Nearly 20% of workers plan to take Nov. 19 off for the release of Grand Theft Auto VI. Some companies are even shutting down for the day

According to Bamboo HR, workforce data shows the GTA VI release date coincides with a spike in personal time-off requests. In fact, 18% of salaried workers say they’re planning to take the day off on Nov. 19 for GTA VI — and that percentage gets even bigger with younger employees, as 32% of Gen Z and 27% of millennial workers plan to do the same.

Among this crowd of excited gamers is Amy Gettler and her husband, who both took the day off and made sure to carve out quite a bit of time for this highly-anticipated release.

“We are going to park ourselves in front of our TV in the living room — we got a new TV, a 65-inch,” Gettler told MarketWatch. “I’m going to dedicate as much time as I can to it. I’m going to let hours float by.”

Bud Burruss, a 36-year-old software engineer, told the Wall Street Journal that he’s taking things a step further and plans to take five days off the week before Thanksgiving to focus on the much-anticipated game.

“We’ve got a couple of days where we’re like, ‘Daddy’s very busy,’” the father of three said back in August. “I’m not going to be playing it for, like, 20 hours straight like an absentee father. But right out of the gate we’re going hard.”

Others are taking even longer breaks away from their laptops. Guilherme Stephano, a 34-year-old from São Paulo, Brazil, will be using 10 vacation days to play GTA VI. And that’s not even as long as the break he took to play “Red Dead Redemption 2” in 2018, which was 20 days.

Even some of the companies that employ these eager gamers are planning to take the day off as well. As GamesRadar reports, Burger Motorsports announced it will be closed for business on Nov. 19 as many of its employees had requested the day off.

"After reviewing multiple employee scheduling conflicts, management has determined that normal business operations may be impacted due to the release of Grand Theft Auto VI,” the company announced on Instagram. “Several team members have already notified management that they will be unavailable, unreachable, and/or 'in Vice City' for the duration of the day."

Why are fans excited for GTA VI?

GTA VI has been a long-time coming. Its predecessor, released by gaming studio Rockstar Games in 2013, made over $1 billion and sold 475 million units, according to the WSJ.

The franchise, which debuted in 1997, takes players inside an open world filled with street crime, reckless driving and half-naked adults. Polarizing, yes, but it’s also one of the most popular gaming franchises in history because of how much time you can spend roaming around a vast city without playing the game’s main campaign — building your car collection, working as a cab driver or playing a round of golf, as examples.

But fans of the franchise have been waiting for the latest title since 2022, when Rockstar Games first announced it was in development. The game was later unveiled in December 2023, but it has been delayed repeatedly, including in the fall of 2025 and in May 2026.

“It has been rescheduled so many times that I’m like, you know what, if we are for sure doing this on Nov. 19, I’m taking Thursday to Thursday off,” Anna Ray, a 30-year-old medical-sales representative in Arkansas, told the WSJ.

The game will finally be released on Nov. 19 on Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5. A release date for PC has not yet been announced.