GTA 6 vs GTA 5: two leads instead of three, and what else changes

GTA 6 launches November 19, 2026 on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S, 4,811 days after Grand Theft Auto V reached PS3 and Xbox 360 on September 17, 2013. The headline change fits in two numbers: three playable characters in 2013, two in 2026.

	GTA 5	GTA 6
Release	September 17, 2013	November 19, 2026
Launch consoles	PS3, Xbox 360	PS5, Xbox Series X|S
Playable characters	3: Michael, Franklin, Trevor	2: Jason, Lucia
Setting	Los Santos, state of San Andreas	Vice City, state of Leonida
Wanted stars	5 maximum	6 maximum
Animations	about 55,000	more than 600,000
The $79.99 edition	Special Edition, with SteelBook and map	Standard
Priciest edition with the game	Collector’s, $149.99	Ultimate, $99.99
First-person view	added November 18, 2014	third person at launch, per eXputer

GTA 5 cells come from Wikipedia, read October 1, 2026, and from Rockstar’s PlayStation Blog post of May 23, 2013 for the editions. GTA 6 cells come from Rockstar Games, Take-Two and the outlets named below.

Two leads, and the switch stays

Michael De Santa, Franklin Clinton and Trevor Philips shared GTA 5. GTA 6 keeps two, Jason Duval and Lucia Caminos. Rob Nelson, co-studio head at Rockstar North, told Dazed on August 26, 2026 that the team first considered four. Character switching survives: KeenGamer spotted it in the August 27 Extended Look.

A crime now needs a witness

GTA 5 topped out at five stars, with helicopters and SWAT at the last tier. Engadget counted six stars on screen in GTA 6, a return to the GTA III, Vice City and San Andreas ceiling. The trigger changes too. Rob Nelson told IGN on August 27, 2026: “The Wanted system in GTA 6 requires that someone witness the crime, or an alarm needs to be set off for it to be reported to the law.” The icons and hollow stars are covered in our police guide.

Stealing a car takes tools

In GTA 5, one button did it. Nelson again, to IGN: “Previously, you could just press triangle to automatically hotwire and steal any vehicle that you wanted and take off.” In GTA 6, some parked cars stay locked until the story hands you the tools to get in. Carjacking a driver works from the start.

Numbers to handle with care

The 600,000 animations come from Rockstar itself, given to The New York Times on August 27, 2026, and where that figure comes from has its own page. The map size does not. Nelson told Kotaku that GTA 6’s world is twice the size of GTA 5’s, but Rockstar has published no measurement, and the debate over that comparison lives elsewhere.

On price, $79.99 buys less packaging than it did. In 2013 it bought GTA 5’s Special Edition, with a SteelBook case and a blueprint map of Los Santos and Blaine County. In 2026 it buys GTA 6’s Standard Edition. What each current edition holds is in our editions guide.

GTA 5 had no first-person view at launch either: it arrived with the PS4 and Xbox One release on November 18, 2014, 427 days later. For GTA 6, eXputer and creator Davy Jones describe a game built around the third-person camera. Rockstar has said nothing about it.