Everyone is obsessed with the size of the world. It's the first thing we check. Honestly, though, the latest GTA VI map leak details coming out of the Leonida Mapping Project suggest we’ve been looking at this all wrong. It isn’t just about how many miles you can drive before hitting an invisible wall in the ocean. It’s about how much of that space actually matters.
The community has been piecing this together for years. Using coordinates from the massive 2022 breach and frame-by-frame analysis of the 2026 trailers, the picture is finally clear. Leonida is huge. Like, 2.7 times the size of GTA V’s Los Santos huge.
But scale is a liar. If it’s just empty grass, nobody cares. Rockstar seems to know that.
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Why the Leonida Map Leak is Different This Time
The mapping project isn't just a bunch of fans with Photoshop. They use RAGE engine units to triangulate exactly where a building in a trailer sits relative to a mountain in a leak. It’s math, basically.
What they’ve found is a state divided into three distinct counties: Vice Dale, Kelly, and Leonard.
Most of the early chatter focused on Vice City being a 1:1 recreation of Miami. It’s not. It’s a parody, but a dense one. Think about the Star View Hotel or the neon-soaked Vice Beach. In previous games, these were just flat textures. Now? Data suggests a massive increase in enterable buildings. We aren't just driving past the skyline; we're likely going inside it.
The Breakdown of the Major Hubs
- Vice City: The crown jewel. It’s the southeast anchor of the map. It’s got everything from the "ultraclub" NINE1NINE (a clear nod to Miami's E11EVEN) to the industrial grit of Port Vice City.
- Port Gellhorn: This is where the "panhandle" rumors got messy. Originally, people thought there’d be a massive northern stretch. Now, evidence from the GTA VI map leak suggests landmarks from places like Panama City have been moved to the western coast. Port Gellhorn looks to be a massive secondary hub, not just a tiny village.
- The Grassrivers: This is the Everglades. You’ve seen the airboats in the trailers. It’s a swampy, dangerous expanse in the southwest that separates the urban chaos from the rural weirdness.
- Leonida Keys: A string of islands stretching south. In GTA V, the ocean was mostly a boundary. Here, it’s a playground with its own dedicated physics for high-end yachts and "Key Lento" settlements.
The Mount Kalaga Mystery
You remember Mount Chiliad. We spent a decade trying to find jetpacks and aliens there. Well, Leonida is mostly flat because, well, it’s Florida. But the leaks keep pointing toward Mount Kalaga National Park in the north.
It’s the only real elevation on the map.
Is it a mountain? Sort of. It's more of a massive forested rise that breaks up the horizon. Experts who have studied the leaked coordinates suggest this northern border is the most "speculative" part of the current community map. Some think the map could even expand over time, adding more of the "panhandle" or even other cities as post-launch updates.
It’s About Density, Not Just Miles
One of the most wild things about the 2026 data is the realization of scale.
In GTA V, cars felt a bit small compared to the world. In Leonida, the scale is 1:1. If you stand Jason next to a truck, he looks the right size. If a plane flies over, it doesn't look like a toy; it looks like a massive hunk of metal.
This change in scale means the travel time from Vice City to Port Gellhorn is going to feel significantly longer. We’re talking over six or seven minutes of real-time driving just to cross the main landmass.
What People Get Wrong
People keep saying there are three "major" cities like San Andreas.
That’s probably not true.
The current consensus among researchers like those on the GTA 6 Reddit is that we have one massive metropolis (Vice City) and several large towns (Port Gellhorn, Ambrosia, Hamlet). It’s a different vibe. It’s more like Red Dead Redemption 2’s layout—pockets of civilization separated by meaningful, dangerous wilderness.
What You Can Actually Do With This Info
Don't just stare at the fan-made satellite images. Use them to plan.
The GTA VI map leak reveals that the "internal" coordinates for places like the Jack of Hearts strip club or the "Treasured Trash" shop are fixed points. This suggests these are major interaction hubs for the story. If you’re looking for where the gameplay will actually happen, keep your eyes on the border between Vice Dale and Kelly County. That's the sweet spot where the urban sprawl hits the wetlands.
Pay attention to the water. Rockstar has clearly put a ton of work into the "Leonida Keys" and the surrounding ocean. In previous games, the water was a way to die or hide from cops. In the new map, the sheer number of islands suggests that boat ownership isn't just a flex—it’s a primary way to move around the bottom third of the world.
The next step is to stop looking for a "final" map image. Rockstar won't release one until right before the November 19, 2026 launch. Instead, watch the terrain in the next trailer. If you see a specific bridge, like the Sunshine Skyway stand-in, you can now pinpoint exactly where you are on the western coast of Leonida.
Track the landmarks, and you'll know the world before you even step foot in it.