After Helene knocked out power in parts of my area for a little over 14 days, I found out that a friend of ours used his cybertruck to power his house through the entire mess. He'd run the house on it for a couple of days, then drive the cybertruck over to a super charger station, recharge, then come home and plug the house back in.
The battery capacity on those things is equivalent to 9 Tesla Powerwall units or something close to it.
They may be ugly, but the emergency prepper in me always wanted one after hearing that story. Before, I always wanted to install powerwalls...but I never considered in an extended event being able to drive my powerwalls somewhere to recharge them.
This seems like an awfully niche case, no? How often does someone lose power at home for days, while also having a nearby and accessible charging station that stays functional the whole time? Most of the disasters I'm aware of people either get their power back in a short enough amount of time that they can use a normal generator for the gap, or things are bad and widespread enough that they aren't driving down the street to recharge their vehicle.
Also very important: the cybertruck is not the only vehicle capable of doing that (the keywords are V2H and V2L, V2H is the more convenient — the car just plugs into the mains and acts as a house battery — while V2L means you have to go and plug your stuff to the car's mains outputs directly)
> Most of the disasters I'm aware of people either get their power back in a short enough amount of time that they can use a normal generator for the gap
TBF an EV car has an absolutely massive battery relative to the electric consumption of a house, unless you're using resistive heating all around. Especially if you ration use.
Most people (like me) don't have generators. But when I hear "oh, BTW this car can be a used as a generator for 48-72 hours in a power outage", that's a nice little selling point that might put me over the edge if i'm otherwise considering the car. No, this doesn't solve for Hurricane Katrina. But it does solve for a nor'easter.
First, 'nearby' can be a 1 hr drive and still be worth it to commute every few days. Second, tornadoes, storms, and floods have exactly that pattern where damage can be block by block.
But it is still cheaper to stockpile some generators and gas than stockpile a cybertruck. If there's an EV charging station up within a 1 hr drive, gas stations are also going to be up.
Even if you can’t easily recharge, it’s a great way to power your home for a few days. It’s arguably a very cost-efficient home backup solution, assuming you were already in the market for an EV.
A Cybertruck has nearly 10x the battery capacity of a single Powerwall, and to buy that much Powerwall capacity would cost at least as much as a Cybertruck. Even a Tesla Model 3 (which now supports home backup) is over 5x Powerwalls.
You still have to pay to install home backup support on your home’s breaker (at least $10k), but you don’t need anywhere near the amount of very expensive supplemental home batteries.
Also, even an EV with a 120V outlet and no home backup support could be very useful for recharging a portable battery bank.
In about 25 years, I've twice been out twice for multiple days and one of those was in summer which was a nuisance rather than a potential really serious problem. (Worst case, I buy ice for coolers and maybe need to toss some food.) But I live just off a (major) country road so I'm probably pretty high on the power restoration schedule.
This is one of those things that happens in rural areas, "the city" (which is not actually a city in any sense but the legal one) gets power on in a day or so but your neighborhood 10 miles away doesn't get power for another week because the population density is something like 50/sq mile at most. And that's just for the people in actual neighborhoods, if you're on a farm or something where the nearest neighbor is a mile down the highway I don't even know how long it takes them to fix your power lines.
That sort of thing happens all the time. All it takes is, say, a big fallen tree in the wrong spot. Its entirely possible for just your road to be SOL for days, if the local utility is otherwise completely swamped by bigger issues from whatever disaster is going on.
Greetings from Northern California! Multi-day power outages are not at all uncommon (though I've never seen 14 days). We had one about a month ago. Most people just have generators, but if you wanted to use a Cybertruck instead, the nearest superchargers are one hour away and do not go offline when we lose power.
Not niche at all. Loss of power for days is common in areas of strong storms with above ground power lines. States frequented by hurricanes and strong storms can experience days to weeks without power.
Ford has also marketed their hybrid F150 as being able to power home appliances for several years.
Preppers are just about as niche as you can get; they're still a valid customer prototype! I'm sure more than a few solar home owners chose it as a PowerWall.
At 6000lbs+ it's a section 179 write off; if you combine that with some of the previous incentives the car was not that expensive to the right population.
Living in Ukraine, I can tell you it's not niche here. Most homeowners without power walls already consider buying an EV because you also get to drive it to an area that has electricity at the time.
Not really. Some areas in California have multiple PSPS outages during fire season. Many people have gotten gas generators or powerwalls to deal with it, but using your EV would be ideal.
Yeah... even powerwalls and equivalent don't seem to be a good just-in-case solution. A gas generator costs 5% for the same capacity, and you can just go get some extra gas when the storm comes. I'm all for electrification, but after doing the math, it doesn't work for this particular corner case.
Other commenters are pointing out places where it isn’t that niche, but I just want to call out that there’s a whole cottage industry for preppers that would eat this up. I would consider a 30-pound bucket full of shelf-stable Mac and cheese “pretty niche,” but it flew off the shelves at Costco.
If you're already committed to owning a bigass $100K electric truck this is an inarguably awesome side benefit. It's a truck, so... you have a few hundred miles of range. Slightly better than "down the street."
But for the other 99.99% of humanity, there are certainly more cost-effective ways. A portable power station and solar panels are probably the better move unless you have some really massive power needs.
(Admittedly, a nuclear winter reduces the effectiveness of those solar panels somewhat)
Actually, if my car worked as a whole-house UPS and base smart battery (charging at night when power is cheap, drawing during day when it's expensive), that's a pretty nice value-add for a vehicle purchase.
Doesn't make sense for what they are charging for it. But still!
I'm not sure it is. I've considered getting home batteries for power outages (due to fires), and frankly given the install cost, using a car is compelling. Not only do they have enormous batteries (a model 3 has a 57.5 kwh battery and can be acquired for 20k), but they can be driven to recharge every few days if need be.
Where I'm located, in most cases when there is an outage, neighboring areas do have power.
Specifically for my model 3, I've been considering tapping into the HV system manually to keep my Ecoflow battery topped up, but I wish there was a way to directly connect it.
I've got a friend who does it simply to fuck PG&E and avoid an electric bill. He has workplace charging, a Cybertruck, and a powerwall + Tesla solar setup at home. He drives his truck to work, fills up on electricity, drives it home at the end of the day, and uses it to power his house. Repeat the next day. The Cybertruck was cheaper than the 13 PowerWalls or whatever that's the equivalent battery capacity.
Actually no, and in fact almost all EVs are capable of powering a house for quite a while. It would be excellent if this was not just a Cybertruck-exclusive feature since here in the bay area we have shitty infrastructure too and power outages happen several times per winter.
I saw it happen during Katrina. Neighborhoods within an easy drive of each other where one had power, and the other not. Not to mention the fact that vehicle charging stations may well be prioritized to restore power.
It’s niche just because natural disasters are thankfully relatively rare, but I still think having good contingencies is worth it.
Ice storms in the Midwest can knock power out for several days in rural areas. Urban areas usually get brought back online sooner than the rural areas. A few years ago a bad one knocked out power at a friend’s house for three weeks.
Not uncommon in parts of California where certain legs of the grid are shut down for high wind events. If you live in Pacifica, you might have your power out for 3 to 5 days, but there will be reliable power in San Francisco 20 minutes away.
An awful lot Elon’s products seem uniquely capable in extreme niche cases primarily caused by America‘s horrendous track record of maintaining, upgrading, and filling in traditional infrastructure.
Even outside of natural disasters, it's a very useful feature for people in the construction business and similar fields where mains power might not be always available.
Another way to view this is that driving a cybertruck every day is quite wasteful (no different than driving a full size gas pickup every day). One recharge cycle in a cybertruck uses enough energy to power a typical home for 8 days, 130kWh. If you aren’t doing truck things with it, it’s better to drive a more efficient EV or hybrid car. It uses almost twice as much Wh per mile compared to a model Y.
I think this is why these EV trucks don’t do well (ford also cancelled the F150 lightning). For truck things, they aren’t particularly capable (you’d get less than 100 miles towing). For daily driving duty, a car or small suv is much more efficient. You can power your home during a storm from most EVs these days, you’d just have to top it up more often
Cybertruck uses like a fifth of the energy of a full size gas pickup truck and is only like 50% more than a typical smaller sized EV. The truth is that most homes don't use much energy apart from hvac. The Chevy Bolt can also power a home for several days if you only have the fridge and lights running.
>For daily driving duty, a car or small suv is much more efficient.
I have a lightning and it averages 0.5kwh/mile and my electricity price is $0.15/kwh, so it costs me $0.075/mile to drive. At current gas prices that's pretty much the same as a very efficient hybrid compact car (55mpg @ ~$4/gallon). If I had solar I could probably offset almost all of the lightning fuel cost based on where I live (sunny) but it's so cheap it's not worth it.
Do you mean "much more efficient" in places where electricity rates are significantly higher than the national average? Or only much more efficient when compared to when you're charging at charging stations?
> Another way to view this is that driving a cybertruck every day is quite wasteful (no different than driving a full size gas pickup every day). One recharge cycle in a cybertruck uses enough energy to power a typical home for 8 days, 130kWh.
Driving in general uses a lot of energy. It’s the physically moving a 1,000 kg or more object that takes a lot of energy. Orders of magnitude more than a few lights or a phone. Same with flying of course; also moving a heavy object.
I own a pretty typical phev sedan (Gen 2. Volt), and I use more electricity on my 20 mile commute than the rest of my power usage combined.
All cars just use a ton of power moving a lot of mass. It is actually impressive, it's like 100KW at full tilt. I think i saw someone do the math for how much power transfer you would need to get EV charging as fast as gasoline refuelling: It's in the megawatts.
The only way you could signifigantly reduce power usage of vehicles is to reduce mass dramaticially with a motorcyle or autocycle. The Aptera is an interesting autocycle design based on this line of reasoning, but we are also seeing the emergence of a lot of electric motorcycles.
Yeah the Silverado EV has my attention but it's the same issue: if you, like me, actually use your truck for truck shit, an electric truck is a substantial, notable downgrade from ICE.
That said if you have a Mall Crawler who's heaviest loads are your monthly Costco run, an electric truck would probably be great for you. I still wouldn't recommend a Cybertruck though.
> Powershare allows you to draw power directly from your compatible Tesla vehicle to power your devices, your home or the grid.
> Powershare is currently available for all Cybertruck vehicles, and all new Model 3 and Model Y2 vehicles ordered on October 1, 2026 or later.
> To verify if your vehicle has Powershare, navigate to ‘Software’ > ‘Additional Vehicle Info’ > ‘Powershare Support: Enabled’ on your vehicle touchscreen.
The caveat is that Powershare is low wattage. You really need to pair it with a Powerwall and have an average draw less than the limited capability of the car to supply it.
To power a house directly from an EV, the main options now are the EV trucks -- Lightning, Silverado, Cybertruck all can have this ability, 240V 30A typically
1) if you're permanently modifying your home or electric panel you're over $1k. (General Motors "Vehicle2House" is ~$10-20k for hardware + installation... an EXTREME investment unless you plan on regular "emergency" usage of it)
2) if you're buying some portable solar panel "battery boom box" you'll likely run out and the folding solar panel it comes with is more gimmick than reliable
3) if you're buying a "real" gas/diesel generator, you have to run it + change the oil every 6 months otherwise it might not start in your emergency situation
...just buy a thing that clips to your car battery and dangles out the front hood of your car!
You already maintain your car every 3-9 months, you already (should) have at least 1/2 tank of gas at all times (especially in a weather / outage situation), you can generally idle your car for at least 2 days off a tank of gas in an emergency, and if this thing can charge your phone/battery packs, keep your fridge running (kindof?), and run a small space heater overnight...
It makes soooo much more sense to buy a $500-$1000 emergency accessory that piggybacks off the car you already maintain than trying to stand up a whole extra distribution mechanism for "survival-ish power, maybe 1-2 times over 3-4 years".
I don't think the residential power generator is needed anymore if you have an electric car.
As soon as we got the adapter for our Ioniq 5, I sold generator to a neighbor. The car will run what we need for four days, which is longer than the generator and five gallon can of gas is going to last.
Despite the dealer saying the used one I bought supported it, it turned out to not be available in the trim I got. My fault obviously for believing something a car dealer said.
It's worth noting that there are several other (nearly objectively better) EVs on the market with larger battery capacity than the CT and have V2H/Powershare tech.
If you live in a sunny area, it's much cheaper to install solar with a hybrid inverter (like a Sol-Ark) with some batteries, and a generator for the extended outages. The cybertruck's battery is 123 kwh, whereas a gallon of gas contains approx 33 kwh of energy. A mere 5 gallon container of gas is more energy than the entire cybertruck.
I camped in a yurt in rural Maine last fall on a motorbiking trip. Needed to keep my phone charged for nav; woke up to find it hadn't charged all the way.
Went looking for the campground host and bumped into another camper, who was pissed the power went out. "Don't worry though - if you need to charge something, you can put it in my truck."
Ended up on a phone charging expedition that landed me in a local library for the first time since I was a child.
Came back and met the host: "Sorry about the power last night - some dumbass tried to charge his truck and tripped the breaker to the whole campground."
Charging a truck does that? What's that campground going to do with someone plugs in their 50A 43 foot-long tour bus RV?
(I'm sure there's more to the story, and the details aren't important, but if charging a vehicle is tripping breakers for the whole campground there's something wrong.)
If pulling 24 amps through a TT-30 or 40 amps through a 14-50 trips a breaker, then it's the host's fault for the campground having a shoddy electrical system, not the truck driver's fault.
This is nothing specific to the CyberTruck; 123 kWh is a lot of battery but a better use would be to add home solar and then you're completely self-sufficient in addition to saving tons of money.
Of course there are two issues that are completely solveable if we had reasonable governance:
1. Adopting an Australia-style solar installation regulation and permitting scheme, which is literally 1/5th tho cost of the US method, and pays their tradespeolpe higher salaries than US workers get
2. Allowing EVs to feed back into the grid. This is something that naysayers would never be useful because nobody would ever want to waste battery cycles on their home. Which of course has always been nonsense. Don't buy EVs without this basic capability, IMHO.
This is obviously not the primary reason to get a Telsa. But a full home generator will run you $15k to buy and install where i live, and a whole bunch of hassle to install with permits. I don't have one because my power doesn't go out that much. But if i'm otherwise on the fence about a vehicle, I would absolutely want this as a feature.
In our area, when a storm hit, the roads washed out, so the generators ran out of propane. Then the local propane companies ran out of delivery truck capacity because of the demand surge. Finally, the regional distributors ran out of propane.
Our solar panels kept the fridge running, but we were heating the house with a wood stove (it was very cloudy, so we were getting maybe an hour of sun a day). If we had bidirectional house charging, we could have had warm showers + used the heat pump: We would have been able to fast-charge the car at 100-200kw in town. The house can limp through 20-30 hours on ~ 25kwh, so the charger would charge the house at a few days per hour, including losses from driving to and from town + round tripping through the battery, and also running the house heat pump.
None of the other people around here stayed online. Some propane-dependent people had no electricity for > 2 weeks (with rationing, they managed to keep their generators online for about a week, and PG&E took three weeks to fix their lines).
This was in the outskirts of Silicon Valley, so better-than-puerto-rico infrastructure, but only just.
You forgot "higher maintenance" that goes along with seldom-used things that run on gas. That gas doesn't drain itself, and if you don't do that, well, Amazon has carbs for Honda generators for $30. For something I might use once a year. No, thanks.
This works for the wealthy that can afford it, but would it be better to be press for a better grid for everyone instead? It amazes me how individualistic and wasteful the usa is.
may I ask why would it not be more sensible to have solar panels, battery and generators? Is that not a viable project?
I'm consodering that for myself, never thought on a cybertruck
The ford home integration setup never really worked as advertised. The idea is that if the home power fails, the truck will output high voltage DC to an inverter that powers the house. No owners have got this failing over reliably.
