Welcome to the official 3DS Homebrew Launcher website ! This page is meant to be a hub between all the best and newest ways to get homebrew running on your system.
If you want to see homebrew in action, check out this video !

What is homebrew ?


Homebrew is what we call unofficial software made by amateur developers for closed systems such as the 3DS. This includes both games and applications, and in practice getting homebrew on your 3DS means you'll be able to :

Play Aperture Science 3D, a free adaptation of Portal for the 3DS. Play out-of-region games you own.
Make your own themes to use in home menu. Play old SNES games with blargSNES.

How do I get homebrew running on my console ?


Getting homebrew on your 3DS has never been easier ! All you need is one or more of the following titles and a bit of patience. Select the one(s) you have below to get instructions :
Nintendo 3DS Sound
Cubic Ninja
Freakyforms Deluxe
The Legend of Zelda : Ocarina of Time
Steel Diver : Sub Wars
Paper Mario : Sticker Star
Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire
Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon
vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv
Citizens of Earth
Super Smash Bros
Smile Basic
IronFall
Web Browser
Home Menu
YouTube

Preparing your SD card


In order for homebrew to run on your system, you will need to place a few files on your SD card :

To make things easier, we put together the homebrew starter kit; you can just download it and extract it at the root of your SD card. Alternatively, you may choose to only download The Homebrew Launcher menu executable and place it at the root of your SD card.
No matter what, you should have a file named boot.3dsx placed at the root of your SD card.

Otherapp/ropbin payloads


Some exploits (not ninjhax, ironhax or tubehax) might allow you to run the homebrew launcher and require you to get an "otherapp payload" (or a "ropbin payload") to do so. This payload is a binary file specific to your firmware version. You can download your own payload by selecting your firmware version using the dropdowns from left to right below (only select NEW if you are running this on a New 3DS (XL) or New 2DS XL; regular 3DS, 3DS XL and 2DS owners should select OLD):

. . -

Frequently Asked Questions


> Where can I find more homebrew applications ?

     You can visit 3dbrew for more homebrew applications.

> Can I use this to take screenshots ?

     Yes. You can take screenshots in either homebrew or commercial games by hitting the HOME button. You can then convert them to PNG by using the screenshot tool included in the starter pack. In order to take screenshots of official games, you will need to run them through HANS.

> I set up tubehax and I can no longer access the eShop. What's going on ?

     tubehax works by redirecting your DNS requests to a server that will make your console think that youtube.com is another server. In addition to this, our DNS server blocks requests to Nintendo's eShop and update servers by default, meaning that as long as you have the tubehax DNS set up, you will not be able to access the eShop or update your console. You can restore access to the eShop (temporarily or permanently) by switching the DNS back to its original settings. If there is enough demand, we may consider setting up another DNS server for tubehax which does not block traffic to Nintendo's servers.

> Can ironhax be uninstalled ?

     Yes. Simply select the ironhax savegame slot in the IronFall main menu, and delete it !

> Can tubehax be uninstalled ?

     Yes. tubehax is never actually installed to your system; all you need to do to disable it is reset the DNS in your internet connection settings to what it originally was.

> What are 3DSX files ? Why doesn't the homebrew launcher load CXIs ?

     We made the decision early on that the homebrew launcher should only work with a highly relocatable executable format as a way to improve compatibility with potential future exploits (such as ironhax and tubehax), which may or may not include the ability to update virtual memory page permissions. 3DSX is a format developed by fincs which allows us to do just that; each section (.text, rodata and data) can be relocated independently, making it perfect for our needs. Compiling as 3DSX rather than CXI will help maximize future compatibility.

> Does this allow region free ?

     It totally does and it's pretty rad. You can access the region free feature directly from the Homebrew Launcher; it's the first option in the list, can't miss it. For more information on the region free feature, please visit regionFOUR's README page, as the exact same limitations currently apply.

> Does this let me run roms ?

     No. These exploits run strictly in userland, meaning that we do not have full control over the console, and therefore cannot run pirated software. That being said, we have the same amount of access as regular apps and games to the console's hardware, and so we can make some kickass homebrew!

Credits


Most of the code for ninjhax, ironhax and tubehax was written by smea. Everything pertaining to smashbroshax, oot3dhax, browserhax, menuhax and stickerhax was made by yellows8. The vulnerability used for the original homemenuhax was discovered by yellows8 and exploited jointly by yellows8 and smea. supermysterychunkhax and (v*)hax were done entirely by ShinyQuagsire. basicshax and basehaxx were made by mrnbayoh. humblehax is the work of Dazzozo. freakyhax was created by plutoo. In any case a lot of help was provided by the following people :
         - yellows8
         - plutoo
         - mtheall
         - fincs
         - megazig, Bond697
         - Fluto, Arkhandar (hbmenu design)
         - Normmatt, ichfly
         - lobo (webpage template)
         - CUE (compression code)
         - GW (bringing attention to the webkit bug used by tubehax)
         - derlanalmeida, ThibG (icons on this page)
We'd all also like to thank everyone who has been contributing to the 3DS scene in one way or another, including (but not limited to) : yuriks, Subv, sm, StapleButter, bunnei, WinterMute, neobrain, and, like, so many other people.