Netflix Crashes Within Minutes of GTA VI Preview Event

Netflix’s servers were put to the ultimate test during the streamer’s exclusive GTA 6 reveal event — and they failed for a lot of excited viewers tuning in. 

Today, Netflix had the honour of debuting a first look at Grand Theft Auto VI ahead of its release in November. We got first looks at the gameplay, story details, and more. As for whether the Netflix servers managed to handle the live event… well, many fans were left disappointed after the streamer had multiple cases of outages.

Grand Theft Auto VI is not just the biggest video game release of the year — it’s poised to be one of the most significant debuts in media history. The franchise is a behemoth, and you need only look at historical sales to see how big the sixth instalment is going to be. For instance, Grand Theft Auto V still holds the Guinness World Record with $800 million on Day 1, reaching $1 billion in its first three days back in 2013. The upcoming GTA VI will almost certainly eclipse those records. According to Forbes, recent projections see the game selling 35 million copies by April 2027 and 40 million within a year of the game’s release.

For many Netflix subscribers, the event ran smoothly. But we’ve seen in the past that Netflix’s servers have to work double time for a drop as big as this. Look no further than the release of the final season of Stranger Things in 2025, which saw myriad viewers met with the error “Something went wrong. Sorry, we’re having trouble with your request.” 

At the moment that the GTA Gameplay Reveal began, Down Detector noted that thousands of users were unable to tune in. The spike was one of the biggest for Netflix on the site in recent memory. The spike in the graph for 3PM ET is comically large. What’s more, numerous users flooded to social media to express their feelings on the matter:

Netflix crashed instantly lol, who would’ve thought

— Double Trouble (Rampant) (@D_Trouble453) August 27, 2026

bye netflix went down bc of the GTA VI thing lmfaoo

— cami ! ❣️ (@camimuwfc) August 27, 2026

GTA 6 made Netflix crash 😭

— MrTastic 🏝 (@MrTasticYT) August 27, 2026

What lessons have been learned? Well, don’t always trust Netflix’s servers, even if it is the biggest paid streaming platform in the world.

Grand Theft Auto VI releases November 19 on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. No PC version will be available at launch, though it will likely release at a later date.