Most people just plug an extension cord into the onboard inverter. You have to manually flip it on and plug it in, but 240V30A is plenty for an emergency. Doing it this way isn't any different from any other vehicle with an onboard inverter though.
Interesting, This reminds me a V2V energy transportation. There was a study in the past to investigate how could it be designed in the public transportation:
Currently in pilot on a small fleet of electric trucks in Australia (actual trucks - prime movers for road trains) - large standard swappable battery packs that can be removed and replaced with a fork lift.
> They may be ugly, but the emergency prepper in me always wanted one after hearing that story
If all you're after is the V2L feature, you can get it for much cheaper: for 16% of the price of a Cybertruck, you can get 86% of the battery capacity (about 8 powerwalls) by buying a used Fisker Ocean Extreme with a 107kWh battery, vs. the cybertruck's 123kWh
What appliances exactly did the house have? And does it last couple of days even for appliances with compressors and heating coils? If it did that then thats pretty impressive! And your friend is a genius
I used to have an inverter I installed in my vehicle, mainly to run powertools, and brew hot cocoa during stargazing events. During the great North American power outage in the early 2000's, I ran an extension cord into the house and ran some basic stuff off it (I recall us being the only ones around who could watch TV to keep up with the news). It was only 1200W (though had an extra deep cycle battery hooked up), but helped enough for a few vitals.
If that’s the only thing you care about you can DIY (or buy dedicated battery backup systems) with 10x more capacity for the same price. With heavier but cheaper Na-ion batteries in the horizon near future backup systems will be even better
Ford did the same thing, but that truck was built during the height of parts shortages.
Ford came in and bought up all of the parts from our suppliers and I had to qual random suppliers for weeks. Even at the time, I was thinking there is too much disparity and this will haunt us for years.
We were a bit more agile and I made a lot of kernel hacks to compensate.
Ford didn’t fare better for all their choices. Recalls galore. Honestly, they made my life hell so fuck em.
On to the truck, they had a proprietary charger and power wall solution but it could run the house for days.
The requirements for a home battery are vastly different than for a vehicle. For home, size and weight matter much less and capacity and discharge matter much more. Vehicle batteries would nearly always be the wrong solution to power a home.
The F150 hybrid is/was also supposed to be really good for this, and when the battery ran down, the engine would switch on and recharge it. So, you were not dependent on a super charger. All you needed is a working gas station. (This is based on an old video from Alex on Autos). So, you could buy a vehicle that is both cheaper and doesn't look like a dumpster and still be able to do this.
Battery capacity is just one side of the equation. You also need a strong output capacity otherwise you won't much. Also if you are to inject current in your network like that, then you need at least a source inverter to isolate yourself from the grid, otherwise it would most likely be illegal and very dangerous for technicians and neighbors. Also
Are the battery compartments water proof? We got hit by a hurricane a few years ago, and a few nearby teslas caught on fire from the floodwaters, torching people's houses.
that is not the only car who can reverse-charge the house. All EVs are theoretically capable of it, given proper power switching algorithm. (the hardware is already there, just how the four switches open/close to reverse the energy flowing direction.)
This is a feature on many new electric vehicles (such as the Kia EV 9). The obstacle is often the power company, which may require modifying your system to enable this.
Can you do this with other normal EVs? I assume they'd have lower capacity, but just getting some power for your fridge, wifi, and chargers might be worth.
Sort of. With my Kia EV9 I can use a V2L adapter to run an extension cord for essential items in my home. I understand in other markets there is a V2H connector so you can connect it to your home mains power but I don’t think it’s available in the US
In theory, yes, but they need to have the hardware/firmware to do it. Pretty sure most of the full-size electric trucks do so, but not sure about any of the smaller crossover EVs.
You also need to have the house setup to run off a generator. You don't want the truck power feeding back into the grid. IIRC, that's usually done with a big switch near the main panel.
No, you can't even do it with most other Teslas. Current models will give you 20A of 120V out from the battery, but most don't have an inverter big enough.
There is a model of Ford Lightning that has power sharing and now that resale values are way down it just might be a cost effective home battery that you can drive around during non-emergencies....
In theory, it requires ONLY firmware changes. V2G/V2H works by establishing a "fast charging session" that directly connects the inverter to the high-voltage bus. And then it just siphons off the energy from the battery instead of charging it.
Car makers are reluctant to support this. In case of Tesla because of market segmentation.
What are the chances that the supercharger station even has power after a hurricane? You want something that is already on the property. I've had roads blocked by fallen trees for days after a windstorm event.
If you are concerned about riding through a 14 day+ event you need a generator. Even a fully off-grid solar / wind setup could be compromised in these kinds of storms. I've seen entire roofs cleaned off by a <100mph storm. Anything not bolted down to a concrete slab cannot be depended on.
It’s unclear to me how a vehicle battery can be 9-10x the size of a house battery, be used as a house battery, include an highway safe cabin, motors and wheels and only cost 4x what a single home battery costs. Oh, and at least Kia rates their battery warranty based on miles driven, so using it as a home battery does not impact any 10-year capacity guarantees.
AI tells me they are completely different though, so I must be missing something.
Permitting in California more than doubles the installation cost of home batteries + PG&E gets to screw with you if you buy one.
Propane generators here have the same problem.
That still doesn't explain the price gap. You can literally just get a V2H EV and use it instead of a home battery (or, you could if the ecosystem was more mature).
Powerwall is a scammy product. WAY too expensive for the storage it provides.
---
So the summary is: Cybertruck is using a different battery chemistry, Powerwall is a scam.
(I mean - to be clear, the Cybertruck is also a scam, but it's a different kind of scam not directly related to the battery capacity, since it's hauling around a 123kWh NCMA battery pack)
I think "recycling" cybertrucks in this manner, basically to reuse their batteries, may give them a more practical afterlife then when they were a truck.
It's a cool car. I'm glad it exists. All SUVs look almost identical. I'm glad it was different, not for everyone but it was an attempt to make something innovative in a very stale market.
It's exhausting reading these kinds of articles from a tech publication none the less. It's just so negative. Here is a summary of paragraphs:
Cybertruck is ceasing production
Here's a mean tweet from some X account with 2,649 followers: "Fuck that shitbox"
> They may be ugly, but the emergency prepper in me always wanted one after hearing that story.
The cybertruck is $70k, which in a 14-day power outage is $5000 a day.
There are cheaper options to weather such a storm. Like flying first class to New York, getting a limo to the Central Park Ritz-Carlton and spending 14 days being waited on hand and foot.
I agree that it’s cool, but is it practical? If your goal is to power your house, you can buy a whole-house backup generator for about 1/12th of the cost of a cybertruck.
A cyber truck as a prepper rig is laughable. EV's do a lot of things well, but if it's a prepper rig, you'd need to have a generator and the fuel set aside to charge it. You can't assume that there will be power near by. If there is power, you can't assume that you will have access to one of the relatively few chargers available.
You can get a generator that will get the job done for under 1000 bucks and you can store diesel or propane to get the job done.
That's before we factor in the likelyhood needing to travel quite a distance (and assume there is no access to grid power), and that you won't have any of the cybertruck defeating issues like heavy rains or standing water that might void it's warranty and fry it's electronics.
A prepper rig is a mechanical diesel that can be roll started or hand cranked without batteries, has no electronics to get fried except the radio, and can burn almost any combustible fuel source on hand. Slap a 200 Gallon transfer tank on the back and keep it full and you can drive across the country without fueling up. And if you also have that diesel generator to power your house, you've got a years worth of fuel for that generator.
You can get all that done for around 25k USD, so, not sure how a cyber truck even enters the conversation.
A real pepper would want a car that runs on gas with a carburated engine and is also a common car. Not a niche one off that requires fussy infrastructure just to refuel.
Generally a propane generator is a wiser, more reliable backup option. Propane doesn't go bad, and in disaster scenarios often the sun isn't shining or your solar panels could be damaged. Solar + battery is a good system when the weather is good and everything is going well, but for a fallback system a propane generator can't be beat.
Yeah, this is where I landed, too. Except propane bottles only get me about 3-4 hours per bottle and it's pricey. It ran $50 for one day of AC during the last outage.
I just bought a kit to convert to natural gas though. Most people who've done it are happy to not change bottles all the time. It won't help after an earthquake but the regular PSPS outages I get make natural gas a better fit for the moment.
I'm looking into getting a large EV so I can move off of a propane generator. A generator needs service, it will cut power for 5-10 seconds while it starts up (so your PCs and whatnot will power cycle), and it's loud.
I'm running an EG4 system with a decent amount of battery storage. I have a generator port on it that makes it easy to plug in a portable generator to assist the PV and charge the battery. It's really easy for me to roll my generator over and run it a few hours a day to supplement the solar. Even a cheap 5kW generator is plenty because it doesn't need to power the house, just provide a continuous charge to the batteries.
If you need to worry about such extended outages, why not just do the normal thing and install propane tanks, a stationary generator, and a transfer switch?
You can buy the batteries installed at your home, charged during the day with solar or night with a small ICE generator. That plus a real same-class truck still costs considerably less than a CT.
my jelly neighbor story is that when our neighbors replaced their ice truck with a cybertruck, a calm descended on our block. iso of getting woken up by the rumble of that damn thing when they started it, they just zoomed off, silently. its the first time i internalized that electric vehicles are inherently better than ice. more human.
Yes, drain your car to power your house, so in an extended outage your house will be out of power and you will be stranded. Risk management, people. You don’t know if power will go out in even more places, or stay off for an extended period of time.
- The emissions credit market (where Tesla made most of its money) is dead due to lowered standards.
- Manufacturing costs haven't come down.
- EV sales share in the US is down to 6% (and falling every quarter).
- Chinese EVs are dominating every market outside the US.
- All the overhyped moonshots (sub-$30K car, unsupervised autopilot, autonomous robots) are nowhere to be seen.
It's hard to see where Tesla goes from here as a company. The stock is still surviving on Elon hype but has been stagnant for 5 years. The day he gets bored and decides to resign to focus on SpaceX full time the company is basically done.
US car companies have been protected and bailed out too many times and are now not only completely uncompetitive on the global market, but set up to be completely demolished as EVs take over.
Their bad leadership and overall inefficiency mean that either investors are going to pay a massive price, or US consumers are going to pay a massive price. If we keep on pushing up consumer costs by propping up bad manufacturers with protectionism and bail outs, the US's entire economy is drug down by that.
There needs to be some creative destruction, ruthless culling of the least efficient manufacturers, so that their best workers can go to the better manufacturers, if the US is ever going to be a top tier car manufacturer again.
I hadn't followed just how bad US manufacturers were failing at EVs the past two years, what with all the other disasters unfolding, thanks for the wake up call. Two years of wasted time, of the US falling even farther behind... such a massive fail and yet not the most massive.
I'd say Koreans are probably the closest to the Chinese, but Japanese manufacturers have fallen behind. Toyota spent too much time with hydrogen. Nissan? Honda? Mazda? None of them have a solid lineup of electric vehicles.
I appreciate Toyota's hybrids, but that is not the future and every model year that they try to delay, they are missing out on developing the technology, experience, internal expertise, and platform refinement.
I hate to see it and I hate to say it, but the last time I was in Europe there were A LOT more giant american vehicles, at least outside of city centers. I really hope this SUV plague doesn't go global.
One state makes up over a third of all EV sold in the country EV’s have a way to go in the United States. Hybrids seem to be doing a lot better in recent times.
California accounts for roughly 35% of all U.S. EV sales, though some estimates put its share near 40%.
Full disclosure: I have been driving an EV for almost a decade. I use an e-bike too. Electric commuting is brilliant. I'm glad for the sake of air quality that EVs and e-bikes exist and are increasingly popular.
That said — let's be realistic and dispassionate.
> There needs to be some creative destruction, ruthless culling of the least efficient manufacturers, so that their best workers can go to the better manufacturers, if the US is ever going to be a top tier car manufacturer again.
Inflicting job losses at that scale is not going to happen. US protectionism (a euphemism for ahem current federal initiatives) is alive and well. The legacy US auto makers have a huge domestic market and their survival is a primary motive for the US trade/tariff war. (Does the thoroughly corrupt administration face any comeuppance? That is a different discussion.)
The lack of EVs has not been a pivotal concern of voters. US voters want cheap fuel. Affordability was a fundamental concern for voters. The mid-term election result is not about loftier environmental goals.
> Their bad leadership and overall inefficiency
Yes, "an American vehicle" is known for grotesque size and high cost of maintenance. And now after two years of a despicable administration, "an American vehicle" is also a Trump-Miller-Hegseth-Bessent-Lutnick-Musk-*.arsehole symbol.
Even so, Tesla sales success is real, domestic and abroad. People who can afford them buy them.
Chinese EV have heavy import taxes in the EU. Also in France, (I don’t know in other countries), you get more subvention when buying an EU-made EV. This heavily distorts the market to try to save VW and friends.
I see sources saying BYD sold 187,657 vehicles in Europe in 2025, and MG sold 307,812. Interesting.
Your source only says:
“Top 5 best-selling EV brands in Europe in 2025
Volkswagen – 274.417 (+56%)
Tesla – 238.765 (-27%)
BMW – 193.186 (+15%)
Skoda – 172.100 (+117%)
Audi – 153.848 (+51%)”
I wish people would stop saying stood things like this and consider the structural and technical reasons why TSLA share values might be disconnected from the company's performance. (No one wants to do that because it might point to misbehavior by market participants.)
Hundreds of billions of dollars do not move because of "hype"; someone, somewhere is making a calculated decision.
I think they have a future as a "normal" car company, but in order to do that they'd have to manage to deliver a new "normal car" model at some point, and accept normal stock prices.
That EV market share direction in the US, though .. really bad compared to non-petrostates (except Norway)
They’ve never been a normal car company. And that’s the problem.
They don’t do a good job at the car company part. They make nice cars, but the company part has issues. Quick example… I was very happy to drive a model 3 for many years. But the constant changes in price of their new cars destroyed any resale value mine had. Every time Tesla was having a bad quarter, the value of my car dropped. That’s not the way to get me to buy another one.
There are certainly other areas where they could improve too. But my point being - they’ve never been all that good at (or interested in) what it takes to drive long term success in selling cars. It’s just too long of a time horizon for them.
Oooh, normal cars. Now there's a concept. Can we get a real EV minivan? Not a gimmick like the Buzz. I've got kids and go on long road trips to visit family. Seats, cargo capacity, range, and 800V charging speed.
Closest thing is like the Ioniq 9 but the cargo space really sucks.
For a polished product that ticks all the boxes, I would pay a premium for this.
I live in SE Asia and travel regularly for work in this region. Chinese EV's are everywhere and completely dominate the market, except perhaps a few fans in Singapore, it's living driving in the future (Denza D9 anyone?) compared to Western countries (tech-wise, not the questionable production and market flooding)
They are running a fleet of taxis around the Bay Area. It's kind of scary because they aren't that safe, given the lack of LIDAR. But they are doing it anyway.
Photogrammetry + AI has developed to the degree, that there are 3D scanning apps on iPhone that don't even use the Lidar when available, so you can certainly make do without and get comparable results.
I rented one for a road trip. It was nothing short of magical. Scary to give it control. And I can believe there are edge cases … but it’s real.
I’d guess that it’s going to take a while to catch up because the real world data is the moat. Maybe if someone partners with Waymo but the price point will be higher.
The thing that gives me pause about buying one is: what happens if the company loses interest? Is it like “owning” a game after the company shuts down the servers?
It's actually easy. The media would love to print stories about robotaxis having chaotic accidents, so you can trust that you will hear about it if that starts happening.
You might be waiting a while, though... If it's not happening now, it's unlikely to ever happen.
I have it. It is shockingly good but not as good as a person. And anything below 100% is dangerous.
For instance, how it detects pedestrians. Ive had instances where someone is looking to cross, the FSD either ignores them completely or it slows down a little, baits them into going forward, then resumes running them over. It detects car to car problems very well but doesn’t try to interpret pedestrian’s intent outside of the actual road.
