GTA 6 Cost More to Make Than UAE’s Burj Khalifa

Grand Theft Auto VI is shaping up to be the most expensive video game ever made, with online estimates placing its total development and marketing budget between $1.5 billion and $2 billion, which is more than the reported $1.5 billion cost of constructing Dubai’s iconic Burj Khalifa.

Rockstar Games has announced that GTA 6 will launch on November 19, 2026, with pre-orders opening this week.

Although the company has not disclosed the game’s budget, multiple analysts on X estimate that Rockstar’s spending reached up to $2 billion after more than 12 years of development on the game.

By comparison, the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building, reportedly cost about $1.5 billion to build and was completed in roughly six years. This is about half the time Rockstar has spent developing GTA 6.

The enormous budget reflects the scale of the project.

Thousands of developers, artists, programmers, designers and actors have spent over a decade creating one of the most detailed open-world games ever produced. Therefore, the global marketing campaign for GTA 6 is expected to be one of the largest in gaming history.

Still, Rockstar Games’ investment could pay off quickly. GTA 5 generated $1 billion in sales within three days of its 2013 release and has earned an estimated nearly $8 billion over its lifetime through game sales and online content.

Many gamers on X opined that GTA 6 could break entertainment industry records again. They said the game may recover its multibillion-dollar budget within days of launch, similar to the historic GTA 5 sales record.