- GTA 6 has officially been delayed to May 26, 2026.
- Unfortunately, this proves many fans were right about a GTA 6 2026 release date all along.
- Nonetheless, 2025 looks to be a promising year for video games with many prominent releases.
The ravens have gathered, the air is heavy, and the bell has officially tolled. After more than a year of intense speculation, filled with countless re-examinations of the same 90 seconds, GTA 6 has officially been delayed to May 26, 2026. The optimist within me has withered into a whiny skeptic, and I’m here to share my sour grapes on the internet. But this won’t be a standard rant that earns me infamy on a random Reddit thread. Instead, I’m here to give the naysayers their flowers, because as it turns out, they knew GTA 6 was headed for a delay all along.
The Community Was Right About the GTA 6 Release Date
Given Rockstar’s silence on the matter, fans online always had a lot of trouble believing the GTA 6 2025 release window. The only updates we received before the official delay came from Take-Two earnings reports, reiterating the same release window. This did very little to instill confidence among fans, some of whom took to Reddit to express their uncertainty.
Visiting these threads now, retroactively, makes it almost comical how on-point some of these fans were. Comments that initially appeared like shots in the dark now seem like enlightened foresight. And I can’t help but tip my hat to the predictions under this popular post from u/Beneficial-Swing1663 that garnered over 7,100 upvotes.
Among them, this comment stands out for its eerie accuracy:
“I can’t see it being released anytime other than the run up to Christmas, and I don’t think it’ll be 25. Even if it’s ready mid-26, they will hold off on releasing it till the Christmas season, given the huge revenue boost. Also, it still won’t be a finished game when they release.”
The replies section has a litany of similar comments, and the optimism appeared to be at an all-time low, even back then. The lack of a GTA 6 second trailer was always a real gut punch to the community’s faith in the 2025 release window. So, imagine the disappointment caused by the GTA 6 2026 delay, which was accompanied by nothing regarding gameplay details.
A delay is fine, but the elusive antics are aggravating. You don’t just push a massively-hyped game’s release date forward by 6 months without knowing that the development was off-track internally. And if that was the case, then why string everyone along? At the very least, an earlier heads-up would’ve helped soften the blow rather than leaving fans to do the math themselves.
As a result, we’re now left with more reservations instead of being jubilant about a concrete release date. With all that said, the uncomfortable question beckons – what next?
Where Do We Go from Here?
For starters, “living to play GTA 6” is no longer a sustainable lifestyle – it might be time to discover new hobbies, or at least find a purpose beyond the GTA 6 mapping project. Jokes aside, a delay isn’t the end of the world. Game development is complex. And if a few extra months mean the difference between a polished experience and a rushed mess, Rockstar should take all the time required.
That said, momentum is a fragile thing. After that first trailer, Rockstar had the world in the palm of their hands. It was a bona fide cultural moment, millions of eyes glued to 90 seconds of footage. But in the silence that followed, that momentum began to dwindle. Anticipation can only stretch so far before it starts to thin, and without anything to hold onto, not even a screenshot, even the most diehard fans start drifting. The delay, in isolation, isn’t what hurts. It’s the dismal lull of radio silence, endless speculation, and the lack of communication that preceded it.
As for where do we go now, 2025 is still jam-packed with many exciting releases. Death Stranding 2 looks outrageous in all the right ways, Doom: The Dark Ages brings a medieval spin to its metal gameplay formula, and Borderlands 4’s gameplay appears to have a wishlist’s worth of new features. On top of these blockbusters, we also have Mafia: The Old Country, Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater, and Ghost of Yotei still to come.
My point is that 2025 will be a memorable year for gaming, even if it isn’t graced by GTA 6. And while you wait for its May 2026 release date, let me remind you of Shigeru Miyamoto’s hallowed proverb: “A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad.”
That said, do you think GTA 6 will make it to its 2026 release date? If you do, let us know in the comments below.