I’ve heard the same but I think the question is “is autopilot worth basing your entire car purchase around it?” and “will competitors be able to replicate Tesla’s success?”.
If autopilot is basically the only thing Tesla has going for it then they’ve got a risky path ahead of them.
I, and many others, could never go back to a vehicle that doesn't have this level of self-driving. It really is such an improvement it's crazy how little people who haven't experienced it understand.
That’s not true in general but the Cybertruck in particular is stupid expensive to manufacture. And then there’s the 4680 fiasco. I think it’s more of a personal political design than a realistic product.
I’d say Tesla’s charging network remains a very strong suit for them. Problem is it’s nowhere near strong enough to justify their current valuation. But we’ve been saying this for years and the stock price still stays irrationally high.
It’s slightly amazing how persistent the Elon hype is. Quite a few of those problems are at least partially due to own goals that Musk himself has been scoring.
I realize that some of it is just a cult of personality, and that part will be unusually sticky because of things like cognitive dissonance. But that can’t be all of it. My next best guess is a bunch of it is a whole bunch of institutional investors are privately thinking these companies are way too risky, but keep it to themselves because it’s not their money they’re putting on the line and taking a contrarian position would risk angering a presumably vocal subset of clients of unknown size. Which isn’t a great way to make yourself popular with your boss.
There’s a severe lack of focus and the only endgame that still makes sense to me for Tesla is basically turning into a cab service like Waymo. Perhaps you own the car perhaps not.
Hundreds of Cybercabs are driving around cities right now with no steering wheel or pedal making money and growing 20% a week, Model Y is the best selling car (of any type) in the planet. European sales are going through the roof, they are doubling production.
Cybertruck was a mistake but rest of the business is printing cash hand over fist.
A side effect of Trump's war with Iran is that every country which doesn't have sufficient domestic oil production, which is most countries especially in Europe, has accelerated their EV transition. Buyers are grabbing every EV they can get their hands on, and yes Tesla are the leader there.
"Tesla (TSLA.O), led the UK BEV market year-to-date, with registrations up 25.4% from a year earlier and a 9.53% market share
South Korea's Kia (000270.KS), and China's BYD (002594.SZ), continued to compete for second place, with market shares of 6.9% and 6.8%, respectively"
> European sales are going through the roof, they are doubling production.
Only when compared to their recent record lows... the broader trend is still downwards. This is disingenuous. They are losing ground to other manufacturers in Europe
Also the Teslas that Europe is buying are made in China not the US.
The countries where EVs are increasing the most are those that have access to Chinese EVs.
> Hundreds of Cybercabs are driving around cities right now with no steering wheel or pedal making money and growing 20% a week
Huh? The cybercab with no steering wheel is only operating in Austin, in tiny premapped areas. There are 45 registered in Texas, and they have only been operating since September.
This isn’t Twitter, you’re generally expected to at least attempt to provide factual information here.
Not sure what numbers you are looking at but Tesla vehicle sales peaked in 2023 and have been falling every year since then. The "sales going through the roof" narrative exists on Twitter, not their balance sheet.
The proliferation of over-the-top EVs around 2019-21, not just from Tesla, did make me think something was wack with the subsidies. Gas was insanely cheap for part of that too.
It's crazy that Democrats were the pro EV party because of the environment, and half the reason liberals bought Teslas, but Elon's white supremacy overrode his business interests and he went all in with the fossil fuel party. And Tesla shareholders rewarded him with an insane pay package for this genius move.
Democrats abandoned the environment in lieu of this weird obsession with socialism- starting with the unions. First, Tesla was repeatedly snubbed when the Biden administration poured billions into every other car company to make them produce EVs- gleefully declaring GMC of all companies to be the Leader of EVs. Then, the COVID situation where the local staff member in government made it illegal for Tesla, and only Tesla, to continue operating. That's when Elon finally got the message that the Democratic party had abandoned him, and cared more about raising money than any kind of environment or progress. He then went on twitter, called it out, and then the entire democratic party reformed under the banner of Anti-Elon (since the whole trans and immigrant stuff was settling down a bit too much to encourage passion).
It's hilarious to me when Democrats crash out over Elon's reliance on EV credits, as though acting on the incentives they created was a moral failure on his part.
This is the most realistic scenario. Hide the stock losses by folding it into SpaceX. Dare the US government to nationalize it. Walk away a “business martyr”.
Elon leaves the company, maybe they focus more on quality, good UX, and a lot of people not currently buying Teslas because they are owned by a nazi and have bad UX and quality issues might start.
He seems to suggest that the future is Cybercabs and Optimus.
But if Optimus ends up with a HW3 problem (current manufactured Optimus bots aren't autonomus yet because the software isn't finished) he'll have a pile of Cybertrucks and early-model Optimus units rotting in a field.
Personally, I just don't see it. If he merges Tesla and SpaceX it won't really be about cars or vehicle autonomy.
Their current stock valuation can't ride this uncertainty forever. At some point he has to have new products that work, no caveats.
He's also looking at an incoming congress that is going to give him a colonoscopy that he didn't ask for.
The only people I've seen driving cybertrucks tend to be asian or older white guys that likely think Elon is great. Yes, this is a generalization, but an observation over thousands of miles between the Bay Area and Vancouver, BC.
I think Tesla is in for more hurt over the coming years, which I don't think is necessarily a bad thing in my opinion on how Musk has handled himself in the public arena with Tesla and Starlink.
Don't forget, they built a truck that's near impossible to sell outside the US due to the fact it's way too big and deadly for other road users.
Elon made this into something cool, but creating a whole model line for a single country is risky. Especially if that model is already in a small niche and has an incredibly controversial design.
Elon resigning from Tesla and just letting it run as a reasonable car company making just regular incremental quality and price and new model improvements on normal vehicles people want to drive could be the best thing for the company. The Model 3 is a huge success. That they didn't follow that up with just a regular pickup truck in a similar niche, and instead got distracted by this cybertruck nonsense is an indictment of Musk's poor leadership at this point.
They should just be the Toyota of EVs -- mass produce quality vehicles people want to drive -- instead he's trying to be Tony Stark and keep pumping it as a meme stock.
Tesla remains excellent at engineering and manufacturing. They need not seek the exotic.
He's a liability to that company, not an asset, at this point. And his name has become a brand liability.
The weird contradiction of musk is that his name is what’s propping up most of his companies/projects but his proximity to his companies is also a threat to them.
>The stock is still surviving on Elon hype but has been stagnant for 5 years.
People may actually start buying Teslas again if they're no longer associated with a fascist trillionaire. The number of "I bought this before Elon went crazy" bumper stickers is very high. The people who would buy an electric car are turned off by his association with the brand. He's more of an albatross on the brand than a hype machine.
Throwing his first-mover advantage into the dumpster to get in bed with the political party who despises not only his core customer base but the very premise of his business is forever baffling.
- When it released, people were lighting Tesla stores and charging stations on fire, flipping off drivers, spitting on the cars even when kids were inside, and defacing them. This was generally supported, and for some reason a lot of people sided with the vandals in an effort to still be considered a Democrat and show hatred of The Other Side.
Elon's honestly their biggest problem. Can't focus on finishing one thing to save his life and alienated the shit out of the European market with his fascist beliefs.
From my perspective, owning a truck and SUV and using them differently for various use cases, the cybertruck is neither. So even if I ignore everything else I feel about it’s aesthetic, Musk, politics, etc. It simply does not serve many real world needs that I have. It put itself in a very narrow box of, only people that really like this quirky design and also like/feel indifferent to the tangential stuff will want to buy this truck. Oh, also you have to be able to afford it too. This is such a small addressable market for a vehicle to target. Was never going to work.
However, it provided content and distraction and kept the stock high longer than it should have and I feel like that’s what Musk continues to excel at.
I found out the same with pickup trucks generally.
I got one, years ago. The bed was not large enough to readily hold full sheets of plywood (the minivan I owned before could hold full sheets!). And yet, the truck was long such that parking, maneuvering in parking lots, etc, was a pain in the ass (here the minivan was about tied with the truck).
So sucked as a regular errand-car, sucked for hauling sheet goods.
(Sold it during the tail of Covid when used car prices were skyrocketing for whatever reason. Never again.)
Nailed it. I considered buying a truck for years, but the minivan has everything I want out of a vehicle. I'm so glad we got one. It's strictly better for hauling dimensional or ply, strictly better for long road trips, for gas mileage, etc. It even tows more than my jeep did, but not as much as a full size pickup. and it has a really nice reconfigurable roof rack, so adding a trip carrier on top is simple. Add to that the optional bench in back, the built in vacuum, the built in TV + entertainment, the full length moonroof, on and on.
It's a luxury vehicle that beats SUVs hands down, and most functions of urban trucks as well.
It just gets soccer mom vibes, so it's not $120,000
> The bed was not large enough to readily hold full sheets of plywood
Many trucks are sold as not much more than vehicles to haul around some plants. But, what I would consider 'real' trucks tend to have 8' beds. My old Toyota Tundra was great at towing, had an 8' bed and was generally an all around great vehicle. It was long, but it was meant to be.
This is why I don't get trucks with tiny beds. I've had a few Chevy 1500's and those were great with the full length bed. I've got a 2nd generation Tacoma with its longer bed, and its just on the edge of too small for some things.
I see people with trucks with 4ft beds (like the weird Jeep thing) and they just seem useless. Gimme an 8ft bed, ideally a bit longer! I don't need a big cab, but I have a truck to be a truck!
(Really, my 2nd gen Toyota Tacoma is pretty close to perfect 95% of the time for me, especially with a cap on the back)
Sheet goods fit in my truck, but I don’t want to load/unload them to that height. The bed is mostly good for dirty stuff I don’t want in the interior of any vehicle. Muddy boots, bags of concrete, kids sports gear, etc. for sheet goods and bigger heavy stuff I have a trailer and the truck the towing capacity for most needs. Occasionally I still need a heavy duty and just rent it.
The Tahoe I had last was a great as I keep tools and what dry in the truck. It only had 2 rows of seating and I don’t need more passenger space in my vehicle. My wife has the city vehicle SUV that we keep clean and use for passengers. Mine is the work / utility vehicle.
When I replaced it recently , the same trim level cost twice as much as a Silverado. And they all have 3 rows now, which means I lose most that space.
It’s all about trade offs. No vehicle is a perfect all rounder. I’d prefer the Tahoe but didn’t want to pay extra for it and have to yank out the 3rd row. I could own a Corolla but it would be overly inconvenient, and probably more expensive over time, to rent a larger vehicle every time I need it.
I'm not a car guy, buy there's a car podcast I really like where the host often tells people that even though they think they want a truck or an SUV, they probably need a minivan or a station wagon.
Sports cars are for the track, trucks are for hauling, and most drivers don't need either.
I always encourage people to consider a two door if they're planning to use the truck for utility purposes.
I picked up a 70k mile 2011 Silverado from an Ontario government auction for $3000 and it's worked great. Tows my boat, carries my dirt bikes, and has enough room in the cab for me, my partner, and my dog between us. Who needs a backseat!
The Ford F-150 Lightning also failed and it was a full truck. It similarly was way too expensive, both for consumer and Ford, and had some issues with towing (range).
I had a friend who 'preordered' to get Cybertruck and he couldn't justify the price which was $140k CAD, so he bought a new Chevy pickup truck instead for $70-80k CAD.
I think a lot of the F-150s failure comes down to dealers. You can read myriad stories in the EV subreddits of dealers putting "market adjustments" on the Lightning and Mach-E of tens of thousands of dollars. It was if they didn't want them to sell, and I think we all know why (lower revenue from regular maintenance like oil changes and other fluids).
That’s a hard comparison point though when the ICE F-150 was the perfect substitute it was competing against. To me, that mostly proves that people didn’t want to go electric or pay the premium for it. The F150 design itself, does fit the bill as a truck doing what a truck needs to do.
I also bought a new Chevy truck recently for less than $40k USD, mid tier trim. Other trucks can be very affordable. The trim and budget options are quite wide. Tesla was never going to get to that as it requires volume.
No idea why it "failed" or was discontinued. From what i remember there was a huge waitlist to get one. I know lots of people that wanted on. It looked amazing IMO. I dont think it was a demand issue that caused it to be canceled
The Lightning didn't really fail. It was the best selling EV pickup in the US by a large margin.
I think it was killed for political reasons: They repurposed the plant for AI datacenter batteries. I predict we'll have EV pickup trucks again if the 2028 election looks like the 2026 election.
Anyway, my next full sized pickup will also be a pure EV. If I can't get a Ford, then I'll get something else. (The lightning is far better at truck stuff than our late model GMC and Ram trucks were. Maybe I can get a truck from China + register in Mexico? Is that a thing?)
The new Lightning has a useless serial hybrid setup and gets 700 miles of range (who needs that?). I suspect it'll end up being like other serial hybrids, and an option to omit the gas engine will be available, and also substantially lower the price (or enable a larger battery). In the meantime, they'll tell Trump that he managed to kill EV pickup trucks.
I don't know, seems like there was a lot of demand for the Lightning, still not sure why Ford canned it.
If:
Fuel economy regulations had not been suspended and the electric vehicle credits hadn't expired I'll bet there would still be a Lightning.
Unlike the CyberTrash. The question (to me) is did Ford make a semi-rational short-term financial decision at the expense of its future competitiveness?
I remember when this thing came out how Walter isaacson came out with his biography treating it as if it was Steve Jobs envisioning the personal computer, celebrating the design process as if the cybertruck’s success was a foregone conclusion.
I lost all my respect for isaacson at that time as it was clear he’d entered a bubble himself.
This also seems along with a lot of other recent moves to reveal that money is getting tighter over there.
That’s wild, I’ve never heard that. And to be clear my issue was not that I’m a perma Elon hater, it was Isaacson’s total impartiality to this biography and seeming desire to get swept up in the bubble which has at least in part been debunked.
There are a lot of lenses through which to view the failure of the cybertruck: aesthetics, not enough truck not enough SUV, size, association of aesthetics with politics, etc. But I think the main one that is ignored is price.
The cybertruck was built in an era of high truck prices driven by zero interest rates. It bet on the price of trucks going up, just as the Ford F150 electric did. That was the wrong bet.
If it was a $40,000 truck, it would have a much bigger market despite all the other explanations of its failure. The market moved under it.
And there has been 31% cumulative inflation since the cybertruck launched, so perhaps I should have said if it had been a $49,000 truck. But either way, it’s clearly a luxury vehicle that was disproportionately affected by interest rates.
I think another big one was the time from announcement to release.
When it was announced, for those who wanted an electric truck, it was going to be the only game in town. By the time Tesla delivered, there were several options already on the road from various companies. The people who really wanted an electric truck were already happy customers of another company by the time the cybertruck shipped. I see a fair number of Rivian, F-150 Lightning, and Hummer EVs around me.
When it comes to price, I expect to see a lot of Slate trucks once it starts shipping, with its low price.
The article even said it was a rounding error in terms of Tesla’s earnings, and expectations were tepid to begin with, and other brands such as Ford also failed with electric trucks. It is not as big of a deal as people have made it out to be. The cars are Tesla’s main business by far. The Cybertruck was a distraction basically.
Tesla projected selling 250k of these a year or $15-20b in revenue per year (20%+ of vehicle revenue for Tesla). This is a big number and would’ve added significant total vehicle sales. Instead, they’ve sold less than 70,000 total trucks over its production history. That’s why it’s a rounding error.
This is an absolute disaster and failure by any rational analysis. Its failure helped puncture “Tesla sales will continue to increase” and stock price justification storyline.
I think the aesthetics are quite important. One thing that set Tesla apart was that they didn’t build weirdmobiles. They started out when manufacturers made “alternative” vehicles look weird to set them apart. The Prius is the classic example. The Leaf was another obvious one. This weirdness has an important impact on the market, because it meant that you called attention to yourself when you were driving one. When you drove a Prius, you weren’t just getting great gas mileage, you were figuratively shouting to everyone around you “look at me, I drive a Prius!” (With an implication of “I’m saving the planet,” and a further implication of “and you’re not, you philisitine.”)
