GTA 6 is the biggest and most grandiose game of this decade, and arguably the biggest one ever made. Therefore, we all knew that it would perform unbelievably well right out of the gate. Analysts were predicting GTA 6 to make over $1 billion from pre-orders alone, and initial estimates of actual sales were somewhere in that ballpark. However, now that we are nearly a month deep into pre-orders, the story is a lot different from what we anticipated.
Analyst firm Newzoo just released some GTA 6 sales data, and the numbers are not as high as we might have expected. Granted, GTA 6 still blows every other game out of the water, but the mythical “billion-dollar” figure is yet to be achieved, apparently.
According to the analysis, total revenue for GTA 6 through pre-orders in its first week sits around $260M, a staggering figure in its own right, but a far cry from the estimates that were floating around a couple of weeks ago.
Breaking down the data, GTA 6 generated around $180M in digital pre-order sales from the US and the five largest European markets, those being the UK, France, Italy, Germany, and Spain. Remember, this data is only for the first pre-order week, that being the last week of June.
To get a global revenue estimate, Newzoo compared sales figures to GTA 5, and deduced that 69% of GTA 5’s console players came from those six regions. Some quick maths brings the global pre-order revenue estimate to approximately $260 million for the first week.
So, as you can probably tell, $260 million is not $1 billion; in fact, it is almost a quarter of the mystical figure that was being thrown around recently. Newzoo thinks it’s “absurd” to think that GTA 6 could have achieved that figure in the first week of sales going live, and that no video game will ever achieve that figure in the future. We will have to wait and see about that.
“Contrary to social media reports, GTA 6 has not done a billion dollars in pre-orders 21 weeks out. This is absurd: given how pre-order curves look, nothing ever has and nothing ever will in the future.”
As far as GTA 6 goes, it will be fine. Per Newzoo’s own report, GTA 6 is on track to earn around $3.3 billion to $5.2 billion in global sales by the end of launch week. This will, by all accounts, be the strongest launch of a video game ever. That will build on the back of the $260 million figure we quoted earlier, which is, according to Newzoo:
“The strongest opening to a pre-order campaign ever recorded”
So, GTA 6 might not have broken the crazy $1 billion barrier within the first week of pre-orders, but it still holds the record for the strongest pre-order opening ever. The firm assumes GTA 6 will sell roughly 51 million units at an estimated average selling price of $88 by the end of the first launch week, bringing in $4.5 billion in sales. That is not a number to scoff at.
Grand Theft Auto 6 is still the biggest video game ever made, and will break all kinds of records moving forward. However, for once, it looks like people may have overhyped and overestimated its pre-order sales performance.
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[PC Hardware Specialist]
Usman Saleem brings 8+ years of comprehensive PC hardware expertise to the table. His journey in the tech world has involved in-depth tech analysis and insightful PC hardware reviews, perfecting over 6+ years of dedicated work. Usman’s commitment to staying authentic and relevant in the field is underscored by many professional certifications, including a recent one in Google IT Support Specialization.
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