Will people skip work for GTA VI? The numbers, graded

Everyone has a number for how many people will skip work on 19 November, and almost none of them survives a look at where it came from. This page grades each one as what it is: a stated intention, an unverified estimate or an old reader poll.

Verdict: Inference, Moderate confidence. Nobody has measured how many people will skip work for GTA VI, because it hasn't launched. The best-sourced figure is a company survey: GameSquare says 10% of the full-time US workers it polled who identify as gamers plan to skip launch day and another 30% are considering it, which is what gamers say they intend, not a count of absences. The viral "1.5 million absences, $1 billion" estimate is graded Rumor: it traces to a 2025 radio report with no calculation, and the inputs now attached to an economist's name aren't in that report. The GTA V precedent, 46%, is a poll of a games site's readers. Not known: how many people will actually be off. Not announced: any forecast from Take-Two, Rockstar or an official body.

Will people really skip work for GTA VI?

Some will, and some already have the day booked, but nobody knows how many. Fast Company spoke to a worker who plans to take Thursday 19 and Friday 20 November off for a four-day weekend, with his manager's blessing. The Wall Street Journal found others saving paid leave, according to IBTimes UK. A California parts company, Burger Motorsports, told customers its operations might slow that day, though TechSpot notes the notice may be a publicity stunt. These are individual cases. None says how many people will be off.

What does the GameSquare survey say about skipping work?

That 10% of the people it polled plan to skip work on launch day, and another 30% are considering time off. GameSquare, a Nasdaq-listed gaming-media company, published the results on 20 October 2026, from a survey of 1,000 full-time US employees who identify as gamers. Of the 30% considering it, 36% said they would call in sick, which works out at roughly 11 in every 100 people polled. And 42% think they may be less productive because of the game.

What can't the GameSquare survey tell us?

Several things, and most of them matter more than the headline:

• It counts intentions, not absences. "Plan to" and "considering" are not "will". People say they will book leave, then don't, or book it and never mention it.
• It covers gamers with full-time jobs, not the US workforce. The respondents identify as gamers. Nothing in it says how many ordinary workers will be off.
• Its method is only partly disclosed. GameSquare's release names no polling firm, no fieldwork dates and no way of recruiting respondents. Fast Company says Pollfish ran it, among adults who play video games regularly.
• The company has a stake. GameSquare sells brands access to young audiences, so findings about how far the game reaches suit it.
• The same survey is reported two ways. Fast Company has 39% planning to request time off, 36% calling in sick and 32% working from home. GameSquare's release has none of the 39% or the 32%, and applies its 36% only to people who were already considering time off. The bases differ, so the figures can't be added up.
• The margin of error doesn't cover every figure. The quoted 3% is for the whole sample. The 36% rests on the roughly 300 people who were considering time off, so it is less precise.

Where does the 1.5 million, $1 billion figure come from?

From a Spanish radio report in July 2025, plus numbers nobody has shown a source for. Cadena SER reported on 28 July 2025, when GTA VI was still dated 26 May 2026, that the US was expected to lose about $1 billion on the game's first day to absenteeism. The reporter states that herself; no calculation is given. The economist the report quotes, José García Montalvo of Pompeu Fabra University, speaks about who would stay home (men aged 18 to 30, especially remote tech workers) and about a historical trend, that video games have taken a share of young people's working hours over the past two decades. He isn't quoted on a launch-day sum.

The tidy version came later. On 7 September 2026 IBTimes UK printed 1.5 million absences at $70,000 of annual output each, a dip of about 2%, and $1 billion lost, as his projection. A day earlier the same outlet had written that neither the headcount nor the output figure should be attributed to his interview. By 19 and 20 October the numbers were everywhere. We found no statement or calculation of his that contains them, and we haven't contacted him, so the attribution is graded Rumor, Low confidence. It may well be a fair back-of-envelope calculation by someone else; it hasn't been shown to be his.

Does the $1 billion add up?

Not on the inputs the coverage lists. 1.5 million absences at $70,000 of output per worker per year is about $105 billion a year, which is about $400 million per working day, well under half of $1 billion. That doesn't prove the billion wrong: the "2%" and "output per worker" may mean something else, and nobody has published the method. It does mean the inputs as printed aren't the whole story. And a day off isn't always a day of lost output, because work gets covered or moved. IBTimes UK makes that point itself.

What happened when GTA V came out?

Before GTA V's Tuesday release in September 2013, IGN asked 10,995 of its readers about their plans: 46% said they had booked the day off as holiday, 19% said they would call in claiming to be unwell, and 35% said they would wait to play. That is a poll of a games site's readers, taken beforehand, about intentions. It isn't a count of workers who stayed home, and it isn't comparable to GameSquare's sample.

The other 2013 figure in circulation, that 6% of 18-to-35-year-olds in New York and Los Angeles missed work in GTA V's release weekend, is one unsourced line in the same 2025 radio report. We found no study behind it, so it is graded Rumor, Low confidence.

Is there real data on absences around big game launches?

A little, from one company that sells shift-rostering software. Deputy says absences among the shift workers it schedules nearly doubled, against a normal day, on the Thursday wide release of Overwatch 2, and were already elevated the day before every launch it studied. Deputy has not published its sample size, countries or dates, covers rostered shift workers rather than office staff, and advises employers to over-roster, so it has a commercial interest. Its forecast for GTA VI, a similar pattern, is an opinion, not a measurement.

Does it matter that GTA VI launches on a Thursday?

Probably, if Deputy's pattern holds. A Thursday launch hit absences much harder in its data than Elden Ring's Friday launch, which barely registered because people already take long weekends on Fridays. The unlock time adds a twist: the console stores open GTA VI at midnight local time, which in the US means midnight Eastern, or 9 p.m. Pacific on Wednesday 18 November. For many players "launch day" starts the evening before a work day. The release-time briefing has the unlock time for every region.

Are employers or officials doing anything about it?

No forecast or count that we could find, and two official remarks. Take-Two's CEO, Strauss Zelnick, said at a conference on 28 April 2026 that he thinks a lot of people will be calling in sick on 19 November. It was a remark, with no number. Australia's workplace regulator, the Fair Work Ombudsman, posted on Instagram that none of the statutory unpaid-leave categories covers a game release, so unpaid leave needs the employer's agreement. We found nothing from Take-Two, Rockstar, unions, the US Department of Labor or chambers of commerce. The nearest thing to an official response in the US is the Army's: one battalion at Fort Stewart offers soldiers who reenlist by 14 November a four-day pass timed to the launch, covered in its own briefing.

Should you skip work for GTA VI?

That's your call, and not one we can make for you. The people in the reports above booked paid leave in advance and told their managers, and Australia's regulator reportedly advised the same: apply early, because unpaid leave depends on your employer saying yes. Calling in sick when you're not ill is a different thing, with consequences set by your employer's rules and the law where you live, so check both first.

So how many people will actually skip work for GTA VI?

We'll know after 19 November, if anyone measures it. Until then the evidence is this: 10% planning and 30% considering, among full-time workers who identify as gamers, in one company's survey; a 2013 poll of a games site's readers; and a viral estimate nobody has shown how to reproduce. Treat any headline number as one of those, not as a count of people.

What changes this: GameSquare or its pollster publishing the questionnaire, fieldwork dates and tables; the economist, or his university, publishing a calculation; Deputy or a statistics agency publishing measured absences for 18 to 20 November; or Take-Two or an employer body publishing a forecast. Each would be logged here.