Many gamers woke up to devastating news on May 2, news that no one wanted to hear. Rockstar Games released a statement stating that Grand Theft Auto 6 will not be releasing at the end of 2025. Instead, the company has pushed the game back to a May 26, 2026, release date leaving gamers disappointed.
Grand Theft Auto VI is now set to release on May 26, 2026. https://t.co/YgaIn1cYc8 pic.twitter.com/cyeK7GM6Ob
— Rockstar Games (@RockstarGames) May 2, 2025
This news by Rockstar was not the news that gamers wanted to wake up to this morning. After all, we all were just a handful of months from getting our hands on the next installment in this iconic franchise. While it may not have been the news you wanted to hear, it may have been crucial news to the success of the game.
Why is Grand Theft Auto 6 being pushed back to Spring 2026?
The main thing that gamers want answered is "why?" Why was Grand Theft Auto 6 delayed till next year? Well the main reason is that Rockstar Games has to make sure that they get this game correct, without any issues.
If you take a trip in the time machine back to Grand Theft Auto V, you may remember that even though the game was so much fun and still is so much fun, there were a lot of issues right out of the gate. These issues were mainly revolved around the online portion of Grand Theft Auto V, but that whole mess led to mixed comments surrounding the game until all the bugs were squashed. Nonetheless, once all the issues were fixed, Grand Theft Auto V went on to be a blazing success and still played a ton to this day.
Rockstar Games does not want a repeat as to what happened 12 years ago and because of that it appears as to why we have gotten this delay. For now this news is hard to hear, but if it prevents any major issues from causing the game to be unplayable due to glitches and bugs, this delay could prove to be useful.
Little added pressure to Rockstar Games now
Now that Rockstar has officially delayed Grand Theft Auto 6, there is a bit more pressure added to them to make sure they exceed our expectations and deliver a masterpiece. They can't afford to delay this game and still end up releasing this game with issues. Knowing how great the Grand Theft Auto franchise has been up to this point so far, I have full faith that Rockstar Games will deliver us that masterpiece we are looking for and one of the biggest games of 2026.
While Grand Theft Auto 6 was set to be one of the biggest, if not the biggest game of 2025, eyes will be pointed towards other projects and releases for the remainder of the year by various different companies.