Then Tesla makes an electric car that’s just a car. Surely, they put their own design touches on it, but it mostly looked like an ordinary sedan. Then they made something that mostly looked like an ordinary SUV. And then more ordinary-looking models. They looked distinctive but they didn’t look weird and didn’t make a statement the way a Prius did.
And then they make the weirdest weirdmobile that there ever was. And released it right before making a loud statement of “I’m driving an Elon Musk car!” became really unattractive to a lot of people.
> They started out when manufacturers made “alternative” vehicles look weird to set them apart. The Prius is the classic example.
The 1st gen Prius (97-01) looked utterly conventional though, just like a slightly taller Yaris due to the batteries. It was the second generation onward that looked "weird", I think due to aerodynamicsmaxxing.
Tesla scaled up CyberTruck production before finding product market fit. Somewhere tween SUV and truck, and without a clear purpose. (I thought Tesla's initial market segment was going to focus on who ever buys Jeeps, boondocking, outdoorsy stuff.)
IMHO, CyberTruck would have been a modest hit if first production run was 100. Treat CyberTruck like Roadster. A niche vehicle for a niche market. Grant enthusiasts the earliest access to the best technology.
I honestly thought that was the plan.
It would have been the cheapest, fastest way for Tesla to de-risk all of the innovations used in CyberTruck. Major stuff that Tesla's could not gracefully, incrementally add to their other models (eg 48V).
And a perfect precursor of for the Robocab (neé Model 2), that would benefit most from the innovations.
Oh well. What do I know? Musk is a trillionaire and I am not, so clearly not much.
> (I thought Tesla's initial market segment was going to focus on who ever buys Jeeps, boondocking, outdoorsy stuff.)
I'm part of that market and was initially curious about the cybertruck but it was clear that tesla was totally unserious about building an actual 4x4 overlanding vehicle. I'm not sure EVs are even there yet for a true exploring vehicle since it's the extreme end of the range problem. There are places people go that are a couple hundred miles from the nearest supercharger, and I bet rock crawling kills the range like towing does.
The actual target market was probably a guy who spends 100k on a heavily upgraded Rubicon that never drives on dirt or gets a scratch, and happens to be a huge elon fanboy.
It didn't fail, more than Model S did, which saw the same fate.
It certainly did not "fail" on aesthetics. Few people would not take note of it, and it wasn't overly impractical. Some people hated DeLorean too, which just made it even more popular as well ...
The Model S was released when Tesla had sold a grand total of around 2,500 cars. It sustained the company for years and did most of the work bootstrapping them from tiny niche to a mass market car with the Model 3.
The Cybertruck was released when the company was selling millions of cars a year. It did pretty much nothing for their bottom line, didn’t break them into any new markers, and fell far short of expectations.
I like the aesthetics a lot. It recalls the DeLorean, which is one of my favorite automotive designs.
But the cost is steep when I'm more in the market for an SUV or offroading vehicle than a truck. Not to mention that the extent to which Musk and Tesla are intertwined with politics is really not an easy sell for me.
Yeah I'm another who actually likes the rough idea of the aesthetics.
A sedan built by another company with similar aesthetics without completely ignoring...well basically everything from safety to build quality, would probably be on my potential list.
Also the things are built like utter shit. The panels come unglued, they rust in the rain, the engine, suspension and steering malfunction, the trim cracks, they leak, they burst into flames, then the door handles don't work when your Cybertruck bursts into flames.
I have to assume that politics or sunk cost are the only reasons people keep these things because they are objectively awful vehicles.
Full disclosure: I work for a competitor to Tesla so I'm a bit biased.
The Cybertruck I thought was initially kind of neat but when you try to use one as a truck you quickly can see some glaring problems that most people who buy a truck want. Towing with an EV is terrible. I've heard there's power stations with pull throughs but havent' seen them personally. The truck bed isn't practical for anything but a lawn mower. When I ride in one it rides like a car. It doesn't look good dirty. I just think they were going for warthog from Halo and thought the rest would work out. It's also super expensive for all these issues. It's a hobby vehicle. A toy.
I think Tesla is struggling personally. The marketing tactics of showcasing cars we'll never be able to buy just to cause a scene. Don't get me wrong the new Roadster my jaw dropped and I agree with Elon now that SpaceX and Tesla are the 'same' company I think it's great but let's be realistic. Most people want cars that are cheap, dependable and sort of cool. Not everyone can afford multiple cars, and a corvette that isn't feasible. Like I said I work for a competitor (GM) and I fear China is going to eat our lunch. Unless we make infrastructure for charging better and make it a no brainer.
I would buy an electric car tomorrow, I have access to cheap charging, and I don't even do long commutes. But there is zero chance I want a spyware car that's like another cell phone.
The U.S. is being protectionist because of Chinese cars that can spy on U.S. soil-- just do the right thing and stop all the car spying nonsense. Require manufacturers to open the code and let us even develop alternatives.
I have an electric Hyundai and you can disable all internet connectivity fairly easily. I have mine disabled and the car works fine. It never connects to any internet connection. I suspect that most other modern cars are similar. The firmware is closed source, but it works fine. It supports CarPlay and Android Auto, which are effectively open standards, so you can replace the infotainment system with whatever you want. This is standard for modern cars.
IDK. Grok bot works with Tesla’s grok so today I learned I can just ask how’s my house is doing. It responded how much solar I’m making vs consuming, hows batteries are doing, is garage door open and flagged that my heatpump water heater is off (i shut it earlier because it can get little loud).
Yes you can sort of get there with Siri and HomeKit, bug nowhere close to sophistication.
Here in Australia, it's interesting how well the Tesla cars are still selling.
The model Y is still the best selling EV despite the wide choice of other brands. BYD out sell them in aggregate, but Tesla are holding their own pretty well. Of course, all the Tesla cars here are made in the Shanghai Gigafactory, but still, I don't think Chinese brand dominance is a forgone conclusion. I think the real danger is if American protectionism makes Tesla feel like they don't need to innovate any more.
Software is everything when it comes to EV's. As an American, I've had many years of experience with software from around the world. No one makes software more suited for Americans, than other Americans.
China is bringing their more expensive cars first to make money once the market gets saturated then we might see more domination as they try to compete for more market share
How well does the self driving work over there? That's the real innovation and personally it seems to work well enough in America so I'm curious what your experience is with that.
> now that SpaceX and Tesla are the 'same' company
Did I miss something big on the stock market or are these actually still two different public companies? How do the shareholders of both of these (ostensibly different, kind of unrelated) large publicly-held companies feel about them being conflated like this? Is there any historical precedent for this situation?
They are still distinct public companies and they want to merge them. And even today the amount of cross mingling between those two entities however is quite significant. You would not necessarily know that they are independent from each other.
The roadster uses Space X propulsion tech, the cybercab uses starlink, grok is in all Tesla cars, both companies share Terafab. But then Tesla also supplies batteries and cybertrucks to Space X etc.
As I understand, electric motors deliver instant maximum torque. Isn't that advantageous for towing? You can get a good list of pros and cons from an LLM with a prompt like this: "towing with electric motor vs ice engine".
What is your opinion on the upcoming Tesla Semi? I expect that it will be successful, useful, and efficient.
Nobody expects an impressive 1/4 mile time from a vehicle towing a trailer. That's not what makes EVs bad at towing.
My towing-capable gas vehicle sees at worst a 30% decrease in range from towing my camping trailer, and my towing-capable diesel vehicle sees closer to a 10% decrease in range.
A while back, I read a comment on here from someone who lived in a trailer full-time as a digital nomad. They were also dedicated to driving an EV. They towed their small trailer with their Model Y. I grant you, the Model Y is not optimized for towing the way that the Cybertruck (ostensibly) is, but they described the process of travelling between Grand Junction, Colorado, and Moab, Utah, a distance just over 110 miles. With the trailer, they had to drive to Cisco, about halfway in between, drop the trailer, drive back to Grand Junction, recharge fully, drive back again, pick up the trailer, and drive the remaining 60 or so miles to Moab, where they could recharge again. Because without the trailer, they could drive the entire 1-way distance 3 times over without recharging. With the trailer, they could not make the whole trip once.
It is reductive to say it is terrible. The issue is that the current range we are putting in trucks, adjusted for the range loss from towing a large trailer, is insufficient.
The Tesla Semi proves that this is the issue: with an extremely large battery and high-speed charging, the Semi solves these problems.
A regular truck that can TOW 300 miles would certainly not be "terrible for towing."
> As I understand, electric motors deliver instant maximum torque. Isn't that advantageous for towing?
Your understanding is not wrong, but quantity of torque is a minor piece of what matters, so that doesn't move the needle.
Towing lowers the range of an EV by so much that it becomes nearly useless. This is much more important with an EV than an ICE, because EV charging is less available and takes much longer.
It's understandable that you might not fully understand the magnitude of the pros and cons from your LLM prompt, those sorts of responses usually assume certain levels of experience and familiarity with the topic. It'll make more sense when you get older!
I don't think the towing aspect matters much: I live in a semi-conservative rural area of the US with a lot of truck drivers, and about 90% of pickup trucks are used as glorified minivans / SUVs anyway that are kept clean at all times. The only pickup trucks I see towing anything are much older trucks (late 80s-early 2000s). Very old 80s Toyota Hilux / Ford Rangers are a common sight as well for filling the truck bed which carries a lot more volume that even modern trucks (most of the drivers don't care about going over the weight limit).
The Cybertruck failed because it's an awfully designed vehicle, along with all of the baggage of being associated with Elon Musk's politics (whether you agree with them or not).
I think it matters. There are lots of people who have a camper or a boat or some ATVs or whatever. Maybe they only take the camper out once or twice a year, and so you never see it hooked up. However, on that one week per year, they do need it to be able to tow.
Gas/Diesel trucks lose range when towing too, but dealing with a shorter range gas truck isn't too big of a problem on a trip beyond the extra cost. Gas stations are everywhere and it takes 5 minutes to fill up. At most gas stations, filling up while towing a trailer isn't too big of a problem. Even if your truck only had a 150 mile range while towing, it would only be a minor annoyance, and the reality is that you'll probably get at least 250 miles out of a tank.
If you're towing with an electric though, you probably are looking at less than 150 miles. Now every couple of hours you have to stop for probably an hour or so, even with a fast charger, because you're probably going to want to charge the truck to full, not 80%. You're also probably driving somewhat out of your way to hit charging stations that frequently if you're not in a very populated area.
Make it make sense. A silverado Turbomax can tow 12k and the bed can handle cargo up to 2500lbs and it's around 45k and a cybertruck easy 85k. Don't get me wrong some of what I said was opinionated.
> I think Tesla is struggling personally. The marketing tactics of showcasing cars we'll never be able to buy just to cause a scene
I think as a car company they're doing alright. They sell two of the most popular vehicles on the road. But the valuation of TSLA is 15-20x what it would be if they were valued at a car company, which is why you get over-the-top demos like the roadster.
I explained this in my other comment but I'll paste it here:
The thing is that ICE vehicles are so inefficient to begin with, but a towed trailer needs the same amount of energy regardless of what is towing it.
Imagine a trailer takes 1 unit of energy to move, and ICE truck takes 5 units to move itself, and EV truck takes 1 unit to move itself.
The ICE truck towing it would go from 5 units to 6 units, reducing the range by 16%.
The EV truck would now go from 1 unit to 2 units, reducing the range by 50%.
So the better your efficiency, the worse you are at towing. Ideally EV trucks would have such a huge battery that even when the range is reduced by 50%, it is still as long as a gas truck's range, but modern battery technology is still too sucky to achieve this.
The charging port is on the rear of the Cybertruck, which means if you have a trailer attached, you would have to find a charger with a long enough cable, or one that lets you pull all the way through.
If the charging port were on the front of the vehicle, you could pull straight in, but now your trailer is probably blocking traffic.
Of course you could disconnect and reconnect the trailer, which adds an extra 5-10 extra minutes to your 15-40 minute charge time depending on your battery level.
Aging Wheels on YouTube basically concluded that EV towing from a handling perspective is actually quite superior, but the charging and range is so much worse that depending on what you're doing it's likely a dealbreaker.
> I've heard there's power stations with pull throughs but havent' seen them personally.
FWIW Rivian has pull through charging stations along I-5, so they do exist. In general, their charging infrastructure is very reliable, uses renewable energy (matching), and is fast (even for my non-Rivian EV) and is not associated with a fascist.
People intuit cost per mile, if states stop making it illegal for Tesla to charge less insurance themselves with FSD, it’s possible they win.
China can produce 7M more vehicles annually than the entire world (including them) needs, so the world has to decide whether to give up all their manufacturing to let china do it, or china has to increase worker’s rights and pay so that they can afford to buy more vehicles (their currency and financing tactics essentially reduce purchasing power at scale to fund their manufacturing infrastructure).
Towing with EV isn’t exactly truck or Tesla problem. So I kinda agree for those particular cases it’s pretty bad choice. But most don’t do that and just like big cars with utility.
All EV trucks suck at pulling, so that's a category problem. It's designed to ride like a car, as truck dynamics of leaf spring suspension on a solid rear axle isn't actually good technically. The feel, though, is a personal preference. It is not a hobby nor a toy: it is fully functional as a truck other than for pulling long miles. It is way more capable than other trucks on certain dimensions. Other trucks are outrageously expensive with similar features. I feel like you are biased.
How do you not understand the trickle down effect of motorsports, given that you work for a competitor? The tech in the roadster trickles down to normal cars (e.g., its drivetrain advancements), and possibly to off-planet rovers (Earth is the brutal case to test the equipment on, but I don't know enough about the potential to reuse here).
you lost me here, laughing. Nobody calls them that. You’ve never driven an EV long distance, much less actually towed with one.
I’ve towed 5000+ lbs, including a mid-size SUV on a trailer, cross-country with another EV half of a dozen times. Stopping a lot is bit tedious, but it drives so well. The Rivian and Silverado both have big packs and work well. The Lightning didn’t have enough range for long-distance towing.
Moving a trailer around in town or taking a boat or camper to a lake nearby would be comfortable and the torque makes the drive effortless.
The absurdity is the best part of it. Finally it was something new, in a landscape where every car and truck has looked the same for the past 20 years. I'm happy someone designed and built something so crazy and different.
It probably would have been better had they not been mass produced, and maybe did a very limited quantity run - make it more like a collector item... I suppose thats what it'll be now. I see quite a few on the road, it takes away from the uniqueness.
Tesla's mission was never to built "something crazy and different". In fact it was kind of the opposite: when Model S came out, Tesla showed the world that EVs don't need to look or drive differently than traditional cars, because all EVs which came before Model S were either looked like a concept car or a small toy-like car. Tesla continued this success with Model 3 and Model Y. Then they started deviating from their mission and came up with Cybertruck. All they needed to do was to show the world that an EV truck can be just as practical and capable as a gasoline truck. They didn't need to go crazy with the design, make it bullet-proof, choose stainless steel which made the manufacturing harder... They shot themselves in the foot.
I find the auto market stale as well. However the CT could have been so much better if it sought to answer that demand with a positive vision rather being a reactionary revolt. Somehow a food critic has given the best critique that I've seen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEcZSM6xS80
I really agree with you here. I would never buy one (vw buzz is more my style) but I loved it in a weird “thank god something new and unique” way. Like my love for good brutalist office buildings even if I’d never want to live in a brutalist home.
The amount of hate it gets has been yet another clear indication to me just how annoyingly tribal people are. It shows you’re in the in-group and definitely-a-righteous-good-guy if you hate on the cybertruck. Not hating on the cybertruck is basically admitting you’re a fascist (I’ve had a friend literally tell me this non-jokingly). I think that’s really what 80% of the hate comes down to.
