Los Santos Armenian organized-crime faction — Simeon Yetarian's network, central to *GTA V*'s Franklin-strand opening missions.
Hispanic-coded Los Santos street gang — appears as antagonist NPCs across *GTA V* and as a recurring rival for the O'Neil Brothers.
Federal Investigation Bureau — *GTA V*'s FBI analog, central to Steve Haines's coercion of Michael De Santa across The Bureau Raid and Three's Company missions.
Green-coded Black street gang faction with two-game continuity — the player faction in San Andreas (2004) where they ran with CJ, and a meaningfully diminished presence in GTA V (2013) where they've been displaced by the Ballas.
International Affairs Agency — *GTA V*'s CIA analog, opposing the FIB across multiple V missions and recurring across *GTA Online*'s Doomsday Heist arc.
Yellow-coded Mexican-American street gang faction with cross-game continuity — established in San Andreas (2004) as one of CJ's adversary factions and returning in GTA V (2013) as a recurring street-gang presence in East Los Santos.
Drug cartel led by Martin Madrazo — GTA V's most narratively load-bearing organized-crime faction, whose mid-game crisis with Trevor Philips drives some of V's most-discussed plot pivots and routes back into GTA Online's Diamond Casino Heist storyline.
GTA V's MS-13-coded Mexican-American street gang — distinct from Los Santos Vagos, anchored in East Los Santos territory and design-coded with the face-tattoo aesthetic the real-world Mara Salvatrucha is known for.
Private military contractor — the *GTA V* analog to real-world PMC firms, central to the Merryweather Heist and recurring across *GTA Online*'s heist and freemode-mission ecosystem.
GTA V's rural family-based crime faction — a Senora Desert clan of meth-cooking brothers who serve as Trevor Philips's primary early-storyline rivals, with their ranch as one of V's most-discussed mid-act setpiece destruction sequences.
Purple-coded Black street gang faction with two-game continuity — established as CJ's primary antagonists in San Andreas (2004) and returning in GTA V (2013) as Franklin Clinton's Chamberlain Hills-area antagonist gang.
Outlaw motorcycle club whose modern incarnation runs across GTA IV's TLAD episode (2009) and recurs as an antagonist faction in GTA V — primarily Blaine County–based, with a contentious history with Trevor Philips and a Sandy Shores compound.
Trevor Philips's drug-and-weapons-dealing crew — the desert-economy operation centered on Trevor's Sandy Shores trailer, with Ron Jakowski and Wade Hebert as core associates.
Los Santos branch of the Triads — Wei Cheng's organization, central to *GTA V*'s Tao Cheng / Wei Cheng story arc and the Korean-and-Triad subplot.