Since 2017, many Nintendo Switch owners have complained about their left Joy-Con’s analog sticks drifting without any user input.

As this seems to be a common problem plaguing many people, Nintendo Switch owner rainbopython, who purchased their system on launch day, disassembled their Joy-Con to find out what is causing the drifting.

After taking apart the components of the Joy-Con stick, rainbopython had a closer look at the contact pad, used for transmitting user input to the Switch itself. Here’s what they discovered – the contact pads had wear marks on them:

rainbopython believes the wear marks were created over time by the metal prongs that rub against the soft texture of the pads. They concluded the wear marks would have caused fluctuations in the X/Y readings, thus resulting in the Joy-Con drifting issue many experience.

Unfortunately there is no permanent fix to this issue, unless Nintendo makes a completely new type of Joy-Con with different parts.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.