The short answer
Take-Two Interactive, Rockstar's parent company, has told shareholders the same thing in every quarterly release since November 2025: Grand Theft Auto VI launches on November 19, 2026, and that launch will carry the company's fiscal year 2027, which runs from April 1, 2026 to March 31, 2027. Its current forecast for that year is $8.0 to $8.2 billion in Net Bookings, first given on May 21, 2026 and repeated on August 7, 2026. For comparison, Take-Two booked $6.72 billion in fiscal 2026.
Investor material is worth reading because it is formal, dated and archived, so every word can be checked later. It is also where the release window was first narrowed, and where the two delays were put into financial context the same day Rockstar announced them. Everything below comes from Take-Two's press releases and SEC filings, plus three interviews and one analyst call reported by Variety that quote the CEO, Strauss Zelnick. All of it was checked on September 29, 2026.
Two terms before the quotes
Fiscal year. Take-Two's year ends on March 31. "Fiscal 2027" means April 2026 to March 2027, so a November 2026 launch lands in its third quarter.
Net Bookings. This is the company's own sales metric. Take-Two's releases define it as "the net amount of products and services sold digitally or sold-in physically during the period." As Variety notes, bookings are recorded when an order is placed, which is why the metric moves with pre-orders. It is not the same as revenue, and it is not a count of players.
Every statement that framed the launch
| Date |
Where |
What Take-Two said about GTA VI |
| Dec 4, 2023 |
Announcement release |
Coming 2025 to PS5 and Xbox Series X|S |
| May 16, 2024 |
Fiscal 2024 results |
Window narrowed to fall of calendar 2025; expectations for its "commercial impact" rising |
| Nov 6, 2024 |
Q2 fiscal 2025 results |
"Grand Theft Auto VI in the fall," inside fiscal 2026 |
| Feb 6, 2025 |
Q3 fiscal 2025 results |
Fall 2025 repeated; "highly confident" of record bookings in fiscal 2026 and 2027 |
| May 2, 2025 |
Special statement |
Moved to May 26, 2026, now in fiscal 2027 |
| May 15, 2025 |
Fiscal 2025 results |
GTA VI "in Fiscal 2027"; bookings to set "a new baseline" |
| Nov 6, 2025 |
Q2 fiscal 2026 results |
Moved to November 19, 2026 |
| Feb 3, 2026 |
Q3 fiscal 2026 results |
November 19 repeated; record fiscal 2027 still projected |
| May 21, 2026 |
Fiscal 2026 results |
Fiscal 2027 guidance of $8.0 to $8.2 billion, "driven by the November 19th launch" |
| Jun 24, 2026 |
Pre-order release |
Prices, pre-order and pre-load dates |
| Aug 7, 2026 |
Q1 fiscal 2027 results |
$8.0 to $8.2 billion reiterated |
2023 and 2024: from "2025" to "fall 2025"
The first investor-facing statement was the announcement release of December 4, 2023, which said the game was "coming to PlayStation 5 ... and Xbox Series X|S ... in 2025" and quoted Sam Houser, Rockstar's founder, on pushing "the limits of what's possible in highly immersive, story-driven open-world experiences."
Five months later Take-Two narrowed it. In the fiscal 2024 results of May 16, 2024, Zelnick said the outlook "reflects a narrowing of Rockstar Games' previously established window of Calendar 2025 to Fall of Calendar 2025," and added: "our expectations for the commercial impact of the title continue to increase." The same quote promised "sequential growth in Net Bookings for Fiscal 2025, 2026, and 2027."
By the second-quarter results of November 6, 2024, the game was part of the fiscal 2026 lineup: "Grand Theft Auto VI in the fall, Borderlands 4 and Mafia: The Old Country." On February 6, 2025, Zelnick called calendar 2025 "one of the strongest ever for Take-Two," listed "Grand Theft Auto VI in the Fall," and said the company remained "highly confident" of record Net Bookings in fiscal 2026 and 2027.
