unlock new items, as well as earning hotel tickets for more special rewards.
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- Outside the hotel.
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- Inside the hotel, in the lobby.
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- Each guest room has its own theme, with matching items.
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- The hotel brings new visitors to your island.
DIY Requests
Another new feature added with the 3.0 update are DIY requests. Parked just outside the hotel, there’s a box where you can complete DIY projects for distant islanders. This feels like a cross between Nook’s Cranny’s hot items and the Nook Miles tasks.
At one time, four different DIY requests appear in the list. These can be anything, including cooking recipes. You can view what requests there are at the box, or, very handily, you can look under the tab via the DIY recipes app on your phone. It tells you what it wants you to build, as well as what and how many resources you need.
As you fulfil a DIY request, a new one appears in its place, so you’ll never run out of orders. Completing DIY requests gifts you hotel tickets, with the amount varying by job.
Sticking to the subject of crafting, you can now craft items using resources taken straight from your home storage, so you don’t have to manually retrieve the items yourself. This saves a lot of time and hassle. However, the requested resources will prioritize the ones currently in your pockets, if there are any.
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- Crafted items are submitted via the dropbox outside the hotel.
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- Current DIY requests can be viewed in the DIY recipe app.
Hotel Tickets and Souvenir Shop
Animal Crossing: New Horizons already has rewards in the form of Bells and Nook Miles Tickets, but the 3.0 update adds a new rewards system: hotel tickets. These are earned by decorating hotel rooms, as well as completing DIY requests.
Hotel tickets can be used at the souvenir shop, run by Grams. There are a ton of items to choose from, including hotel merchandise such as a mug, towel rack, clock, and an assortment of shirts. Plus, there are brand-new items including furniture and decorations, which change daily.
The new hotel-themed items are fun and slick, a great addition to any islander’s home. The rotational items are a huge welcome to New Horizons as well, bringing a fresh array of furniture and decor to provide new looks for homes.
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- At the souvenir shop, you can buy hotel-themed items.
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- You can also get new items that change daily.
New Nook Shopping Promotion Items
The hotel isn’t the only place in Animal Crossing: New Horizons providing new items to purchase. With the 3.0 update, if you look under the promotion items tab in Nook Shopping, where all the Super Mario stuff is, you’ll find brand-new LEGO items! These include furniture, decorations, and t-shirts.
That’s not all that’s new under Promotion! Also added is the collection of items that came with the Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp cross promotion, which has been added free as part of the 3.0 update.
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- New Lego items are available, such as this arcade machine.
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- There are also Lego t-shirts available.
Slumber Island
If you like playing online in Animal Crossing: New Horizons with friends and other players, there’s a new online feature with the 3.0 update: Slumber Islands! You can create up to three Slumber Islands, including with friends, decorating these islands with items you have unlocked in the game, including plants. You can access the Slumber Island by going to sleep on any bed object in New Horizons and speaking to Luna.
Note that to use the Slumber Island feature, you’ll need an internet connection as well as a Nintendo Online Membership subscription. Otherwise the Slumber Island is inaccessible.
Providing you have internet access and Nintendo subscription, you can create your own Slumber Islands.
Resetti’s New Reset Service
There’s one final new feature to discuss that the 3.0 update introduces with New Horizons. This is Mr. Resetti’s updated Reset Service.
Resetti can reset decorative items on the island including furniture, fencing, ladders, and objects placed on the ground. These will go into your home storage. Resetti cannot reset items buried in the ground such as trees, bushes, vegetables, and weeds.
Resetti can reset the whole island, or do specific areas such as beaches and whichever area you choose. He won’t clear away shells on beaches though. He’ll also be able to clear planted flowers and custom designs on the ground. Flowers can be tossed or put in storage.
Resetti also does pest control, clearing your house of cockroaches after you’re away for a long time.
If you need Resetti’s Reset Service, speak to Isabelle. The daily fee for using the Reset Service is 60,000 Bells. However, the first usage is completely free. Resetting the island covers a whole day at a time. The Reset Service is unavailable during events such as festivals.
Want a fresh slate on your island? Give Mr. Resetti a call!
What the 3.0 Update Could Mean for the Future of Animal Crossing
For years, since the last major update for Animal Crossing: New Horizons, it seemed unlikely we were going to get anything else. New Horizons has been out for several years now, and we’ve been wondering if a new game is in development, especially as the Nintendo Switch 2 was released last year. However, the arrival of the 3.0 update in January 2026 makes us curious. What does this mean for the future of Animal Crossing, and not just New Horizons, but the series as a whole?
Honestly, it’s hard to say. I feel I have experienced most of what New Horizons has had to offer, but I don’t feel done with the game yet. I still enjoy playing it; perhaps not every single day, but I frequently jump in to see what’s happening. I still get a thrill of watching the seasons change, watching the sun set, seeing villagers come and go, discovering new DIY recipes, enjoying the various events throughout the year.
The 3.0 update will keep Animal Crossing: New Horizons going with new content to enjoy.
With the admittedly unexpected arrival of the 3.0 update, I feel certain that New Horizons‘ lifespan isn’t coming to an end just yet. It still feels like yesterday that we got those first preview pictures of New Horizons.
I’d like to add that it was this very game that inspired me to get the Nintendo Switch in the first place, after a year or so of debating whether I should – and I definitely do not regret it for a second. Animal Crossing: New Horizons didn’t just justify my hype, but I fell in love with the Nintendo Switch as well, and now have a whole library of games I adore playing.
However, the fact that New Horizons has received a big new update doesn’t mean a new Animal Crossing game isn’t going to happen. The series has proven that it’s still hugely popular, and it’s certainly not going anywhere anytime soon. For all we know, right this minute, Nintendo could be working on a brand-new Animal Crossing entry. We don’t know when this might be, but in the meantime, we have New Horizons to keep us busy, as well as all the other games before it that we still love to play.
