Citra (emulator)

Nintendo 3DS emulator

Citra

Citra Nightly 1910 running on Linux

Developer(s)| Citra team
Initial release| April 24, 2014; 11 years ago (2014-04-24)
Final release|

Nightly 2104 / 4 March 2024; 16 months ago (2024-03-04)

Preview release|

Canary 2798 / 4 March 2024; 16 months ago (2024-03-04)

Repository| https://github.com/citra-emu/citra at the Wayback Machine (archived March 2, 2024)
Written in| C++
Operating system| Windows, macOS, Linux, Android
Platform|

* x86-64[1]
* ARM64[2]

Available in| 22 languages[3]
Type| Video game console emulator
License| GPL-2.0-or-later[4]
Website| https://citra-emu.org at the Wayback Machine (archived March 3, 2024)

Citra is a discontinued[5][6][7] free and open-source game console emulator of the handheld system Nintendo 3DS for Windows, macOS, Linux, and Android. Citra's name is derived from CTR, which is the model name of the original 3DS.[1] Citra can run many homebrew games and commercial games.[8]

Citra was first made available in 2014. The core team behind it went on to develop Nintendo Switch emulator Yuzu in 2018.[9] Support for Citra by the Yuzu team was dropped on March 5, 2024, following a $2.4 million settlement reached with Nintendo of America.[5][6][7]

## Development

[edit]

Citra was initially created in April 2014.[10] The first commercial Nintendo 3DS game to be run by Citra was The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D.[11][12]

Citra has been able to emulate audio since May 21, 2016,[13] and has had a JIT compiler since September 15, 2016.[14] In November 2017, Citra announced networking support for the emulator.[15] The networking support emulates the 3DS's local Wi-Fi, which originally made it possible to play over local networks. Additionally, Citra allows the networking to be compatible with other users anywhere.[1] In April 2020, the Citra Team announced compatibility with New Nintendo 3DS games and support for save states,[16][17][18] and in May 2020, they announced a version of Citra for Android.[19][20] The console's Home Menu was bootable from March 2023.[21] In September 2023, support for Vulkan was added as an experimental alternative to OpenGL.[22][23] In March 2024, Nintendo and Yuzu developer Tropic Haze LLC reached a settlement prompting Tropic Haze to shut down operations for Yuzu. Additionally, Tropic Haze agreed to surrender or cease working on any project that involved Nintendo's copyrighted properties, and as a result support for Citra was dropped by the developers.[24][25] Due to the open source nature of Citra, many forks appeared after its shutdown. Two of these forks, Lime3DS and former Citra team member PabloMK7's fork merged into one project, Azahar Emulator. [26][27]

System requirements  | Requirements

|

Personal Computer[1]
Operating system |

* Windows 10 (64-bit) or higher
* macOS Big Sur or higher
* Modern 64-bit desktop Linux

CPU | x86-64 CPU| Single Core Performance > 1,800 on Passmark
Graphics hardware |

* OpenGL 4.3
* Vulkan 1.1

Android[2]
Operating system | Android 8.0 (64-bit)
CPU | AArch64| Snapdragon 835 or better
Graphics hardware |

* OpenGL ES 3.2
* Vulkan 1.1

## See also

[edit]

* Yuzu, the Nintendo Switch emulator made by the same team.

