Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer breaks Guinness record for YouTube views

All the buzz around Grand Theft Auto 6’s official reveal made it the most-viewed non-music video on YouTube in the first 24 hours after publish, according to Guinness World Records.

At just 90 seconds long, the Grand Theft Auto 6 debut accrued over 90 million views after a single day. It also holds the record for the most-liked video game trailer on YouTube with 8.9 million likes in the first day, a ratio that suggests a large percentage of views were organic rather than ad-based.

The video sits at 121 million views as of publish time. If you’re one of the few who missed out, might as well give it a couple more.

Mr. Beast previously held the “most non-music video YouTube views in 24 hours” crown with “Every Country On Earth Fights For $250,000,” uploaded in Aug. 2023. A screenshot posted to Reddit shows that GTA 6 broke Mr. Beast’s record in just 13 hours. I’m suddenly thrilled for the developers at Rockstar Games?

The achievement is still impressive if we include music videos. Only two such uploads garnered more views over the course of their first 24 hours online than the Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer, according to YouTube, and they’re both from South Korean boy band BTS. “Butter” and “Dynamite” were watched 108 million and 101 million times in their first days on YouTube, respectively.

While Guinness has not proven to be a consistently reliable source, a look back at recent major game reveals helps back up the record-breaking assertion, at least relative to other game trailers. It’s difficult to find info on 24-hour figures on game trailers for comparison’s sake, but it’s easy to assume Grand Theft Auto 6 blew them out of the water going by lifetime views for reveals of similarly long-awaited releases. Here’s where some recent tentpoles topped out:

Even the first trailer for Grand Theft Auto 5, perhaps the only game whose anticipation matched that of its sequel in recent history, has only 103 million views after over a decade.

Nothing, at least when it comes to video games, seems to parallel the excitement for Grand Theft Auto 6 more than a year away from its launch. Please pace yourselves.