Grand Theft Auto 6 has been in development for over 10 years, which means Rockstar Games has packed its new juggernaut with a ridiculous amount of content, some of which could take you eons to see. GTA 6’s story length is long, and that’s just the beginning.
The marketing for GTA 6, the Netflix Showcase and subsequent trailers and magazine reveals have given us a huge window into Jason and Lucia’s relationship and dynamic. From what we know about the game, we’ve barely scratched the surface.
How Long is GTA 6’s Story?
A key Rockstar Games dev completed a playthrough of Grand Theft Auto 6 in around 80 hours, factoring in story and some side content, which means if you purely focus on the story, it could be closer to 60 or 70 hours.
Rob Nelson, head of development and co-studio head at Rockstar Games, was interviewed by The New York Times, and here’s an interesting excerpt:
“I hope that there will be people that want to get up, have a cup of coffee, shower, get dressed, go out for a little exercise,” Nelson said. His 80-hour play-through of the game in February included the main story and some optional goals with narrative ramifications. Routines can escalate quickly. “Interact with some people, explore, maybe get into some trouble,” he added. “Rob some places, make some money.”
So, let’s dissect this. Roughly 80 hours, with optional content. Even ‘dabbling’ with side content, given how big GTA 6 is, could easily consume a few hours of your playtime.
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The story alone will likely be worth the price of admission, and you can’t see it being shorter than 60-70 hours for main missions and nothing else.
How Long to Fully Complete GTA 6?
Achieving total completion of GTA 6 means anywhere between 100 and 300 hours, based on recent Rockstar titles and everything we’ve read and heard about the game’s size and scope.
Even though it’s always a smaller sample size, HowLongToBeat features player-specific answers about how long they’ve spent on a game. Let’s take GTA 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2 as examples.
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According to the tens of thousands of player-submitted times, a completion playthrough of GTA 5 (achieving 100%) takes roughly 90 hours, but it could easily be 100+.
Whereas Red Dead Redemption 2 is marked down as 196 hours for a completionist playthrough—again, this figure could be over 200 hours. Could GTA 6 be smaller and less densely packed with activities, collectibles, jobs, and things to do? We’ll find out once reviews drop, but there’s every chance that conquering this mammoth game is going to require several hundred hours of your time.
Are we going over 200 or 300 hours to complete GTA 6 fully? Let us know your thoughts on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
For more Insider Gaming content, check out ‘GTA 6 Map Size Officially Revealed—How Big Is It?’ and don’t forget to sign up for our newsletter.
Andy is Insider Gaming's Senior Evergreen Editor and has been in the games journalism sphere in one way or another for over 7 years. His video game taste is as…
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