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b c d "FAQ". Citra. Citra Team. Archived from the original on 22 August 2020. Retrieved 23 August 2020.
2. ^ a b "Citra Android is here! · Citra". Citra. Archived from the original on 22 May 2020. Retrieved 23 August 2020.
3. ^ "The Citra translation project on Transifex". www.transifex.com. Archived from the original on 25 July 2019. Retrieved 4 January 2022.
4. ^ "Citra/License.TXT at master · citra-emu/Citra · GitHub". GitHub. Archived from the original on 2019-01-25. Retrieved 2020-08-23.
5. ^ a b Hollister, Sean (March 4, 2024). "Bunnei confirms Yuzu is shutting down — and it'll hit Nintendo 3DS emulator Citra too". The Verge. Archived from the original on March 17, 2024. Retrieved March 4, 2024.
6. ^ a b published, Wes Fenlon (2024-03-04). "Nintendo 3DS emulator Citra taken offline as collateral damage in Yuzu lawsuit settlement". PC Gamer. Retrieved 2025-07-17.
7. ^ a b "Nintendo Lawsuit Shuts Down Switch Emulator Yuzu And 3DS Emulator Citra". GameSpot. Retrieved 2025-07-17.
8. ^ "Games · Citra". Citra. Archived from the original on 3 October 2020. Retrieved 10 October 2020.
9. ^ Lilly, Paul (January 15, 2018). "Nintendo Switch 'Yuzu' Emulator Announced By Citra 3DS Developers". HotHardware. Archived from the original on 31 October 2019. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
10. ^ "Citra Progress Report – 2015 P1". Citra Team. 23 February 2016. Archived from the original on 27 November 2019. Retrieved 12 December 2017.
11. ^ Parlock, Joe (12 May 2015). "The first commercial 3DS game's been successfully emulated". Destructoid. Archived from the original on 7 April 2017. Retrieved 7 April 2017.
12. ^ Orland, Kyle (12 May 2015). "Don't look now, but 3DS emulation is becoming a thing". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on 18 August 2015. Retrieved 7 April 2017.
13. ^ "HLE Audio Comes to Citra". Citra Team. 20 May 2016. Archived from the original on 25 January 2019. Retrieved 8 April 2017.
14. ^ @citraemu (16 September 2016). "After much anticipation, Citra now has a JIT! Props again to @MerryMage for another massive contribution to the project!!" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 26 September 2019 – via Twitter.
15. ^ "Announcing Networking Support". Citra Team. 4 November 2017. Archived from the original on 25 July 2019. Retrieved 17 August 2018.
16. ^ @citraemu (31 March 2020). "Citra's NEWEST release brings New 3DS game support! Games such as Minecraft 3DS are now playable. To celebrate, we are taking a page out of Nintendo's playbook and for a limited time, you can try out New™ Citra Canary XL" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 1 April 2020 – via Twitter.
17. ^ @citraemu (1 April 2020). "Accidentally fell off that cliff or killed that shiny? We've got you covered with new experimental save state support in Citra Canary. Save and reload till you finally succeed!" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 2 April 2020 – via Twitter.
18. ^ "Switch & Emulation News: GameCard Installer NX 2.0 released with faster install speed & more while Citra gets savestate, New 3DS & texture upscaling support!". wololo.net. 2020-04-06. Retrieved 2024-08-01.
19. ^ Plunkett, Luke (26 May 2020). "Android Now Has A Very Good 3DS Emulator". Kotaku. Archived from the original on 15 February 2024. Retrieved 28 February 2024.
20. ^ "Citra Android is here!". Citra Team. 23 May 2020. Archived from the original on 22 May 2020. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
21. ^ "Citra Progress Report 2023 Q2 - Citra". Citra. Archived from the original on 2024-03-04. Retrieved 2024-08-01.
22. ^ "The Vulkan-o erupts - Citra Vulkan is here! · Citra". Citra. 2023-09-15. Archived from the original on 2023-09-22. Retrieved 2023-09-23.
23. ^ Liam, Dawe (18 September 2023). "Nintendo 3DS emulator Citra adds Vulkan support". GamingOnLinux. Archived from the original on 17 March 2024. Retrieved 28 February 2024.
24. ^ Fenlon, Wes (4 March 2024). "Nintendo 3DS emulator Citra taken offline as collateral damage in Yuzu lawsuit settlement". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 9 March 2024. Retrieved 17 March 2024.
25. ^ Williams, Hayley (4 March 2024). "Nintendo Lawsuit Shuts Down Switch Emulator Yuzu And 3DS Emulator Citra". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 12 March 2024. Retrieved 17 March 2024.
26. ^ "Two more Nintendo 3DS emulators just bit the dust, but this time it's good news". Android Authority. 2024-10-31. Retrieved 2025-07-17.
27. ^ Wilkins, Shawn (2024-11-16). "Lime3DS and PabloMK7 Citra Fuse Into Azahar - Retro Handhelds". Retrieved 2025-07-17.

## External links

[edit]

* Citra website Archived 2021-04-21 at the Wayback Machine

* v
* t
* e

Emulators of Nintendo hardware

Handheld|

| Game Boy|

* Wzonka-Lad

|

Nintendo 3DS|

* Citra

Multi|

* Delta
* higan
* VisualBoyAdvance
* MAME (MESS)
* Mednafen

Home console|

| NES/Famicom|

* Family Computer Emulator
* FCEUX
* NESticle
* Nestopia

|

SNES/Super Famicom|

* Snes9x
* ZSNES

Nintendo 64|

* Mupen64Plus
* Project Unreality
* Project64
* UltraHLE

GameCube/Wii|

* Dolphin

Wii U|

* Cemu

Switch|

* Ryujinx
* Yuzu

Multi|

* Delta
* higan
* Mednafen

List of Nintendo video game console emulators

Portals:

* Video games
* Free and open-source software

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