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|style="text-align: center;"|[[Citra]]|style="text-align: center;"|Windows, OS X, Linux|style="text-align: center;"|(nightly builds)|style="text-align: center;"|✓|style="text-align: center;"|✓

|style="text-align: center;"|[[3dmoo]]|style="text-align: center;"|Windows, Linux|style="text-align: center;"|(nightly builds)|style="text-align: center;"|✗|style="text-align: center;"|✗

|style="text-align: center;"|[[TronDS]]|style="text-align: center;"|Windows, Linux|style="text-align: center;"|1.0.0.5|style="text-align: center;"|?|style="text-align: center;"|✗

* ;[[Citra]] is an :An early in development open-source 3DS emulator made by experienced emulator developers. It is considered experimental, and it runs homebrew applications with a decent degree of compatibility. Though it can play many commercial games to some extent, the emulator has various graphical and sound issues with most games, and requires a very powerful CPU for most games to be playable. Citra is being regularly worked on, and progress in it is faster than expected for most emulators. However, there's still no telling how long it will be before it is suitable for playing games to completion.* ;[[3dmoo]] is another :Another open-source 3DS emulator, made by experienced developers in the DS hacking scene. It was released shortly after Citra and received similar progress for a few months, but was eventually aborted by its authors after a while.* [[;TronDS]] is a :A closed-source 3DS emulator, presumably made by the iDeaS author. Little is known about it other than that it can run simple homebrew. It cannot be used for playing games.

* ''';NCSD-type:''' Includes '''.CCI''' (Citra Cart Image), aka '''.3DS''' - data on physical carts, can be executed right off the bat, not used much since no one bothered to develop a CFW solution to load them yet (besides converting them to CIA) and only overpriced flashcarts (Gateway/Sky3DS) can load them.* ''';NCCH-type:''' Includes '''.CIA''' (Citra Importable Archive) and '''.CXI''' - installers that unpack game data to the SD card or the 3DS NAND memory (if you have a ticket proving ownership of that game, but tickets can be shared and even fool Nintendo's servers into letting you download the game, using tools like FreeShop or Wii U USB Helper if on a PC). Some homebrew apps (FBI, DevMenu) can install CIA files on 3DS systems with CFW installed. Digital only games will use this format internally.

'''Citra''' can only load game images in '''decrypted 3DS format''' so far. A solution to load encrypted images is for the moment on the back burner and there's not much developer interest for it. If you want to play games on Citra, you'll have to convert your game images to that format.