Affiliate links on Android Authority may earn us a commission. Learn more.
The best Nintendo 3DS emulators for PC and Mac
The Nintendo 3DS is one of the best gaming handhelds of all time. It sold over 75 million units during its run and was home to some iconic titles. Those include several Pokémon games, the Etrian Odyssey series, Kid Icarus, Radiant Historia, and various Mario, Zelda, and Kirby games. The handheld system was discontinued in September 2020, and the Nintendo eShop closed in March 2023.
Still, the original hardware remains incredibly popular, with second-hand prices reaching crazy prices as of 2026. The good news is that Nintendo 3DS emulators are in a pretty good spot in terms of compatibility, so it’s never been easier to enjoy your favorite 3DS games on modern hardware. To that end, here are the best Nintendo 3DS emulators for PC and Mac.
Before we start, it’s worth pointing out that we have excluded a few options from our list due to a lack of active development or untrustworthy development practices. Now that Citra has been shut down, there are only a few good Nintendo 3DS emulators on PC and Mac, and one of those still uses the final build of Citra.
The best Nintendo 3DS emulators for Mac and PC
Azahar Emulator
The two best Citra forks combined into one.
- Pricing: Free
- Platforms: Windows, Android, macOS, and Linux (Downloads)
What we like:
- Easy to use.
- Great feature set that’s still growing.
- Ability to download games you’ve purchased.
- Great compatibility.
What we don’t like:
- Still some graphical glitches.
Azahar emulator is the next best hope for Nintendo 3DS emulation now that Citra has shut down. Based on the now-defunct Citra, it merges Lime3DS and PabloMK7’s Citra fork into a new emulator with a combined feature set. It has now replaced Lime3DS on the Play Store, and it’s easily the best Nintendo 3DS emulator on Android, Windows, Mac, and Linux.
With the original team behind Citra no longer working on the project, it wasn’t long before Azahar overtook it in compatibility. The two existing forks already had things like online play and Amiibo support, and it now has the ability to re-download purchased eShop titles, which is a great way to sidestep outright piracy to enjoy the games you legally own.
Initially, Azahar also removed support for the .3ds filetype, citing its history tied to legally questionable practices. However, this led to some sketchy forks created expressly to restore this functionality, so the devs recently backtracked and returned support for .3ds files. Like Citra, it also supports .cci files, but for legal reasons, it will not run encrypted game files.
RetroArch
RetroArch is an excellent all-in-one emulator that includes Nintendo 3DS support via its Citra core.
- Pricing: Free
- Platforms: Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS (Downloads)
What we like:
- It’s available everywhere.
- It uses Citra as its core, although it’s no longer actively supported.
- You can play a variety of other consoles with RetroArch, making it a good all-in-one option.
- There are enough configuration options to work for most people.
What we don’t like:
- The setup has a learning curve.
- The Citra core is no longer under active development.
RetroArch, despite its faults, remains the best all-in-one emulator across most platforms. It’s one of our favorite emulators on Android, and an easy recommendation for PC, Mac, Linux, and iOS users too, since it can do Nintendo 3DS games as well as dozens of other consoles.
That said, setting it up is a bit of a pain. You have to download the core, load the core, load the game, and then you can play it or configure your experience from there. It’s not bad at all once you get used to it, but it may be a bit intimidating for people who are new to emulation.
RetroArch is different from standalone emulators because it uses cores. Think of each core as a console that you can load in like a plugin. Thus, you only have to download the cores you want for the consoles you’re interested in. The 3DS core is the open-source Citra emulator, but the Citra developer was shut down in early 2024 after legal action from Nintendo. That means that it’s no longer in active development, but it still has good performance and game support.
Panda3DS
A Nintendo 3DS emulator that’s still cooking.
- Pricing: Free
- Platforms: Windows, macOS, and Linux (Downloads)
What we like:
- Easy to use and configure.
- Works on PC, Mac, Android, and Linux.
- (More or less) actively developed.
What we don’t like:
- Early in the development cycle, with many bugs to be squished.
- Limited compatibility.
While Azahar has now taken the crown as the best Citra fork, there’s one more Nintendo 3DS emulator that’s worth checking out. We’ll be honest here, it’s still early in development and things are still rough around the edges. Some games have graphical errors and others don’t load at all. We also found audio issues on a number of titles.
Still, if the other two above aren’t doing it for you, Panda3DS is your best option. Development is much slower than Azahar’s, but hopefully, some of the rough edges will be smoothed out over time. Until then, I recommend sticking to RetroArch and Azahar for the best compatibility.
Thank you for being part of our community. Read our Comment Policy before posting.