What to know about the Red Dead Xbox free upgrade today

Rockstar’s new Red Dead Redemption version is rolling out on December 2 with a promised free upgrade for existing digital owners, but Xbox players are running into a maze of mixed messaging and broken entitlements. Mainstream coverage has flagged the confusion, yet the real mess is in the details showing up on Xbox accounts, bundles, and regional storefronts.​

What Rockstar said would happen

Rockstar’s announcement and follow-up coverage made it clear that current digital owners would not need to pay again for the new version on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Switch 2. ​That specifically included people who bought the digital backward-compatible Xbox version, which many 360-era players understandably took as a guarantee that their existing purchase would carry forward. ​

Gaming sites repeated this as a simple rule: if you already own Red Dead Redemption digitally on Xbox, you get the new-gen upgrade for free; new buyers pay, albeit with a launch discount. That clean promise is exactly why today’s Xbox behavior feels like a bait-and-switch to some players.

What Xbox players are seeing

In the r/reddeadredemption thread you linked, user u/keyblaster52 says they own the digital 360 version but still see a full purchase price instead of a free upgrade, and several others in the same boat quickly chime in.

u/Mysterious-Bit5890, u/Addablemonster, and u/BlueEyes1905 all report that their long-owned digital copies aren’t unlocking anything, with one user even being funneled toward a pricey bundle that includes RDR1, RDR2, and DLC they already own.

Another commenter, u/That_Hotel1452, describes the Xbox store throwing up a “manage your subscription” prompt despite having the digital backwards compatible edition for years, and getting nowhere with a Microsoft support ticket. Others in the thread experiment with owning all DLC (including Undead Nightmare), uninstalling and redownloading, or waiting for regional unlock times, but nothing reliably flips the entitlement from “buy” to “free.”

Edge cases and conflicting answers

Across other r/reddeadredemption and r/xbox threads, players report the same core issue: the store lists the new version at full price with no free-upgrade flag, even when the account clearly owns the 360/back-compat SKU. A few say they can trigger a download via the Xbox mobile app or library, but the game still demands payment when they try to launch.​

That has spawned a bunch of theories: that only a specific “Xbox One” build qualifies, that only certain RDR1+RDR2 bundles are upgradeable, or that GTA+ library owners are treated differently. One newer thread suggests some 360 digital owners have finally seen the upgrade start working, hinting at a slow entitlement rollout, but many others still report no change.​

Adding to the chaos, Rockstar Support has allegedly told some players that Xbox 360 owners are not eligible for a free upgrade at all, directly clashing with how the earlier upgrade promise was worded and how outlets originally reported it.

Articles from sites like TheGamer and PureXbox now describe the situation as “confusing” or “unclear,” but stop short of definitively stating which exact Xbox SKUs are entitled.

What to do if you’re affected

Right now, Xbox players who own the digital 360/back-compat version should expect inconsistent behavior: for many, the store still shows a normal price instead of a free upgrade tag. It’s worth checking both the console store and the Xbox mobile app, plus your full library, in case Microsoft slowly fixes entitlements in the background.​

Given the conflicting information from Rockstar Support and the visible mismatch with earlier messaging, it’s also worth documenting your ownership (screenshots of your original purchase and current store listing) in case Rockstar or Microsoft formally acknowledge and correct the issue later. 

We’ll update the article if and when there are any further developments.