Hating the cybertruck might be tribal for some people, but definitely not everyone. I thought it was stupid and ugly from the moment it was announced, and I still think it's stupid and ugly, and it is demonstrably bad at the job of "being a truck".
You can celebrate Tesla for trying something new while still hating the actual thing that they tried for being bad.
lol, no. I actually saw one at a client's and beside being uglier than what a 5yo would be able to draw, it was also built like shit. I'm talking about going to the hardware store for aluminum panels and bend them, cut with scissors and some soldering job here and there kind of bad.
thank god these monstruosities were forbidden in europe
The Ioniq 5 leans into the same aesthetic too and that car is everywhere now, so it's not like there's anything fundamentally keeping that from working.
This take is widespread on this venture capital fan forum, but it's both incorrect and a retreat. The Cybertruck was poorly thought out, sold teribly, and is now dead. By example it has discouraged future diversity in automotive design.
Good design that breaks the mold and then succeeds for that reason is what changes the world. Bad design that starts from the desire to be different without understanding the forces that led to the preexisting equilibrium is what we got. If you start out with hundreds of billions of dollars you can fake it for much longer, but if your premise is fundamentally economically incorrect then it will only last as long as you can subsidize it.
It is impossible for someone's statement of preference to be incorrect. You may differ in your opinion, but the gp is not wrong for having their own opinion.
My understanding is more that economy and safety standards have driven us towards these aerodynamic and impact absorbing shapes. I may be quite wrong though!
The cybertruck had good enough safety ratings, but kinda just decided to not care about the aerodynamics and economy side. Which freed Elon up a lot in terms of style.
Personally, I also agree that it was refreshing to see something bold out there on the road. It's just that the final product looked just 'off' enough to make it look bad in the end.
Like, it's wheel base is about 6 inches too long and the ride height is about 6 inches too low, making it look a bit toddler-y to my eyes. The bed was also just not practicable and too small (something I see on a lot of trucks these days). The speed was good, the torque was great, the giant screen you can't feel when driving was not. The seats were uncomfortable for my build.
Overall, the car was a statement, one that just barely missed the mark to my eyes, but it did miss
Except it is very ugly and the triangle profile created a impractically large windshield and caused the bed cover to completely block the rear window when closed.
Thr angular Cybertruck design was actually not primarily for show. It comes from the fact that its body is made from cold-rolled, full-hard stainless steel that can't be stamped into arbitrary shapes. Ordinary car bodies are made from steel that can be stamped but is not stainless, so they require paint.
The original design was that the body would be made from these panels. The exoskeleton structure.
The Cybertruck that was released did not have that, instead the panels are just normal body parts connected to a standard car frame underneath - like any other car.
They didn't go for looks though. The whole premise was ease of manufacturing. An interesting idea that soon proved to be invalid. But they pushed forwards anyway for some reason (and we all know that reason).
Meanwhile all other Tesla models look exactly the same. Doesn't help that people buy them like the other appliances in their lives, meaning that they're almost all white too.
Yet again I consider the disparities between the US market, as described by commentors, and the UK market. Cybertrucks never made it to road legality here, and would probably have required an HGV license (if the maximum manufacturer permitted vehicle+load weight is over 3500kg).
The US style pickup is pretty rare. There are some Ford Ranger/Raptors, which look comically large but are apparently smaller than the common F150 (??). People who need a truck bed get a Ford Transit or similar with the bed variant.
Agricultural use cases are handled with actual tractors (who can use the cheaper "red" diesel!)
The pickup in the US is a staple of the plumber, roofer and other tradesmen, and as you say; this use case as a tradesman’s tool is broadly filled by the panel van in Europe.
To some extent you even see this in New York too. Certainly there’s a need for these vehicles in rural areas where road conditions may be poor or absent altogether and the work needs done regardless.
The cybertruck on the other hand isn’t a work vehicle, it’s bought by the same people who buy the super kitted out models and who have no interest in using it for work, let alone taking the thing off road.
Ultimately I think of it as the modern Delorean, but I don’t think it will engender the same level of good will when it ages out and becomes less common due to the increasingly negative profile of Musk and his connections to the politics in which the vehicle was created.
EV trucks sound good but you can't haul anything heavy or your range plumments. Unless the battery is huge but that is weight. A truck that can't haul is just for show.
Even gasoline trucks are stupid no low end torque, you need to rev it. I had a 6 cylinder Cummins diesel and at 500rpm idle on a hill it could move the 10,000 pound truck up the hill.
I feel like this is less true nowadays. Or at least, less of a concern.
I have a Rivian and my 400mi range gets cut significantly (down to 200 or 300, depending on the trip) when I have 7k lbs on the back, but never enough to stop me from towing. And with good charging in the area, it's a non issue. And waaaaayyyyy cheaper than diesel.
Maybe if I was towing daily, I'd feel different. Your mileage may vary. (Couldn't resist the closer!)
Edit: btw instant torque is a game changer. You can't beat an EV on that front
I used to think this way, but it turns out that EV trucks hold up on range better than one would expect thanks to regenerative breaking. The added weight of cargo requires more energy to get up to speed, but you get most of that back when breaking, so it's not lost energy. Meanwhile, a gas or diesel truck's range plummets when hauling since all the energy used to accelerate the load is lost in breaking. I'm not saying that EV hauling is perfect or a solved problem, but that the trades offs aren't as intuitive as they might seem.
I borrow my brother’s truck all the time to transport various DIY supplies. I could probably get a roof rack for my car for things like plywood and drywall, but borrowing the truck is easier.
Some gas engines have low end torque, big block V8s and anything turbo. But yeah if hauling uphill is your thing diesel is a no brainer. It would be great if our half ton and midsize trucks had diesel options but as usual other countries have better options.
Personally I'm going hybrid truck next time. The advantages of electric (torque, 240V inverter) with the flexibility of gas. Payload is lower but I'm hoping they fix that by the time I need a new truck
I get so much joy from seeing these on the road. They are not to my taste, but it’s so nice to see something new on the road.
I still remember years ago seeing one in a grocery store parking lot, with a banana yellow wrap and the Zelda unlock sound as its lock chime. A brief moment of inconsequential joy.
Lastly, having the cyber truck drag race a Porsche 911, while towing a Porsche 911 (and win) has to be one of the best marketing stunts of all time.
A bad design that costs too much, the only people who bought these were ideologues committed to the vision of a man responsible for millions of unnecessary deaths, the gutting of the American state, and some of the most destructive politics of hate in living memory.
Some of us just got one because it’s a fantastic self driving electric family car. I have a family and live somewhere nice, life’s too short to get so wound up about politics. And you’ll still be seeing them on the roads for many years to come :)
I'm not an Elon fan in the least, but it does feel like most cars are designed by committee and converge on a few well-defined shapes and segments. And they sell a ton of them, so sure, of course.
But there's certainly some charm when you see a weirdmobile that doesn't conform and somehow got by the bean counters and into existence. The MINI Clubvan, for people who needed something compact and cargo-focused. The Cadillac CTS-V wagon, for people who wanted to haul ass ... and the family. The Toyota MR2, which felt like Toyota engineers decided "let's take these Corolla parts and build them in the shape of a Ferrari".
With the high costs of certifying a new car for sale it seems like we see fewer and fewer of these oddballs, and that feels like a shame.
So even though I'd never personally consider driving a poorly rendered dumpster from a 1980s video game, perhaps the world is a bit more interesting due to its existence.
I agree. I was personally getting really sad on how all design appeared to be converging on one 'allowed' shape without considering any other possible -- ah ha - angles. I posted on this before, but I will repeat it here, because it is relevant.
Those cars did have uses, but those uses revolved around drawing attention ( think advertising ). Whenever I saw one in my neck of the woods, they were selling something.
> Lastly, having the cyber truck drag race a Porsche 911, while towing a Porsche 911 (and win) has to be one of the best marketing stunts of all time.
I suppose, if you don't really like cars much, this was interesting. No one debates the ability for EVs to have absurd 0-60, 0-100 times, but there's almost no overlap between why you'd buy a Cybertruck versus a 911 besides status symbol, which gets back to... maybe it's neat, if you don't really care about cars much.
Agreed. Even if the design is polarizing, has quality issues, whatever about elon and politics, it is refreshing to see something different and distinctive on the road in a sea of blobby SUVs and extended cab trucks.
Kids really love these things and get very excited to see them on the road.
They are going to be very valued collectors items in 30 years once the kids of today have enough disposable income to buy whichever are left roadworthy by then.
Clearly this behavior is not original, but taught. Kids don't "boo" things out of nowhere. They are indifferent as hell to things on their own sure, but not a CB ...
Very clearly behavior introduced and encouraged by the parents, driven by politics, and not the merits of the object itself. Though it is an interesting commentary on the extreme, enforced conformity and politicization-of-everything we see in the world today.
Mostly I've seen younger kids love it. I was at the park and a little girl saw a Cybertruck pull up -- "Look, Dad, it's from the future!"
I think Cybertruck is probably ultimately a failure, but the amount of hate it gets when they are at least trying to push things outside of the normal makes me sad. The amount of negativity towards anything new that's not perfect is insane.
I’m an ultra lib, despise Elon, hope he faces a jury of peers to answer for all he has done, but this seems like learned behavior. My toddler son thinks they look really good (wife and I think they look atrocious and our anti-Elon bias doesn’t help).
>My kids, and any friends of theirs riding with us, will boo whenever they see them on the road
Because adults around them groomed them for those actions. Kids don't just start booing at objects out of the blue, they parrot the learned behavior of the adults around them.
My kids and their friends play a game where when you see certain cars, you do certain actions. Like "punch buggy" with VW bugs but with a bunch of different cars. Cybertruck is "cyberslap" and you get to slap someone when you see one.
I live in Dubai. There is no lack of super cars on the streets. The other day a cybertruck was parked outside my window and this group of teenagers spend a long time posing in front of it taking group pictures and individual pictures.
You don’t see that with a Ferrari or Rolls Royce.
It is definitely going to be a collectors items, if it isn’t already.
That’s not gonna pay the bills for Tesla, but I guess it’s something.
It certainly could, but likely very Ship of Theseus'd. I feel like enough of the parts are DRM'd hard by Tesla you'd need to Frankenstein the thing to do it.
Definitely not, not only is the De Lorean a cooler car (by far) it wouldn't even be a collectors item if it wasn't in one of the most popular movies ever made. The cybertruck has the exact opposite associations, instead of being in a cool movie it's the pet project of one of the most hated humans alive.
I mean the 4680 cells are used in the model Y and the pack assembly isn't that complicated. I don't expect it to be financially ruinous to replace over time.
I think if you were to compare the cybertruck with other things kids like, you'd see that it looks like a hot pile of garbage. There's nothing about it that would attract a kid, it looks like a refrigerator.
I think there's a lot of kids (and parents) being influenced by politics more than pure ascetics.
The classroom of kids Ive seen (my kids attend 3 different schools), all of them are amazed by them - age ranges: 3, 7, 9 all their classrooms loved them. Same with some of the older kids I've been around. They're all boys, I do imagine it's a very boy-friendly car.
I personally don't have a cyber truck, not big on it personally, but never put my own opinions into my kids. The kids may not "like it", but they are amazed by it.
I'm in an area that doesn't really hate Musk, so I think that does have an impact.
I've never met or known a person IRL who cares about Tesla's ownership. I know people who hate Teslas cause they drive in the carpool lane or because they had bad experiences owning one, that's about it.
This theory backs up my opinion that every rich person who drives an exotic car is just an eight year old who had a Lamborghini poster on their wall growing up
I own a exotic car for the same reason I own mechanical watches. I love the engineering and craftsmanship. (But yes, I had several Lamborghini posters growing up) ;-)
I suspect we’re going to discover a depressing future for today’s era of cars. 40 years from now will the Cybertruck software even let you turn it on? When will the last update have been? What servers does it communicate with that’ll end up long since decommissioned?
(FWIW my kids giggle at the Cybertruck and say it looks silly. In a sense they do love them but I’m not convinced they’ll long for one in years to come)
> Kids really love these things and get very excited to see them on the road.
Do you have anything empirical to back this up? This feels like someone kind of hoping something is true. It's like the Harley rider sure that everyone thinks they're super cool with their super loud bike.
politics aside, Cybertuck is/was an engineering breakthrough.
48 volts, steering wheel, no paint ( better durability), trunk, wipers etc.
the car pushed the boundaries. If you compare level of creative thinking of cybertruck vs lets say electric ford, it's not even comparable. I respect that despite one person behind it. I don't care how it looks. It's polarizing. oh well.
My 11 y.o. relative from abroad asked me to take rl pictures of the truck, after he heard my neighbor bought it.
I think Tesla did some cool things with it, but I think it's a little too early to label it as an engineering breakthrough. I'm not convinced some of the things they did and decisions they made (one large wiper, the stainless steel is susceptible to surface corrosion, various pinch points, weak control arms) will hold up over time
It's a hulking pile of shit built to be hostile to the people and things it shares an environment with. The middle fingers and thumbs downs people aim at them are fully deserved by the buyer and driver. They don't fit in parking spaces and are driven by people who think they're the main character of earth. I look forward to the day when the last one melts from a faulty battery fire.
And yet there were still durability issues with the truck? My understanding is that there were many manufacturing issues, and it also experienced several recalls.
Maybe through a very specific engineering perspective it was interesting. From a broader engineering perspective it was embarrassing. It is called a truck, very much not a truck. Nearly no actual utility. No hauling capability. No durability. Falls apart because it is glued together. Shows every place where someone brushed up against it. Poor fit to the operating environment.
I'll give you that it was a unique design. But if we're talking about engineering... it could not have promised more or delivered less.
Its made from hard steel, which is much harder to scratch and damage than ordinary car paint (or indeed ordinary car bodies, which are made of softer steel).
I think the main breakthrough was cost-engineering: glued on panels, cast-aluminum frame, "metal" accelerator pedal glued onto a plastic component. Which is ironic considering how expensive the thing was.
I blame Tesla and their "giant iPad" interiors for many of the cost-cutting trends we see in cars today.
I really thought it would have had a lot of potential for cheaper manufacturing. No paint process is huge. And originally they were talking about basically building it like origami from a sheet of steel.
The steel exoskeleton idea didn't survive to production. The production truck has a mix of aluminum castings and welded steel unibody, with the stainless panels just acting as the skin. Maybe they bring some structural rigidity, but not like the origami plan that was originally discussed.
The end result is a vehicle with all of the costs of a normal unibody design plus the costs of dealing with cutting, folding, and attaching thick sheets of stainless steel.
It never delivered the promised $40k starting price or the promised 500 mile top spec range either.
It’s staggering how much money they wasted because Musk didn’t want to listen to real experts. It was years late because stainless steel is so much harder to work with, especially when it has so many complicated geometries, and every one of those delays was a chance for him to say “maybe the people I hired for their expertise know something I don’t” rather than “I’m the boss, make it work”.
They could’ve done something like the Slate truck a decade earlier.
I mean once you buy the tooling, it’s still probably cheaper to produce stainless steel trucks than paint normal steel. I agree on everything else though
Painted piece of plastic gonna be cheaper than sheet of stainless steel. Stainless is significantly more expensive than typical materials used on car, which would be normal steel or plastic depending on panel.
Also painting IN THE FACTORY isn't expensive. Re-painting the part on repair is because of all of the prep work required (take apart, clean, color match etc).
Might be break-even, but I doubt it would be cheaper
"It will be cheaper" is a perspective of ignorant "smart guy" that thinks because he got successful in one thing that they can weight in on industry processes they have no idea about
They developed, at great cost, the process used for the cars with the giga press and the plastic. It would've been a fine process for an inexpensive truck.
Speaking out of my ass here, but I would not be surprised if it's much cheaper to paint cheap stamped steel, compared to using more expensive stainless steel that's treated to remove all surface marring/scarring from the stamping process. Those panels don't come out all brushed from the metal presses...
