How long has GTA 6 been in development?

GTA 6 is a long time coming—that’s an understatement. But just how long has the genius mind of Rockstar slaved and labored to develop GTA 6?

During the early 00s, Rockstar pumped out games quite regularly, including multiple GTA titles, Red Dead Revolver, Canis Canem Edit, and much more. Now, something like GTA 6 takes years of development to meet the team’s lofty standards.

The celebrated developer and publisher takes far more time between releases now but it’s understandable as the company’s neverending success means Rockstar doesn’t feel the need to keep churning out new games. However, let’s take a fascinating journey into how long it’s taken to develop GTA 6 and journal the time required behind the scenes.

GTA 6 development time explained

In a 2014 article for Bloomberg, renowned industry journalist Jason Schreier reported that GTA 6 has been in development since 2014.

Now, “in development” is quite a loose term. The second Rockstar Games starts diverting manpower toward the project and even just doing basics such as brainstorming the setting or protagonist, this counts as being in development.

The common belief is that Rockstar started taking things seriously in 2017 or 2018—following the tail end of Red Dead Redemption 2‘s development. Since then, it’s been a case of maintaining and updating the stupidly successful GTA Online, as well as working on GTA 6.

As of 2022, support for Red Dead Online has pretty much stopped and The Last Dose DLC for GTA Online serves as a final content bump in the GTA 5 saga. So, it’s full steam ahead for GTA 6 and the leaked first trailer not only confirmed the rumored Vice City setting and new protagonists but also gave us our first real indication of when to expect GTA 6 to release.