GTA radio through the years: from Chatterbox FM to Leonida's dial

Every Grand Theft Auto since 2001 has been, among other things, a radio. The car stereo is where the series' satire lives, where its licensed music sets the era, and where a lot of players found artists they still listen to. With six Leonida stations now previewed, here is how the dial got here.

GTA III (2001): the stations become a feature

Nine stations with DJs, adverts and phone-ins. The leap was Chatterbox FM, hosted by Lazlow, which turned the radio into comedy writing rather than background noise. The idea that a station could be a character stuck, and so did Lazlow, who would appear across the series for the next decade and a half.

Vice City (2002): the needle-drop era

Nine stations of licensed 1980s music, from Flash FM's pop to V-Rock's metal and Emotion 98.3's ballads, with a budget that made the decade the co-star of the game. "Vice City" became an aesthetic partly because of what was coming out of the car. The licensed approach has a cost: the 2021 Definitive Edition lost some tracks to expired rights.

San Andreas (2004) and GTA IV (2008)

San Andreas moved the dial to 1992 and the West Coast, with stations spanning hip hop, funk, country and rock and a cast of hosts that included real musicians. GTA IV's Liberty City gave the radio an immigrant city's range and added a working, listenable talk format alongside the music. The pattern was set: each game's radio is a portrait of its city and its year.

GTA V (2013): the biggest dial yet

Los Santos had more stations than any game before it, across genres from Latin to electronic, and the online game added to them for years afterwards. Radio became one of the ways GTA V stayed current through a decade on the charts.

Leonida (2026)

Six stations have been previewed so far: Flash FM returns from 1986 as a pop station; Dirty South Classics plays classic rap and hip hop; Cocoteo FM covers bachata, dembow and reggaeton; Afro Bank FM plays amapiano, 3-step and more; Back Country Radio is country; and The Chamber 106.6 is heavy metal. Rockstar called the reveal a glimpse, said some stations are tied to specific parts of the map, and has not published hosts or tracklists. Separately, Grand Theft Auto VI: The Album brings 34 original songs with the game on November 19, a first for the series on that scale. The station art is in the screenshot gallery under Radio.

See the station art in the gallery