Short answer: yes. SA-MP's own development stopped years ago, but the servers never closed; many run on open.mp today and players still join with the same SA-MP client. We are one of them: Vice City has been open on SA-MP since 3 November 2019 and turned seven this week.
What happened to SA-MP?
GTA San Andreas came out in 2004, SA-MP in 2006. It was updated for years, then official development stopped and the developers' forum went quiet for a long time. From the outside it looked like SA-MP had died.
What died was the updates, not the game. Servers stayed up and players kept joining; what was missing was someone to fix the bugs and keep the platform standing.
What is open.mp?
open.mp is an open-source server rewritten from scratch by a volunteer team that includes former SA-MP developers and the authors of its best-known plugins. It is compatible with SA-MP, so existing servers and game modes keep working while bugs get fixed and updates ship.
We announced our move to open.mp on 27 October 2025. Not much changed for players: you still join with classic GTA San Andreas and SA-MP 0.3.DL. What changed is behind the scenes: better protection and fewer hiccups.
Vice in numbers, 2019 to today
The most honest answer to "nobody plays SA-MP any more" is numbers. Ups and downs included:
| When | What happened |
| November 2019 | Launch. The big question back then was "will we ever see 100 players?" |
| March 2020 | The 2.3 update. We went from around 90-100 players to around 500. |
| 2020–2021 | The pandemic years. 750 players online at once, 1,300-1,500 accounts logging in per day. |
| July 2022 | 30,000 registered users in under three years. |
| December 2024 | Back to 250-300 players online. |
| October 2025 | 400 players in the evenings, 2-3 thousand accounts active in a month. |
| 2026 | More than 50,000 approved users, and the 4.5 update. |
We included the dip because it happened. After the pandemic people went back to their lives, and for a while we focused on GTA V. But in seven years we have not closed for a single day.
Why does it not die?
The first reason is simple: it runs on an old PC and it is still the most comfortable home for text roleplay. The second is people. If you are still in touch with someone you roleplayed with four years ago, that is not something you find just anywhere.
The third our founder wrote on the forum after the 4.5 update: "Which game it is does not matter, 2004 or 2025. The point is that it is the thing that brings us together; if it were not SA-MP it would be something browser-based, and if not that, something else." The same post has another line we stand by: we do not accept the "it is only SA-MP, just put up a forum and move on" attitude. This community deserves better than that.
How do you join SA-MP today?
Install classic GTA San Andreas, install SA-MP 0.3.DL on top, add the server address. It takes about ten minutes; the installation guide walks you through it. To join Vice you first register on the site and send a character application.
What happens when GTA 6 is out?
People said SA-MP was finished when GTA V came out in 2013 too; we opened six years after that. GTA 6 roleplay servers need a PC version first, which we cover in the GTA 6 roleplay guide.
Until then, and after, we are here.
Stuck somewhere? Open a ticket under Support on the forum or come to our Discord; someone is around at any hour.
