How to connect a Nintendo Switch Pro controller to your PC | Tom’s Guide

As one of the best nintendo switch controllers out there, knowing how to connect a nintendo switch pro controller to your pc gives you the best of both worlds. Using the Nintendo Switch Pro is a delight and is much more comfortable than the Joy-Cons that come with the Switch. It’s one of the prettiest pads ever made, so it’s only natural that you want to use it as much as possible.

Fortunately, Nintendo has made it easy to connect the Switch Pro controller to your PC, either with a USB-C cable or wirelessly via Bluetooth. while some gaming puritans would never give up the keyboard and mouse combo, using a joypad for sports games or a few rocket league sessions now and then is a welcome change.

It may not offer the advanced options you can get when using a dualsense controller with a pc, but in terms of comfort and ruggedness, the switch pro pad and its superhuman battery life are still extremely hard to beat.

here is how to connect nintendo switch pro controller to pc.

how to connect a nintendo switch pro controller to your pc (wired)

There really isn’t much to this method, but…

1. take a usb-c cable and plug one end into the top of the switch pro controller and the other into your pc.

2. windows should detect and identify the nintendo switch controller, and you’ll see a small notification in your taskbar letting you know when it’s done.

how to connect a nintendo switch pro controller to pc (wireless)

To connect the switch pro controller to your pc wirelessly, you will need to have bluetooth built in or have a bluetooth dongle available. Assuming you do, this is how you connect your switch pro controller to pc via bluetooth.

1. press the home button and then press “settings”.

2. In the window that opens, select “devices”, which is the second option on the top row.

3. make sure the bluetooth switch is on and then press “add bluetooth or other device”.

4. You should now choose the type of device you want to connect. ignore the mention of xbox controllers at the bottom and press the top option: “bluetooth”.

5. You should now put your switch pro controller into pairing mode. pick it up and find the small button on the left side of the charging port (number 2 in the diagram below, thanks nintendo!).

Press and hold the button until the set of lights at the bottom of the pad (marked 6 in the image above) start blinking back and forth.

6. Back on your computer, a list will have started to populate with connectable bluetooth devices. the switch pro controller will appear here, and luckily it’s easy to spot, simply called “pro controller”. click this option.

7. if everything is ok, you will receive a confirmation with the words “your device is ready to go”. once you have seen this message, your gamepad is connected.

how to setup nintendo switch pro controller on steam

Before you start playing around with your nintendo switch pro controller on pc, you’ll want to do some tweaking in steam.

1. log in to steam and press the steam menu button in the upper left corner of the window. select “settings” from the dropdown menu.

2. from the menu that appears,select “driver”. this will open a new panel on the right, where you will need to choose “general driver settings”.

3. select “change pro settings support” to let steam know what type of gamepad you are working with.

When you do this, you will see an additional option that allows you to use the “nintendo button layout”. this is because nintendo’s position for a, b, x and y differs from microsoft’s on the xbox controller, you can make the switch pro controller reflect this or make it the way nintendo intended .

4. Now you are free to customize the Nintendo Switch Pro controller as much as you want. Go back to the previous menu and select “general settings” and you can adjust everything to your liking.

how to use nintendo switch pro controller with non-steam games.

but what about your non-steam games? well, you can play around with programs like x360ce if you want, but an easier solution is to port your non-steam games over to steam. here’s how.

1. log back into steam and select the option labeled “games” on the top bar. From the drop-down menu that appears, choose “add a non-steam game to my library”.

2. A new window will appear listing a bunch of applications on your computer. just find the games you want to add, select them, and then press “add selected shows”.

Now that you know how to use a Nintendo Switch Pro controller on your PC, check out some of our other Nintendo Switch guides including how to add friends on Nintendo Switch and how to connect Nintendo Switch to a TV. And if you’ve recently upgraded, take a look at how to transfer switch data to your new oled switch.