What happens if you scrape your fridge getting it into the kitchen?
You go to the DIY shop and buy a tin of white spray paint.
What happens if you scrape your brushed stainless fridge getting it into the kitchen?
Well, now you get to either live with it, or come up with some really clever ideas on polishing out the scratch and then sanding it back to disguise it with the rest of the surface which will never really look right.
The original design is what gave them millions of pre-orders, it was the reduction in range and increase in cost that made most people cancel those pre-orders.
A folded stainless exoskeleton without paint has the potential to make low volume car manufacturing much cheaper.
A press brake is generic and cheap. Molds for presses are cheap if the cost can be spread over many vehicles, but are expensive for low volume manufacturing.
Paint shops are similar. They're not expensive if you're running a lot of cars in the same color through it, but at low volumes with custom colors they are fabulously expensive.
Of course the final production Cybertruck didn't use the exoskeleton design so it was the worst of both worlds, but it does feel like the original design wasn't expected to sell well and was designed for low volume manufacturing.
Same. Initially I was optimistic about the Cybertruck because I though “flat metal panels and no paint is going to make both manufacturing and repairs so much easier and cheaper”.
Paint has been well studied. We know how to do it really cheap and automated these days. Cheap is relative. I'm sure that we're talking tens of millions of dollars to get all the equipment needed. But on a scale of factory and for how long it will last, that's cheap.
Flat metal is more expensive than curved metal. Curved metal, you design the curves to help support the stress points: you can get by with thinner sheets. Flat metal requires thicker heavier more expensive sheets of sheet metal in order to be strong enough.
Curved metal also lets you design the whole thing to be more aerodynamic. which is an important consideration even with something as un-aerodynamic as a truck.
They built that truck backwards and upside down. The single-piece forged aluminum frame was basically impossible to repair and brittle. Typical truck frames flex, they're part of the suspension. For small accidents, the frame can be bent back. The CT would just crack, requiring extensive aluminum welding to fix which is waay harder than welding a steel frame.
Either you have a modern expensive car and insurance which knows how to handle it properly, or it doesn't matter anymore and you got to a cheap car doctor.
There were no flat panels. That was a sales pitch. In reality, a slight curve to a panel adds so much strength that it can be made considerably lighter/cheaper than a flat panel of sufficient strength. Flat panels also tend to dent inwards very easily, which is not a good look for a car. Then there is the issue of thermal expansion. A pre-bent bit of metal will expand in a predictable way. A dead-flat panel could buckle in multiple unexpected ways.
I had a jeep wrangler once. The window was "flat" but not if you looked at its reflection. There was an almost imperceptible but complex curve, no doubt for strength.
how you repair steel panel and also make it look nice ?
...you don't. You replace it in whole. You can't use filler to mask small dents and paint over it, if you want it to look as before, you have to pretty much replace it.
That original process was what should have led to lower prices. Instead, they couldn't do it and had to resort to gluing steel panels onto a body-on-frame design which is much more expensive. They still managed to keep it just as hideous, so kudos there I guess.
I doubt that replacing painted regular steel with fancy stainless steel is going to be cheap. Paint is expensive, but so is stainless steel. I also can't imagine the "origami" technique to be cheaper than stamping, the reason they suggested that is because their fancy stainless steel can't be stamped. And in the end, Tesla couldn't even do it, so they glued the parts on...
I don't know any item where the unpainted stainless steel version is cheaper than the painted steel version, thinking about kitchen appliances for instance. For cars, the most famous car with a stainless steel body is the DeLorean DMC-12, which was notoriously expensive, even without the time circuits.
There's a pattern here: when an Elon Project is successful, he jumps in with Elon innovations, like cyber truck. The next example that will follow this pattern is building a rocket that's too big for orbital payloads, but takes 22 refueling flights to get beyond orbit.
> And originally they were talking about basically building it like origami from a sheet of steel.
It turns out that sitting in your office wearing an adult nappy and snorting cat sedative until your bladder no longer functions might give you a lot of quite "creative" thinking, but it doesn't make you an engineer.
At some point Elon has to climb out of the K-hole and realise that these things are better left to proper engineers.
The original wasn't what shipped. From what I read the cheaper easier process wasn't, which isn't unusual.
It's also an ugly-ass car. If it had turned out to be super-reliable and cheap and "hackable" that would make up for it, even earn its strange look a cult following, but no it just ended up as an overpriced weird ugly-ass car.
Why would Tesla make "cheap" ? That's not their customer base.
Cheap hackable electric work truck (I imagine chassis with basic cabin that you can expand in various ways, like the EU van options have like half a dozen chassis) would be great but it's not something Tesla ever wants to make
I know its not fashionable to have such pesky concerns as priority in US, but pedestrian safety was simply non-present, hence it was banned all over Europe. Not missing it here, not missing that fugly ego whim of a sick man at all.
I’ve been seeing complaints on the internet about how all cars look the same nowadays. I think the cybertruck proves why. A lot of design has coalesced around the same thing, not just for cars but for websites and apps, logos, furniture, etc. because people like that stuff.
Something new and fresh can be accepted and loved, but it still needs to be familiar and somewhat iterative. A radical change like the cybertruck is hated for that reason. (People also hate it because of Elon, but they don’t hate the other Teslas nearly as much as they hate the cybertruck)
When the Cybertruck was first announced, Musk was still the darling of the left and progressive wealthy. It was daring and different and cool, and it was explicitly meant to be an experiment in making cars differently.
By the time of its delayed release, Musk had become deeply unpopular with many of that original coalition of fans and buyers, the truck was more expensive than originally promised, his new ‘base’ probably couldn’t afford to buy many of them, and it was structurally a fairly normal car underneath the steel panels. It also suffered plenty of embarrassing issues, which people were of course gleeful to publicise.
It could have been a cool funky status symbol, but Musk screwed it all up.
> When the Cybertruck was first announced, Musk was still the darling of the left and progressive wealthy. It was daring and different and cool, and it was explicitly meant to be an experiment in making cars differently.
People still hated it when it was announced, the online discourse was largely negative surrounding it. I remember being in my tech office at the time and we were all talking about how bad it looked.
The Cybertruck announcement was a couple years after the Thai Rescue Divers "pedo" incident, which was the tipping point for many people (including on the left) to realize he wasn't actually the Tony Stark character he pretended to be and actually a pretty shitty person.
This was well into the Tesla flamethrower/short shorts/funding secured/etc period of $TSLA meme stockification. Also pushing Dogecoin/crypto.
He certainly wasn't the "darling of the left" by then. But you are correct that his image was significantly less tarnished by political meddling and later obsession with woke/trans/culture war of the day stuff.
He was the darling of the emerging meme stock day trader/gambler/WSB crowd which in broad strokes tends to anti-correlate with the "left".
Agreed. When it was first announced, I was kind of interested. I laughed at imagining it as a screenshot from an N64 game.
But it didn't live up to the selling points, it is very expensive, has design issues that weren't necessary for the aesthetic, and the company's owner turned out to be a really horrible person contributing meaningfully to changes in my country that are dangerous.
This is rewriting of history. It was ridiculed even by the reddit shitlibs that hung on to Papa Elon's every word. Breaking the glass twice was a meme.
One thing I think gets overlooked in cybertruck discourse that I didn’t appreciate until I saw one in person is that it’s really big. It FEELS really big. With all those hard edges, it also seems more imposing and aggressive.
It doesn’t give me the impression of “radical change.” It felt familiar and iterative of the modern, oversized F250-style pickup truck in all of the worst ways.
Cars look the same because they're trying to his specific mileage and safety standards. There are a few common shapes that can do that, and every angle you flatten into a curve gets you a couple more MPG.
Trucks don't look quite the same because they have different standards to adhere to.
Or maybe "I am not like other girls" is not a good personality to hang on. An exceptional athlete stands out. But so does the village drunk. Just being different is not enough.
The product failed because it was a shit product. In the grand scheme of unreliable American built cars, it was just another one. It was certainly not as bad as a Jeep. But it was ugly, and did not do what it was supposed to do; be a truck.
This is every top comment ITT, and I am checking user's post histories to confirm they are real. I understand I might be in the minority, but this belief that just being different is a merit unto itself is ridiculous.
There’s a school of thought that anything is better than blandly conformative design. In that school, the Cybertruck counts as progress.
To me, it’s more like answering a complaint about the blandness of pop music with electric bagpipes and nails on chalkboard: if you can’t be different and good, maybe don’t try so hard to be different.
I think a lot of the reason most cars look the same is they all have to pass similar pedestrian crash standards. Once you account for all of that, the basic shape of the vehicle is set and there is only so much unique styling you can attach.
People don't just hate it because it looks different. They hate it because it's ugly, unreliable, and a symbol of the modern idolatry of the billionaire class.
It's a massive, gaudy symbol of unfathomable decadence, and every purchase was made to visibly support the passion project of the world's most influential white supremacist.
It's one thing for a vehicle to be "ugly," but this one stands for so much more.
All other things aside, the worst part of the Cybertruck's design, to me, was its sloped truck bed walls (on the sides). Anyone who frequently uses their truck bed will know that getting access to stuff quickly and easily is key. And the Cybertruck's sloped walls go too high for anything in the very back of the bed to be reached. That just seems like such an unnecessary functional miss.
The whole part about the "sharp edged design" is quite misleading.
Yes sharp edges are an issue as they can very much make the difference between people getting killed in a car accident and them surviving.
But this wasn't even the biggest problem for selling it to the EU.
E.g. cars sold in the EU there are a bunch of standards for safety of pedestrians for slower speed impacts. The Cyber Truck is kinda not passing any (most?) of the standards. This also isn't just the Cybertruck in general US style trucks are more deadly (for pedestrians; especially for children) and the Cybertruck is just the cherry on the top.
Lastly even if it could be sold in the EU it is questionable if it would be profitable, given some of the quality issues surfaced, the likely small production/sells quantity (trucks aren't exactly beloved in large parts of the EU, neither needed and as an actual truck it doesn't do the best job as others have pointed out).
The good: someone trying a radically new design. Polarizing like the Fiat Multipla or Pontiac Aztek or even the first Chrysler minivan, but credit for trying.
The bad: didn't seem to be very good as a truck (eg build quality). That would not have been too bad, but it's dangerous when the design already alienates some buyers. Carmakers need time to get it right, and that needs sales.
The terrible: Elon torching his reputation in all sorts of ways and essentially insulting his past and future customer base. The politics, the bait and switch over features, etc etc. Eventually people tire of it.
It's tragic, because for better or worse Americans love their trucks, so the team that solves the electric transition is doing the world a huge favor.
While I will happily admit, the initial Multipla looks awful both inside and out to my sensibilities, I have to defend it vs the Cybertruck. Purely from the practicality standpoint, it was ingenious, having three seats front and back while being small, light and cheap solved a real need and I do still see quite a few, especially compared to other Fiats from that time, because of it. It also has what I feel is the most impactful facelift of any vehicle ever.
Had the Cybertruck brought forward the manufacturing innovations that were alleged to cause the weirdness in its design, I could draw the comparison with the Multipla, but as it stands, it has all the visual appeal of one, with none of the practical reasons for it. Having something ugly for good reasons, I can appreciate, function over form to the nth degree. Looking awful just for the sake of looking awful, not so much. Cybertruck is the car equivalent of intentionally bad Balenciaga releases (like the plastic bag), wherein even with taste being subjective and beauty in the eye of the beholder, there is a point where it just becomes as close to objectively ugly as is possible.
Can't comment on the Pontiac, have never seen one outside Breaking Bad.
Chinese vehicles are cheap because they're sold under cost. It can't continue to be that cheap and places with a car industry like Europe are crazy to allow them to be sold there.
Laws and regulations around car dealerships are deeply ingrained into state and federal politics. I don't think we will see Chinese or Mexican EVs anytime.
Why do you spend time thinking about outcomes that will never, ever be realized? There is bipartisan support for anti-China protectionism. There is not bipartisan support for paranoid FOSS neckbeard concerns about radios that have been built into most cars since Onstar.
I remember 15 years ago when liberals were absolutely furious at companies relying on Chinese "slave labor" for making shoes cheap and cutting into US wages.
I myself have no strong opinion on the issue, and think protectionism can often be quite bad, but it's weird how things have flipped. Presumably because of reactions to one man's views.
I have very little interest in electric vehicles, Tesla, Elon Musk, etc. But I still think the Cybertruck, at least the design, looks awesome. It looked like something you'd see in the "Another World" or "Out of this World" intro cinematic.
Both look extremely cool to me but Elon's behaviour is the only reason I'll never buy a tesla. Even though the cybertruck looks awesome but it's impossible for me to be seen in this. I wouldn't be surprised if they'd used a cybertruck in a BTTF remake
The cultural element is the difference. It's a suburban vehicle who wants to pretend it's a truck, exactly like the pompous suburbanite assholes who want to pretend they are rugged alpha types just because they drive a truck they don't really need: both would fall apart in a minute when faced with real problems.
The Countach was just the usual Lamborghini luxury scam, and I say that as someone who grew up a few km from the factory. Nobody cared if it was kinda crap inside, because it existed just to look like a cool car. A truck is supposed to, y'know, be a truck.
You don't see how an angled polygonal shape sold in 1974 might be more loved than the same angled polygonal shape sold in 2020?
You realize style evolves right?
That style was futuristic in the 70s. It is not futuristic anymore. A lot has happened since the 70s to change what the future should look like.
Ironically, I am finding myself thinking that all the supposedly "bland" electric cars nowadays finally look like cars from the future, simply by being normal car looking, with very slight and subtle styling accents.
Because that's what a future car looks like: Roughly the same aerodynamic profile but with electric motors. That's literally what everyone wanted in the first place, as was Elon's thesis for Tesla as more than a niche car company.
The Cybertruck aesthetic is stupid because it is literally a middle finger to what people want, as Elon himself noted.
I don't get why people are so stuck on "But it looks different" as a good thing.
It's a car. Why are you so stuck on needing your car to stand out? Why is it a problem for you if cars look the same?
Less than 50,000 of them ever built. And didn't SpaceX and the DoD (thanks, DOGE) buy about 2-3,000 of those between them? (I think SpaceX bought a thousand).
You might see "a lot of them" because they stand out and are "memorable".
It looks like something that would be fun and cool to drive around in a video game. I would never get a Tesla for unrelated reasons, and would especially not get a Cybertrunk because it's not fit for purpose, but I thought the hate for the aesthetics was overblown.
But then I saw it in-person, and it looks indescribably weird and bad, akin to the uncanny valley. The problem is that it's a real vehicle and not in a video game.
I kept thinking the design was going to grow on me as I saw more of them on the road, but nope. I still think it looks unbelievably ugly. I do not think it looks like something that you'd see in Another World, it looks more like something I would have designed when I was fourteen playing with Lightwave.
There's someone near me who has one with a white wrap over it.
I see it parked, and I thought:
"If Kenmore had the wherewithal to manufacture 4wd electric chest freezers...that's what they'd look like."
...but I'm not offended by it. I think that sort of whimsical craziness is all too often missing from modern durable goods, so I'm glad it got built.
I'm even happier that its existence upset mincing, peevish little eurotwee Conde-Nasty scribblequeefs like this Wired author. If it'd guarantee him leaping off of a tall pier, I'd pay MSRP for a Cybertruck.
I legitimately would have bought it if they made it look more like a regular pickup truck, and if Elon didn't go full crazy.
I did buy a Model-Y shortly before his Trump endorsement, and then sold it for technical reasons.
On a cold January morning, I was pulling up to a stop-sign, didn't have any autopilot turned on, and the car accelerated.
I think there is just too much software between gas pedal and the machinery of the car. They're honestly kind of dangerous vehicles. The average person can't handle the responsibility of a self-driving vehicle.
I told all of my friends and family that I would not recommend the vehicle yet to a non-technical person, even when I was myself driving it and loving it.
