GTA 6 pre-orders leave recent AAA games trailing

Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto VI is already pulling away from the biggest AAA releases of the past six years in US digital pre-orders, according to an analysis from Sensor Tower reported by GamesIndustry.biz. The comparison puts the game’s pre-order trajectory well ahead of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Diablo 4, Hogwarts Legacy and Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 at comparable points before launch.

The numbers

Sensor Tower estimates that Grand Theft Auto VI had reached 6.08 million US digital pre-orders by October 13, generating an estimated $594 million in revenue. The figure excludes boxed releases, so it is not a complete worldwide sales forecast. It is still a striking snapshot of the demand building around Rockstar’s next open-world crime game.

The analysis puts Grand Theft Auto VI 148% ahead of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 at the same point before launch. That comparison matters because Modern Warfare 2 was itself a huge release, with more than twice as many pre-orders as Diablo 4 45 days before launch. Sensor Tower’s numbers therefore suggest that Rockstar’s game is not merely leading a quiet field; it is stretching the gap against other major blockbusters.

What players are buying

Sensor Tower says 74% of the estimated pre-orders are on PlayStation and 26% are on Xbox. The report also says the vast majority are for the $100 Ultimate Edition, which helps explain why the estimated revenue total is so high even before launch. Those figures should be read as estimates rather than a final sales ledger, and the digital-only US scope leaves out physical copies and other markets.

Rockstar’s official Grand Theft Auto VI site lists Jason and Lucia’s return to Vice City, with the game currently scheduled for November 19, 2026, on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S. The scale of the pre-order comparison shows how much anticipation has accumulated, but it does not guarantee that every projected sale will arrive on day one or that the game will meet the analysts’ longer-term forecasts.

Our opinion

The useful takeaway is not that Grand Theft Auto VI has already “won” its launch, but that its pre-release pull is operating on a different scale from the comparison set. A six-million-plus digital estimate, even with the limits of the data, gives Rockstar a remarkable commercial head start. The more interesting test will come after release, when curiosity turns into sustained play, word of mouth and actual player spending.

Sources: Sensor Tower analysis reported by GamesIndustry.biz; Rockstar Games’ official Grand Theft Auto VI site.