This is a general Heists tactics & tips guide. To check out our Heists missions guide click here. Or, if you're looking for a reliable Heists team head over to this page and leave a comment with your nickname and system. You can also read our story mode Heists guide here.
Note: this guide focuses on general tactics and tips for GTA Online Heists only. Don't miss our Online Heists Missions Guide either!
Are you looking to land the big score? Are you tired of grinding jobs for pocket change? Do you want a Lowrider or maybe even a yacht? Any GTA V community discussion about the best ways of getting money will have most people saying Heists. They have larger payouts than any other type of activity plus if you're a newbie, you can have a try at the Criminal Mastermind Challenge. It nets you 8 million in in-game cash if you succeed.
As doing heists is the best way of getting money in GTA Online (legitimately, at least — you can always try exploits), it should be no big surprise that they're quite difficult to pull off. Hard as they may be, many teams fail not for a lack of skill, but because they just don't know a few good strategies that can make the whole affair somewhat simpler.
These tips will not make heists easy, but they will help prevent stupid mistakes, or silly accidents. Following these steps will not guarantee success, but it will cut out the blunders that cause 90% of groups to fail. Some of these may seem painfully obvious, but you would be surprised how many players don't adhere to them.
As the host of the heist, you have quite a few settings open for you. Before you begin the first set-up, you should select "player saved outfits". Beforehand, it is handy to pick up a heist vest, with is either the black or grey combat vests, as these will significantly boost survivability. They halve all damage received, regardless where it's coming from, and this effect does not degrade or run out. Use these vests in a heist whenever possible. Granted, they do make you run a tad slower, but you can make up for it with the good old run'n'jump technique. Just keep sprinting and hammer that jump button like there is no tomorrow (be mindful of ledges though, or there really won't be a tomorrow for your character).
Three things you'll need for a successful heist run is ammo (duh), snacks and armor. What many, many players seem to forget, thus ending up as bloody splats on a wall, is that you can refill and use these from the interaction menu even while in a heist. Now, we're not suggesting you stand around mid gun fight to fiddle with a menu. While in cover (or if you're the kind of guy that tears toilet paper with one hand, while driving), you can pull up the menu to munch some health back into your system, equip more armor, and to buy more ammunition. An added bonus is that while you're in cover, running, or driving, you can spam snacks without waiting for the eating animation to play.
In fact, if you don't dally too much, cover is something of a safe haven. Many players aren't mindful of their current status (despite, you know, the bloody red rave show the screen turns into when you're near death...). You should always keep track of your health and armor levels, and if you're running low, get into cover and do what we outlined in the previous paragraph.
If you're playing the given heist for the first time, you might feel compelled to follow the path the GPS tells you to, helpfully highlighted with yellow navigation lines. While these certainly won't lead you astray, knowing the map, or simply pulling it up, will allow you to find better routes. Most experienced players have their own preferred routes to follow, and these often yield better results..
One of the biggest problems that heist teams face is co-ordination and the fact that one guy's inability will drag the other three down too. If the planets align, a blood moon rises and the tides reverse, you might find a heist team of randoms that actually have enough intelligence between the three of them for you pull off a setup successfully. And you can always invite the same trio back for more. If you do this, remain patient and give them a few minutes as they might be stuck in a loading screen for a while. The way these invite notifications work, they'll see them even in the loading screen, as it arrives via the PS4 or Xbox interface, not the in-game phone.
If the inevitable does happen, and someone bites the dust, you can always retry from the last checkpoint, no need to start the whole thing again. A good precaution is to set yourself to passive before the heist begins, because this way some random player, or god forbid, one of your team mates might gun you down after completion just for the laughs, meaning you lose a good portion of the cash you've worked so hard to steal earn.
One of the best "jolly jokers" of doing heists is the obscenely overpowered Armored Kuruma. Sitting in that thing is almost like having a bunker as it takes ages for its armor to be whittled down. If you have a Kuruma, bring it. If someone else has a Kuruma, get in. Seriously, if the Kuruma, pulls up, if it keeps honking, or knocking your feeble mortal vehicle that is anything other than a Kuruma, you get out, and get in the Kuruma.
Of course, no vehicle, no amount of armor, no outfit and no custom route will ever compare to having a group of friends, all with microphones set up, sufficient experience and a capability to cooperate. If you communicate, and know your team, you're likely to succeed.
Undoubtedly, there are hundreds of other tips and tricks the players have found over time. Feel free to post any advice you have for heists in GTA Online!
