GTA 6 NEWS · LEONIDA MAP

GTA 6’s Leonida Map Is Officially Six Regions Wide — and Twice the Size of GTA 5

Locals, the guessing game is over. As of today, the structure of Grand Theft Auto VI’s world is on the record: the state of Leonida is divided into six primary regions — Vice City, the Leonida Keys, Grassrivers, Port Gellhorn, Ambrosia, and Mount Kalaga National Park — in a map Rockstar describes as twice the size of GTA 5’s and “more dense, detailed, and interactive” than anything the studio has built before.

The confirmation lands in Welcome to Leonida, the 14-page cover feature in Game Informer’s Issue 382 that went live this morning — and promptly melted the magazine’s app, but we’ll get to that in a second. Buried inside is the clearest picture yet of how Rockstar assembled its version of Florida. The short version: like an actual state, not one giant city with countryside stapled to the edges.

What Happened: Rockstar Put Leonida’s Structure on the Record

The feature is the same Rockstar interview spread Game Informer teased on September 25 with that original cover art of Jason and Lucia in a bullet-riddled convertible. As ScreenRant reports from the feature, Leonida’s map splits into six primary regions, each one a riff on a real slice of the Sunshine State — and for the first time, the full regional lineup is confirmed in print rather than dripped out through trailers and postcards.

Rockstar’s Aaron Garbut reiterates the headline number the studio has been circling for a while: the world is roughly twice the size of GTA 5’s map — and crucially, bigger isn’t the whole pitch. “More dense, detailed, and interactive” is the part that should have GTA 5 map-veterans paying attention, because size alone has never been Rockstar’s problem. Filling it has. Our own deep dive into how big GTA 6’s map actually is — and why 80 hours might not be enough just got a fresh coat of official paint.

The Six Regions of Leonida, Region by Region

Here’s the confirmed lineup, with what the feature and its rollout tell us about each:

• Vice City — the Miami analogue. The neon heart of the state and the only region that needs no introduction. Everything Rockstar has shown since trailer one — the beaches, the strip, the vibe — lives here.
• Leonida Keys — the Florida Keys. The island chain trailing off the south. Boating country, and the source of the Key West debate map-sleuths have been arguing about for weeks.
• Grassrivers — the Everglades. Swamp, marsh, and gator territory. If the “staggering amount of wildlife” Game Informer keeps teasing has a home address, it’s here.
• Port Gellhorn — the struggling tourist traps. Per the feature, this one channels “Florida’s many smaller and, in some cases, struggling tourist trap areas.” Think boardwalks past their prime, attractions that peaked in 1987, and the specific melancholy of a highway town.
• Ambrosia — the manufacturing city. Leonida’s industrial muscle: factories and refineries, and per the coverage, turf controlled by a biker gang that doesn’t appear to be the Lost MC we knew from GTA 4 and GTA 5. New state, new outlaws.
• Mount Kalaga National Park — the north country. A national park sitting on Leonida’s version of the Florida-Georgia line. It’s described as more scattered than the city regions — bike trails, farms, golf courses, and wide-open space between them.

And the question every theme-park lover was asking — what about central Florida? Does Leonida have its own answer to Walt Disney World or Cape Canaveral? Rockstar senior vice president of environment art Paul MacPherson told Game Informer the game “may not have those exact locations,” but that Rockstar is consistently “geared to getting that full Florida experience.” Read that how you want: no literal mouse-adjacent megapark, but the spirit of the state — all of it — is the target.

A Map That Reads Like Satellite Imagery

One presentation detail from the feature deserves its own spotlight: Leonida’s in-game map is styled after satellite imagery rather than the simplified, cartoon-friendly maps of older GTA games. That tracks with everything Rockstar has been saying about chasing realism at the state scale — and it pairs with Garbut’s comments about density. “We obsessed about every part — the rooftops, the alleys, the internals and everything in between,” Garbut says in the coverage, to the point that Rockstar “hit a critical mass” with the number of interiors, so buildings “feel more real inside and out.”

Translation for the rest of us: the map isn’t just bigger, it’s deeper. Twice the square mileage of GTA 5 means nothing if it’s 70% empty marshland — but interiors stacked to “critical mass,” a satellite-grade map, and six regions engineered as distinct biomes is Rockstar explicitly designing against the empty-open-world problem. The same coverage also touches on fast travel, side activities, and the animal species roaming the state, which tells you the activity layer is being scaled to match the geography.

What This Means for GTA 6

Six regions means six flavors of trouble. A city for the heists, keys for the boats, swamps for the wildlife chaos, tourist traps for the scams, a factory town run by bikers, and a national park for when you just want to ride trails and pretend you’re not wanted in three counties. Structurally, that’s closer to how GTA: San Andreas divided its world into distinct cities and countryside than to GTA 5’s one-metropolis model — and that comparison should make anyone who logged 200 hours in San Andreas very happy.

One caveat, Locals: no official map image has dropped. What went on the record today is the structure — the six-region breakdown, the scale, the design philosophy. Rockstar still hasn’t published the actual full-world map graphic, which means every “FULL GTA 6 MAP!!!” thumbnail currently flooding your feed is fan-made, reconstructed from leaks and old trailers. Treat accordingly. When the real thing lands, it’ll come from Rockstar, not a reaction channel.

The clock is doing its thing. This is the last big info mile-marker before the final stretch: GTA 6 is locked for November 19, 2026 on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S — seven weeks out, with the 50-day point of no return already behind us. If you’re planning to day-one it, you can pre-order GTA 6 for PS5 on Amazon or grab the Xbox Series X|S version here. And if a map twice the size of GTA 5 has you side-eyeing your console’s storage, our best SSD upgrades for GTA 6 guide is ready for exactly this moment.

One region at a time, Leonida is coming into focus — and it’s shaping up to be the most ambitious world Rockstar has ever assembled. Now we just need Game Informer’s servers to survive the rest of the week.

Want GTA 6 news the second it drops? Join the Locals — free newsletter, no spam.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Related reading: Why GTA 6 fans just crashed Game Informer’s app · GTA 6’s “advanced” weather system, explained · How big is GTA 6’s map, really? · The Key West map debate · Things to do while you wait for GTA 6