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Take-Two CEO says more people are buying GTA 6 at $100 than at $80. Alex Gherzo August 14, 2026 Grand Theft Auto VI, the latest game in the long-running video game series from Rockstar Games and parent company Take-Two Interactive, is already a hit, to no one's surprise. Analysts have estimated that the game made around $260 million during its first week of pre-orders and expect it to earn as much as $5.2 billion by the end of its first week of release. But an interesting aspect of the GTA 6 pre-order period comes from Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick, who says that more people are buying the $100 Ultimate Edition than the $80 Standard Edition. On Monday, August 10, Zelnick appeared on CNBC's Squawk Box to discuss GTA 6's success during its pre-order period. One of the program's hosts, Melissa Lee, asked Zelnick whether gamers pre-ordering GTA 6 were choosing the cheaper Standard Edition or the more expensive Ultimate Edition, and Zelnick replied, "Both." Lee then asked if the two editions were being bought in equal numbers, and Zelnick said it was "skewing more to" the Ultimate Edition (he misspoke and said "Premium Edition"), confirming that gamers are choosing to buy GTA 6 for $100 rather than for $80. While the GTA 6 Ultimate Edition is 20% more expensive than the Standard Edition at a time when gamers are being asked to pay more for seemingly everything, it's still easy to see why they'd rather pay the $100 for the game. The Ultimate Edition comes with a lot of bonuses and, as Zelnick described it to Squawk Box co-host Andrew Ross Sorkin, "additional content." That includes more vehicles, more weapons, more outfits, more clothes, more shops, and an extra side mission in which you track down vintage cars that a mechanic named Wyman can fix up for you. (See the full list here.) These extras are not essential to the game, of course, but they'll almost certainly add a lot of flavor. Completists will want to get every last car and firearm they can to test out all the fun and mayhem GTA 6 has to offer (especially after waiting over a decade for the game), and they'll pay $100 to do it. This also reinforces something else Zelnick said on Squawk Box: the reason GTA 6 pre-orders favor the $100 Ultimate Edition could be that "the most avid consumers" account for most pre-order sales. Hardcore gamers are the ones who will want the game on day one, and they're also the customers who will want every last bell and whistle they can get. To that end, Take-Two and Rockstar have sweetened the deal for pre-order customers, giving them a special bonus called the Vintage Vice City Pack, which has even more cars, clothes, garages, and more, all based on one of the franchise's most beloved games, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. But the GTA 6 Vintage Vice City Pack is only available to those who pre-order the $100 Ultimate Edition, likely another reason for the pre-sales to be weighted in the Ultimate Edition's direction, especially if Zelnick is right, and those who make up the bulk of the pre-order sales are the "most avid customers." Regardless, it seems Take-Two doesn't need to worry about overcharging for GTA 6, since most of its customers seem to favor the $100 Ultimate Edition anyway. After this, it's reasonable to expect a lot of in-game purchases will flood GTA 6 in the months following its launch.

Take-Two Interactive's CEO Strauss Zelnick revealed that pre-orders for Grand Theft Auto VI have reached unprecedented levels for both the company and the videogame industry. Despite this demand signal, Take-Two maintained its fiscal 2027 net bookings guidance of $8 billion to $8.2 billion, below analysts' $8.86 billion projection. The game launches 19 November for $79.99 on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S. Take-Two shares rose over 4% on the news. Zelnick explained the cautious stance, noting that pre-orders can be cancelled and "we haven't sold one unit yet". The company's longer-term value depends more on replicating GTA Online's lasting economics through recurrent user spending rather than initial sales alone.

'The level of pre-orders is unprecedented' - Take-Two reportedly made $1.39 billion in sales during GTA 6's pre-order period. Published 3 hours ago * Take-Two Interactive says it drew in $1.39 billion in sales during Grand Theft Auto 6's pre-order period * Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick says the game had an "exceptional start to pre-orders" * Specific sales numbers are undisclosed, but Zelnick says "the level of pre-orders is unprecedented and astonishing" Take-Two Interactive has reported earnings of $1.39 billion during Grand Theft Auto 6's pre-order period. As reported by Variety, during a recent call with analysts, the Rockstar Games parent company said the sales were recorded from April 1 to June 30, the quarter in which it opened GTA 6 pre-orders. It's worth highlighting that pre-orders were open for just five days during this quarter, which makes them numbers especially astonishing. Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said that the game had an "exceptional start to pre-orders", but couldn't disclose specific sales numbers. Latest Videos FromTechRadar "I can say that the level of pre-orders is unprecedented and astonishing, and we're very grateful for that," Zelnick said. "But they are so unprecedented that we just don't know how it'll translate into sales, which is a question I answered earlier. We genuinely don't, and we just don't believe in claiming victory before it occurs." The publisher's $1.39 billion in total net bookings for the quarter wasn't broken down by title in the report, explaining the figure reflected "better-than-expected performance" from the NBA 2K, which was up 7%, and GTA franchises, which rose by 3%. Video game market research firm Newzoo previously reported that the game earned roughly $180 million in digital pre-order sales across the US and the five largest European markets during the last week of June, which kicked off "the strongest pre-order campaign ever recorded." Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inbox