Setting your experience aside, my national transport agency in Denmark recently approved Tesla full self driving because the data confirmed that it’s safer than the average driver. I think it’s both true that these cars can fault, and that they’re safer on average than humans. To be clear, Denmark is not alone. Many European countries have approved it for the same reason, and many more are evaluating. Holland is the toughest to pass, and they passed.
"Safer than the average driver" is great if all the below-average drivers start buying Teslas. But if you're converting drivers on the other end of the spectrum then the roads become less safe overall.
Yeah same. It was too strange looking for me and Elon’s turn to the far right kind of ruined Tesla for me. I ended up getting a F-150 lightning instead and it’s been a great experience. Unfortunately they stopped making those too.
> I think there is just too much software between gas pedal and the machinery of the car.
There's a shit ton of software between the gas pedal and the machinery of just about every car on the road today whether that be an ICE, hybrid, or EV. We're a long ways away from the go-go pedal directly pulling a cable opening the throttle plate.
Electric trucks in general seem terrible. You only see Rivians and Cybertrucks in urban settings, the electric F150 was discontinued. Anybody who knows how people that actually need trucks use trucks saw this coming, I never once saw a cybertruck used as a truck.
I always got the impression that the vast majority of the F150s are never used as trucks either. Americans just like really really big cars because fuel is cheap there and none of the cities are old enough that big cars are impractical.
Obviously it doesn't affect the electric vehicles but light trucks being excluded from CAFE def did a lot to acculturate americans to always buying a big car
No, the F150 has great sales numbers but this is mostly due to commercial/work use. And commercial buyers need trucks that can tow, haul, be fitted with large toolboxes, booms/cranes, winches, plows, etc. The F150 electric solved none of those problems.
> Anybody who knows how people that actually need trucks use trucks saw this coming
I'm a current truck driver and very excited to swap out my ICE truck for a Slate next year. I need something that can haul my trash to the dump, grab a load of wood chips for the garden, and bring home the occasional sheet good from the home store.
I agree with your assessment as it applies to the Cybertruck or F150, but not the idea of an electric truck. Some people buy trucks because they need a light-duty hauling solution; unfortunately, the market seems to only want to sell luxury SUVs that happen to have truck beds.
cough small dump trailer (<3000 GVWR). Can be pulled by a light SUV. No shoveling those wood chips. Depending on where the trash is going, no having to lift that a second time either. I've carried 25 sheets of 3/4 ply in mine (and unloaded them by myself, as the tilting bed meant I could tilt up a bit and easily slide them off)
Most people driving trucks in the US don't use them as trucks, especially in cities. I think most people willing to take on a $1000/mo truck payment for their personal vehicle in the current economic climate are doing so for social reasons anyway. Whether the electric trucks on offer at the same price can compete on that front is a much more slippery question.
If we can get some affordable electric trucks in the US, it will be very interesting to see how the more rational segments of the market react once they are no longer priced out.
I've only ever heard positive things from every electric truck owner I know and this is coming from a market that's very truck-forward in terms of culture.
Unlike electric cars, the price for a used F-150 lightning is still a substantial fraction of new price. There is still substantial demand.
Work trucks are a very different market than for passenger vehicles. Their usage is a lot more consistent and known. This means that electric works very well for some work trucks and very poorly for others.
The other aspect of work trucks is that they're generally purchased by very conservative businesses who don't want to buy the bleeding edge, they want several years of reliability data before committing. The F-150 Lightning was cancelled just as that data was starting to come in.
Of course, most F-150's are sold as passenger vehicles rather than work trucks. Along with almost all Cybertrucks.
1. People who need them for work.
2. People who need to carry bulky loads
3. People who need to tow.
4. People who buy them for some form of self-expression.
The only real use case for electric trucks, imho, is construction site supervisors who do most around-town driving but may occasionally need to haul stuff. Their towing range is absolutely abysmal (F150 Lightning range dropped to about 90 miles when towing a moderate trailer!).
I see electric Silverados and Hummers (not a truck, but effectively the same vehicle as the electric Silverado) all the time, usually pulling landscaping utility trailers (flatbeds with huge commercial lawnmowers, etc.). I have no idea if this is economic or not (they definitely aren't cheap) but I've heard electric towing can't be beat for responsiveness, torque, etc.
It's pretty economical. Towing about halves your range. So you're still paying quite a low gallons/mile equivalent. However, that decreased range is a killer. So it makes sense why you'd see them doing lighter duty local work like landscaping.
An acquaintance saved thousands of dollars (over ten thousand, easily) by using his Cybertruck while building a cabin up in the mountains. All those trips to the hardware store and picking up random building materials add up very quickly when you are going up and down the mountain for materials and the big box hardware store is two hours away.
Truck brained people are notoriously stubborn. If it isn’t like daddy’s old truck they simply can’t see past it
I live in the PNW and you see people not using their trucks as trucks every single time you go out on the road. This includes urban areas.
I’ve owned an F150 and an R1T and for camping, overlanding, snow trips, etc the Rivian is hands down the most capable vehicle I have ever driven. You couldn’t pay me to go back to a Ford
We recently had a guy drive 146 miles out of the cascades, to Oregon City, to get a replacement radiator for a Jeep after a trailside wreck. We don't know how to fix a Rivian when it breaks down, or where to get parts.
People who are towing a lot may like the idea of electric. However they need range, and EVs when towing don't deliver. It is too bad, I'd like a electric truck, but when I tow I'm trying to get someplace and EVs don't deliver.
It doesn't help that nearly all chargers are arranged such that I'd block important parts of the parking lot for half an hour if I was towing when I needed a charge, then I have a complex back out (where something is behind me that I need to avoid). Most gas stations are designed so my trailer might block a pump from someone else using it but otherwise I'm not in the way.
Truly terrible for pedestrians. Modern trucks are already death traps with their super high front grills, multiplying the weight compounds the problem.
Vehicle mass is a significant factor in collisions between vehicles because taking two thirds of the impact is a meaningful increase over taking half of it. Heavier vehicles are much more dangerous to lighter vehicles.
It's basically irrelevant in pedestrian collisions because the pedestrian is already taking ~95% of the impact even from a lighter car and the <5% difference between that and an arbitrarily heavier vehicle is completely dwarfed by any of the other variables like the speed of the collision. For a pedestrian it's better to get hit by a freight train at 35 MPH than a 3000 pound vehicle at 39 MPH.
You think cutting the weight of the truck is going to make it safer for pedestrians?
This is the silliest argument against the Cybertruck, IMO. Its forward visibility is significantly better than other full-sized trucks, yet people continue to bring up pedestrian safety every time the Cybertruck is mentioned.
F150 Lightning was ruined by the dealership network who had 0 interest or financial incentive to sell them. When they did sell them, they added huge markups.
The quality of the vehicle is actually quite high.
I wonder how much of this is due to politics. I always thought it wouldn't matter much to most people but earlier this year I tried to convince my wife to get a model Y for the family and there was no convincing her. The interesting thing is she doesn't even care about politics but just didn't want to buy a car that is associated to any political view. I guess that happens when you take such a hard stance, you alienate one entire side and the people in the middle that wanna stay out of it.
They wanted Cybertruck for the exoskeleton, made giga casting instead and then proceeded to never make the cheaper versions, hence never reached units of scale as well as a bigger market. I do believe they could have avoided this but instead stayed in the luxury market.
I noticed that the cyberpunk wedge cars that inspired it are 2 seaters… maybe this shape isn't right for much larger cars?
DeLorean is the real life 80s reference of course, but in cyberpunk revival media like the coupe in Ghost in the Shell 2017, the spinner in Blade Runner 2049—those cars are all much smaller cabins than the cybertruck
The dimensions felt off to me. I had it as a loaner and enjoyed it a bit, especially since it had HW4. But I would never buy one.
The size is just too impractical. It would never fit in my garage. On top of that, the standby drain was significant. Just sitting idle, it would lose 10 to 20 miles of range.
I would have liked a 3-row SUV based on the Cybertruck; but the Cybertruck was just too expensive to be competitive. At least the Model Y's price dropped (right after I bought one) to something more reasonable.
What's most frustrating is that I had to trade in my Model 3 for a 3-row SUV, and Tesla just didn't have anything competitive in that segment.
You could run much of this discussion about the hummer. Not all of course, because a bunch of half and mis truths about EV are being floated.
90% of this is "I liked it" or "I didn't like it"
The rest is "it didn't suit this use case so it's useless"
Fwiw I thought it was stupid, but it doesn't define what an EV truck can do, or their utility. I've no problem if people poke fun at them. I've no problem if people like them.
Why would they focus on "cybercab" over this. Everything that makes the cybercab cool will never be legal in a consumer product. Cybertruck is definitely more useful to an average person.
An average person has no use for a truck that costs more than twice what an average person makes in a year and half or more what an average person spends on an average house
the economics of Tesla , a company with lots of capital, renting out their fleet make more sense in a market of consumers with little disposable income.
I liked the styling. Thought about getting one. Got a chance to get in one the other day. and it was so uncomfortable. felt like sitting on a park bench. I thought this was supposed to be not a real pickup. Rather a suburban big old thing with blade runner styling and reviews said lots of comfort. No, just a big old vehicle, that's not even that roomy on the inside (hip room felt like that of my old integra), with the comfort of an 80's pick up. not much of a point to it.
I don't like the design but don't hate it either. At least the jaggedness is for a functional reason. There are uglier cars, about 10 of which are from Kia and Hyundai.
There's nothing wrong with an interesting design. It's not a serious market however. The Cybertruck was a pet project forced onto the market by an out of control CEO (there's a large disconnect between Musk and the consequences of his actions). Tesla requires very high volume selling vehicles to prop up its comical market cap. The entire company is resting on one car model. They desperately need another highly successful model, the Cybertruck could never be that.
Frankly Tesla is dumb lucky the Europeans and Japanese have botched the EV market so badly overall. Tesla shouldn't even exist at this point with how trivial their lineup is.
Fun fact from Denmark: you could never buy one here anyway. It never got EU type approval, mostly due to pedestrian safety rules (sharp edges, rigid steel body). Curious whether that limited market was part of why volumes stayed low.
I think what also contributed to the commercial failure is that it actually looked great at the early prototype stage, but the production car turned out to be uglier. Most people don't notice this, but they feel it subconsciously.
Go find early pre-production Cybertruck photos and compare with the actual prod car. It became subtly bulkier, uglier, less streamlined, and IRL it looks even worse than on the photos. Probably they had to do this due to production difficulties or to meet some standards, or to cut costs, whatever. But it was a mistake.
I had a pre-order. The reason I canceled was because the delivered product had a lot less range and was much more expensive than previously announced.
There were other things that contributed to the decision, too: the announced "stressed skin" exoskeleton was panned in favor of adhering the body panels to the body with glue, it became clear that Tesla's profit and valuation were funding Elon's right-wing political project, and I would have preferred a solid-axle design.
The absurdity was not what was wrong with it. It's OK to be absurd. I really liked the stainless steel design. Less trail damage when off-roading and no need to worry about paint scratches causing body rust. The door wedge design? Meh. But it enabled the stainless steel body.
In the end, I want what the Cybertruck failed to deliver: a full-size electric pickup at a good price with excellent range. I currently have my eyes on the RAM REV. We'll see if that one gets axed, too.
Disabling Javacsript lets you read the article already. There's no need to visit archive.today, where you participate in executing DDOS attacks against anyone who criticizes the site's creator.
I live in SF (and sometimes NYC), so those are the only places I've really seen them. They're enormous, and incredibly unwieldy in an urban environment.
I think they'll be a hard sell in rural areas, too... where the Cybertruck isn't really competitive with traditional pickups for the actual things they're used for.
It's cool, though. Even if you don't like the look, there's something whimsical about seeing a vehicle that doesn't look like every other car on the road. I just don't think there's a big enough market for it.
Truly one of the most baffling stories in recent automotive history. All they had to do was make a normal pickup truck with Tesla tech. Hell, go ahead and use it as the testbed for 48V, steer-by-wire and whatever else if you want to - but the amount of time and money wasted to make what was in the end an absolute monstrosity that failed to deliver on any of its price, performance and range promises strains credulity. Cybertruck is the most visible inflection point marking Elon's descent into madness.
They look quite silly but I really love it when a car manufacturer takes a chance and does something out of the ordinary. In a few years these are going to be really popular at car shows.
They can cancel it, but it will always symbolize the time period and culture associated with its creator, that probably just ended. I bet future generations will use its image that way.
Hopefully they make some sort of "Signature Edition" version as a last hurrah.
The upsides were the steer by wire which once you drive it feels amazing and an exterior surface unlike painted vehicles you can choose to neglect and it doesn't matter.
The major downside was the price. I feel if they could have gotten it in the mid/low 40K range for an entry model it would have sold more units.
I still hold that if they made a cyber van with steer by wire and an exterior surface, it would have sold like hot cakes. An electric van with long range, tight turning radius, and durable kid resistant body panels? Yes please.
I suspect the semi truck will be next on the chopping block. Tesla being merged into Spacex would have resulted in the shutting down of the car business and a focus on robots. I doubt that robots will be a money maker, it's only useful on mars because people can't live there.
I'm not a fan, but I was hopeful that the direct sales model would drive others to confront the dealership tax. Ford floated the idea with the Lightning, but faced a mutiny.
I am the exact target audience of their new Fathom, but I abandoned my preorder sign up process when I saw the phrase "dealerships set the final price".
I think the cybertruck appeals to a very narrow market. It's too expensive for most people who just want a big vehicle to get groceries and run kids to around, and doesn't really have any qualities that make it useful for commercial use, outside of being a rolling billboard. Unless it just really appeals to you and you have cash to burn, I don't know why you'd buy a cybertruck over a Ram/Ford/GM. A RAM 1500 w/ etorque costs half a cyber truck and gets decent fuel mileage... If you need a work truck a RAM 3500 is cheaper and will reliably haul 30-40k loads 12 hours a day and the warranty isn't void the second your tires touch dirt.
I think the Fathom will outsell the Slate 10 to 1 despite costing more, because U.S. buyers have adapted to "luxury" in every trim level of vehicle. I mean, yes base level Corollas still sell quite well (but these days even those have features you dreamt about in a luxury sedan not too many decades ago.)
The Slate represents an ideology that combines the nostalgia of what trucks used to be (especially the Ford Ranger) with a modern EV powertrain, but most people don't actually want the stripped down basic vehicle, even if their eyes light up over the idea.
I have a slate preorder but it's a niche vehicle. It's a small 2 door 2wd pickup that can't meaningfully tow and has a 200 mi range.
It's not going to appeal to people who want a truck as a symptom of fragile insecurities around their masculinity and that's a biiiig part of the US truck market
Look at the F150 lightening to see the failure of electric trucks. Chevy, Dodge and Ford all have, and it shows. Chevy's electric Silverado has a lot more range because more people want a truck for towing than the 1% that hacker news claims, and so range became and issue. Ford and Dodge are instead looking at plug in hybrids for the future: use an engine when towing, and battery for acceleration and shorter trips.
Trucks are a status symbol in the USA. EVs were becoming acceptable in the mainstram, hence the initial surge in sales, but that has cooled off since 2024. Now very few outside of the big tech cities are spending money on EVs. Hence the fate of the electric F-150 as well.
I have very mixed feelings about the Cybertruck. Personally I absolutely hate it, it's just not my cup of tea and I would never in a million years buy one. However as a general lover of cars, I have to appreciate just how striking the design is and how it was a complete departure from pretty much any other car on the road.
There's nothing quite like the Cybertruck and I don't think there ever will be again.
Largely agree with your mixed feelings. When the Cybertruck was revealed, I thought it was atrociously ugly, but I appreciated something radically different in a market of converging (and IMO boring) styles. I could see the style being more successfully applied as a Cybercar / Cybercoupe.