May 2025: the first delay reaches investors
On May 2, 2025, Take-Two issued a statement on the same day Rockstar moved the game. It said GTA VI, "which was expected to launch in Fall of 2025, is now planned for release on May 26, 2026, during the Company's Fiscal Year 2027," and still reiterated record Net Bookings in fiscal 2026 and 2027. Zelnick: "We support fully Rockstar Games taking additional time to realize their creative vision."
Two weeks later, the fiscal 2025 results of May 15, 2025 put fiscal 2026 guidance at $5.9 to $6.0 billion and said that with GTA VI "in Fiscal 2027," record bookings would "establish a new baseline for our business." Asked by Variety when the delay was decided, Zelnick said: "we don't talk about when we make decisions around here."
November 2025: the second delay, framed as polish
The second-quarter results of November 6, 2025 carried the new date as a headline: "Grand Theft Auto VI now launching November 19, 2026." Zelnick's quote gave no reason, only confidence that Rockstar would "deliver an unrivalled blockbuster entertainment experience." In a Variety interview that day he said: "Rockstar Games believes a limited amount of additional time is required for polish." Both dates sit inside fiscal 2027, so the move did not change which financial year the launch falls in.
2026: the date becomes the forecast
The third-quarter results of February 3, 2026 named "the highly anticipated launch of Grand Theft Auto VI on November 19th" and projected record fiscal 2027 bookings that would "establish a new financial baseline."
The fiscal 2026 results of May 21, 2026 turned that into a number: $8.0 to $8.2 billion for fiscal 2027, "driven by the November 19th launch of Grand Theft Auto VI." That is 19 to 22 percent above the $6.72 billion booked in fiscal 2026. The same day, Zelnick told Variety that no price would come with the results: "We never make marketing announcements in our analyst calls. Never ever ever." He said the guidance is built on expectations that include pricing, and that the model "does have full assumptions in it." He also said that "when it's summertime, Rockstar expects to start marketing."
Prices then came from Rockstar, not from an earnings call. Take-Two's pre-order release of June 24, 2026 listed $79.99 for the standard game and $99.99 for the Ultimate Edition. Those are US prices. For your own region, use the pre-order guide.
On August 7, 2026, Take-Two reiterated the $8.0 to $8.2 billion outlook, citing "excitement around the November 19th launch." On the analyst call, as reported by Variety, Zelnick called pre-orders "unprecedented and astonishing" but gave no figures, adding: "we just don't believe in claiming victory before it occurs."
What the SEC filings add
Take-Two's annual report for fiscal 2026, filed May 22, 2026, lists "We are dependent on the future success of our Grand Theft Auto products and other hit titles" among its risk factors. It says Grand Theft Auto products made up 12.4% of net revenue that year, and that any "delays in product releases" of hit titles could cut revenue and profit "substantially." It also records the September 2022 intrusion in which someone "illegally accessed and downloaded" data from Rockstar's systems, "including early development footage for the next Grand Theft Auto."
The quarterly report of August 7, 2026 states that "Rockstar will release Grand Theft Auto VI on November 19, 2026," and puts the series at "over 470 million units" sold-in.
What investors have not been told
- Unit forecasts. Take-Two has published no GTA VI sales target and no pre-order count.
- A PC version. Every product table that lists GTA VI names PS5 and Xbox Series X|S only.
- Why the game moved. Neither delay statement names a cause beyond time and polish.
- A guarantee. Take-Two's releases and filings carry a forward-looking statements warning that names "the timely release and significant market acceptance of our games" as a risk. The date is a plan, stated firmly and repeatedly, but it is not a contract.
Where to check next
Take-Two usually reports its second quarter in early November: November 6 in both 2024 and 2025. That release will be the last investor statement before launch. Until then, the release time and countdown page has the unlock time for your region, and everything Rockstar has confirmed collects the rest of the official record.
