Big update on GTA 6 release date, gaming fans will have to wait for a year

Take-Two Interactive has hinted once again that Grand Theft Auto 6 (GTA 6) is scheduled to launch within the next 20 months. The publisher revealed this clue as part of its latest earnings call, which also saw Take-Two defend the price of the Red Dead Redemption Switch port.

The next entry in the popular series is currently rumored to release during Take-Two’s fiscal year 2025, which ends in March 2025.

This possible GTA 6 release window is based on several recent insider reports, as well as Take-Two’s own financial forecasts which repeatedly indicated that the company is expecting a huge revenue increase during its upcoming fiscal year.

Rockstar has now confirmed that expectation as part of its August 8 earnings call covering the first quarter of its fiscal year 2024, with CEO Strauss Zelnick stating that the company has prepared for a “significant inflection point in fiscal 2025.” Explaining that point, the executive said that Take-Two is expecting “record levels of operating performance” during the 12-month period ending March 2025, which some industry watchers are interpreting as a sign that Grand Theft Auto 6 is planned to release in this timeframe.

That’s not to say that the game’s launch window is fixed, especially since analysts had already misread one such Take-Two forecast from early 2022 as a sign that GTA 6 will be out by March 2024. That prediction is very unlikely to come true, considering that the game hasn’t even been announced yet, and given the publisher’s historical preference for long marketing campaigns.

But assuming that GTA 6 is indeed aiming for a release in Take-Two’s fiscal year 2025, that realistically means that the game is intended to hit the market around the end of 2024.

Most 3D entries in the franchise except for GTA 4 followed that trend, having been historically released around October. That timeframe also matches a recent leak from a reliable Rockstar insider who claimed that GTA 6 is targeting a holiday 2024 release, noting that the game might still end up getting delayed over Rockstar’s difficulties to retain developer talent due to the mandatory return-to-office policy that the company introduced following the initial onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Whatever the case might be, the fact that Take-Two itself is currently telling investors to get ready for a historically lucrative fiscal year 2025 does inspire hope that GTA 6 will see the light of day in the near future.

After all, the publisher has but one IP that could fuel such unprecedented growth building on its already impressive $5.35 billion in annual revenue.