Brings me to a point I'd like to make: it boggled my mind that Tesla decided to execute the 'Cyber' aesthetic via a pickup truck, particularly after the US auto industry ramped up marketing the pickup truck's familiar shape as a cultural facet during/after the Great Recession and the fuel economy regulation changes.
Tesla could've capitalized on the billions Ford, Chevy, Dodge, and others spent in the 2010s marketing pickup trucks as God's gift to humanity, but instead decided -that- was the best market to try a complete novelty in. It makes no rational sense -- I've heard it ultimately came down to Musk stubbornly wanting the Cybertruck, but I don't know if that's factual.
I love my Cybertruck. It's absolutely amazing for road trips with my dog. I watch movies and work on my projects (using a voice app I built) while FSD drives. It's basically a mobile apartment for me. I sleep comfortably in the truck bed when needed. I installed MOLLE panels on the L-tracks in the bed and 3D printed various accessories.
Sad to see it go but glad I got mine. Oh and kids love it. My Sentry mode clips are full of kids asking their parents to take pics with it.
Winding down production of this abomination isn't enough. The ones already on the road should be rounded up, crushed, and recycled. This is urban blight on wheels. Citizens have a right to streets free of these eyesores.
Musk was a fool to mistake the hollering of a small group of enthusiasts for that of the truck-buying U.S. population. Nobody was actually wanting for the CyberTruck. He should've listened to his marketing people and not be guided by social media and his right-wing instinct.
Then again, he's a con-man who's now quietly distancing himself from CyberTruck ("I had nothing to do with it") and moving on to the next con-trick: the CyberCab.
Well, if you're dreaming, instead of a cyber truck at 40K, wouldn't you want instead a Chauffeured Rolls-Royce and the Swedish bikini team to keep it maintained?
Based on the lie about how much it would cost, how many they could produce, and how soon they would be delivered...
Even very ugly cars will sell if they give you a really good deal for the money. The Cybertruck at $39,999 was a shockingly good deal. It was just a lie.
Worth clicking. Ton of people who actually want the cybertruck to continue. I can't believe there are still people who still didn't realize what colossal idiot Musk is.
Sad, but reminds me of the Model S line teardown in making space. CB truly was ahead its time in how it pushed Tesla's tech, and will always be futuristic. Still, I can't help but to feel like it died too early. Its spirit lives on in the Roadster, and I sure hope this won't be the last "truly exceptional" Tesla among their "quality sleeper" EV's.
No other car is as awe-striking to see on the streets, especially in the EU. This will be the Mustang Fastback or Testarossa of the 2040's ...
I mean as much as I love thd idea of actually doing something bonkers, the lack of sales seemed inevitable to most I assume, so that should come as no surprise. Should have stayed a concept car.
I wouldn’t be surprised if cost were the only reason its sales weren’t even lower. If it’s expensive it’s at least a plausible status symbol. At a reasonable price it’s just an incompetently designed utility vehicle.
Behold the Toyota Hilux [1], a truck so reliable that it is the truck of choice in many developed nations and even less developed ones. It's so cheap and reliable it became the platform for a war [2]. It also has a truck bed equivalent to a Ford F150, a vehicle significantly larger. But you can't buy a new Hilux or equivalent in the US because cars younger than 25 years cannot legally be imported [3] (to stop grey imports on Mercedes in the 1980s, originally) and because of CAFE standards [4].
Electric vehicles obviously don't have the hurdle of meeting emissions standards so Tesla, or any other company really, had (and has) the opportunity to create a small, cheap, mass market utility truck that no gas-powered vehicle can compete with. This is what the Cybertruck should've been.
There have been breakdowns of the Cybertruck and it is such an incredibly bad design. Things like the weight of stainless steel panels but with an aluminum frame. Why is that a problem? Because aluminum is prone to catastrophic failure with the up and down motion of towing a heavy load than stainless steel simply isn't [5].
The rumor has been that the only thing propping up Cybertruck demand is Elon forcing his own companies like SpaceX to buy them [6]. Other than that, the Cybertruck became a weird political statement [7]. Those people are getting crucified on resale. It's even a trend on Tiktok and elsewhere to watch these trade in videos. People who paid $150k+ are getting <$70k less than 2 years later.
Anyway, I'm shocked no US manufacturer is tackling the EV small utility truck market. Yes there was the F150 Lightning but it's still too big (and thus expensive).
Oh man, I was wondering if anyone was gonna bring up Slate.
I try not to get excited about stuff, but the idea of The Next Big Thing in Cars being a total lack of garbage nonsense screens and giving us back CRANK CRANK WINDOWS -- this is pure joy.
Wheels. Seats. Motor[1]. Box to keep rain off. Done.
Oh you attached a bed to that? Double awesome.
[1] Enough top end cruise speed for American interstates.
The Tacoma is more like the modern Hilux. I should've been more specific. The 1980s and 1990s Hilux weighed in at 1000-1200kg. Now it's 1700-2100kg. It's a lot bigger truck. Those 1980s and 1990s trucks were indestructible and so easy to service.
Now I get why the gas powered Hilux has changed. Emissions standards have changed. Fuel efficiency is more important. Modern cars are full of computers and microcontrollers. But an EV is relatively simple. It's one of the big advantages. Yes you have an OS and it's not just turning the ignition but the drive system itself is fairly simple, the thing that turns battery power into movement (compared to ICEs). No moving parts (in the engine), basically.
You could absolutely make a small EV utility truck. Remember that part of the reason why people were excited about the Cybertruck when it was announced was the price point (~$35k). Of course it turned out to be 3 times that.
Look at what BYD is doing [1]. Now these are PHEVs rather than pure EVs. Other automakers are making smaller pure EV trucks.
> A Tacoma is basically the US model of the Hilux.
This is a very common misconception Americans believe about the hilux. I’ve owned multiple generations of both on different continents.
The Tacoma is much heavier, but has a much lower payload rating. It has way less torque, and gets much worse fuel economy. The Tacoma only comes with a regular bed- no cab chassis, no tray back, etc.
The Tacoma is much more expensive. The Tacoma only exists in two countries. The hilux is one of only a few truly global vehicles.
One is a genuine work utility vehicle, one is a lifestyle vehicle.
They have never shared a frame, engine, transmission, axles or body panels.
As a Tesla owner and fan, their 5 year consumer strategy is unclear. Their 3 upscale / luxury products have been canceled, and there's no clear "growth" roadmap for their existing owners. And although they have exceptional technology, innovation for the Tesla badge has stalled.
I can tell they are likely investing all of their production capacity into Cybercabs, in order to tap into a growing rental market (mostly short term, possibly some long term), and adjust to shrinking vehicle ownership.
But as someone who enjoys driving, car ownership, road trips, spontaneity -- I don't have a clear picture of what my next Tesla purchase would be in 5 years.
The Cybertruck wasn't really designed as a volume item, it was designed as the testbed for Tesla's next gen tech (ethernet-based fieldbus, 48V tech). You can do only so much in the lab, and sometimes you have to push your tech into production to find the last few% of failures, which will cost you dearly if you actually put them into your volume sellers.
I mean it's probably not that comforting for owners to unknowingly have signed up for a beta test, but that was the plan for Tesla for a while with the Cybertruck.
This was also the reason for sloppy stuff like steel panels glued to the aluminium frame, and not following up on their initial promises - the car morphed from a serious project into a low volume testbed sometime during its production.
Tesla seems to be killing its non volume cars the S and X are dead as well, I've heard rumors the Model 3 might be on its way out.
I love that they took a swing for the fences. Car makers are so fucking safe these days. Sadly it didn’t land, but it’s awesome that it exists. I think if it had used a more conventional design it would have done so much better. Owners report an incredible driving experience. I also think battery technology held it back. It was originally advertised as having much better towing range, and production came in very underwhelming. This made it much less appealing as a utility vehicle. It ended up being used for picking up groceries and this wasn’t broad enough a market.
Not every swing is a home run. You can win with a few home runs or a lot of singles.
The only guaranteed way to lose is if you stop swinging. And Tesla has stopped swinging. They haven't revealed a mass market consumer vehicle since 2019.
There is some incredible technology in the Cybercab that allows them to be built cheaply in high volume. Instead Ford looks like they are going to be the first Western consumer vehicle out of the gate with the unboxed production method with their Ford Fathom. Unsurprisingly, the Chinese are ahead here too.
Hasn’t Musk been clear that he’s abandoning traditional passenger vehicles? He’s retooling for Cybercab and Optimus. Model Y and 3 are selling too well to abandon but there won’t be new models. We’d be lucky for refreshes.
Agreed, I love to see long shots even if they don't land, and in this case the price/performance fundamentals were likely the biggest problem. The "limited TAM for a bold stand-out design" was probably another, but Elon also didn't do any favors by vigorously adopting the opposite politics of his customers at the same time he was trying to launch a bold/iconic design.
I disagree. Teslas used to be nice designs and pleasant to see on the street. Cybertruck and Cybercab designs are an affront. Intentionally ugly. I’m glad we don’t see a lot of trucks on the street, and I despair at the thought of millions of Cybercabs about.
The 3/Y and the screens had lots of design and product innovations. Iterating on those lines would’ve been quite nice.
The DeLorean wasn't taken seriously when Back to the Future was released either... it looks like a cool car now, mostly because of the movie, but back then it was considered a joke of a car and the company went bankrupt less than two years after it began production.
no one here will say it because the Musk glazing is crazy, but it was always his own little pet project, he really pushed for it and now it's obvious that it's stupid and a failure and he was wrong for entertaining this idea
Truly the peak of 2020s antisocial car design. The car looks designed to plow through other vehicles, barriers, and pedestrians without slowing down to count the bodies. "Bulletproof bodypanels" is only a selling point on a mass production car if you routinely piss people off enough to make them grab iron. Folks who need pickup trucks for the utility they provide have stuck with trucks that are actually fit for purpose. It was a way to signal to the world that you had extremely poor judgement and low standards.
There are plenty of people who drive pickups because they like them, not because they fulfil a utilitarian purpose, and not all of them are assholes.
I would say the issue is more that there has been little to no progress in mainstream consumer car aesthetics in the past 25 years. It used to be that you could clearly tell a 50s car from a 60s car from a 70s car from an 80s car, etc. Everything from the past 25 years or so is pretty indistinguishable, so something comes along with a clear but possibly misguided aesthetic vision, its naturally going to appeal to some people.
modern cars are literally designed to deform on impact to keep the passengers safe. they're called "crumple zones" and they exist to dissipate kinetic energy to keep everybody involved safer. adding "more rigidity" isn't serving any meaningful purpose.
The Musk strategy is to quietly drop failures/broken promises from a previous hype cycle after kicking off a brand new hype cycle to take its place.
This is entirely consistent with his tried and true strategy to constantly redirect attention forward to the distant future, and never stay idle long enough to encourage looking back at the ever growing pile of ideas that didn't work out.
It's called Supervised Full Self Driving (FSD) and that is an accurate name given it controls every aspect of the vehicle's operation, only requiring the driver to pay attention as a supervisor. And, essentially, the same software and hardware available on a Model 3 and Model Y is present on the CyberCabs that are driving people around a few cities, now, without input mechanisms. Elon is a PoS, and it took a decade longer than he said, but the cars are driving themselves.
This isn’t news to anyone following the business. I’m pretty sure it was announced months ago that model X and Cybertruck (and maybe Model S too) were being discontinued.
And Model 3 and Y have always been 95%+ of the cars Tesla delivered.
Just to be clear, the earliest possible date for no further increase in temperature under the most optimistic IPCC scenarios is 2050. Actual decline to pre industrial levels at best around 2100.
I'm convinced that Elon made it just because he thought it would be funny. "Let's make a truck that looks like it came out of a 90s low-polygon video game! That'll be hilarious!" He never cared for one moment if it was actually a good product.
The poor people that bought them were the butt of his joke.
The first Tesla was based on a Lotus Elise. It was stunningly good looking. It changed people's minds that an electric car had to look like a glorified golf cart.
Later cars from Tesla looked more generic but still like looked like regular cars.
The cybertruck seems like a throwback to the old electric cars that looked like something out of nerd's sketchbook.
Tesla's forgotten how to make actual products people want to buy thanks to its meme stock status, government handouts, state & federal tax and carbon credits, not to mention the absurdly high tariffs on foreign competitors. It has received zero actual feedback from the market so the new products are based on ketamine high visions rather than market needs.
It'll probably be folded into SpaceX by the time the feedback arrives.
Tesla's forgotten how to make actual products people want to buy thanks to its meme stock status, government handouts, state & federal tax and carbon credits, not to mention the absurdly high tariffs on foreign competitors.
It has received zero actual feedback from the market so the new products are based on ketamine high visions rather than market needs.
It'll probably be folded into SpaceX by the time the feedback arrives.
> The issue stems from the brake rotors, and the report says more severe road conditions "may strain" the stud holes in the wheel rotor, causing cracks to form. If the cracks persist and worsen, it may result in the wheel detaching entirely.
> In a recent off-road escapade at the King of the Hammers event in Johnson Valley, California, a Tesla Cybertruck experienced a mechanical failure resulting in one of its wheels snapping off. The incident, captured over the weekend, has raised eyebrows about the durability of Tesla's much-touted electric truck.
I can't remember the specific video, but I recall seeing someone breakdown some of the poor materials/engineering choices for "truck" use cases and of the mass of the CT.
That article seems to be fairly flattering of the technical tricks tesla used to make the demo roadster flip? Your claim about "paying his mortgage ... critiquing everything Elon does" is certainly not backed up by this citation. Dude clearly doesn't like the cybertruck, but to a first approximation, that pretty much describes everyone.
As someone who described himself in an earlier post as a "Big Elon fan boy", perhaps the source of bias here lies in a location other than the author of the WIRED article.
So the big plan here is to just keep making Model 3 and Model Y?
I'm guessing the Model 3 will be next on the chopping block.
FSD is a serious moat. I'll give Tesla that. But they've really decided to stop being a car company. Maybe they're just scared of Chinese brands.
I think Musk has some specific things he'd like to do in the next 10 years and running a car company isn't something he cares about. So he's willing to destroy the company and the hard work of thousands of engineers, to build stupid robots, stupid cyber cabs, and phenomenal electric trucks in stupid angular wrapping.
I have no idea what the Tesla board is smoking, because Musk does not care about money, the company, its customers, or its employees.
in the past ten years:
60,000 cybertrucks?
350,000 model X
200,000 model S
0 roadsters
0 cybercabs (stupid)
a ton of model Y, which is why nobody wants one but are forced to buy it anyway because of FSD.
it's amazing how one guy gets to destroy an iconic car company and absolutely nobody in the organization pushes back.
The Cybertruck should tell you how stupid Elon really is. Its a coffin on wheels, and rightfully banned in the entire EU. His next stunt was to make a flying car, thats basically vaporware, and, also banned literally everywhere.
>The US EV maker only began delivering the Cybertruck to customers in late 2023. According to Kelley Blue Book, the company only sold 20,237 Cybertrucks in the US last year, down 48% from 38,965 in 2024. Before the pickup truck launched, Musk had predicted annual sales of 250,000 units.
I can assure you there are much uglier vehicles out there. I once stopped at a stoplight and there was this car ahead of me, I don't know which make or model but when I saw it I just laughed out so loud. I think it was Korean or Japanese, but I'm not sure.
You rarely see them, probably because they're so dog-ugly that hardly anyone buys them.
side-topic: why trucks are so popular (especially USA)? Is it all in the fake testosterone virtue signalling and pretending to be hard working country people?
To me trucks are the most useless type of vehicle apart from niche utilitarian cases in farming or construction. Super heavy, gas guzzling, open bed, compromised handling, pedestrian crushing death machine.
If you want big family hauler, grocery getter: mini-vans, wagons.
If you are in trades: van, box truck or flatbed box truck (where bed is useful shape and size, and all sides can be removed if needed).
No, you don't need 3 tonne vehicle with bajillion horsepower as a daily, because you may need to pull a trailer with your inflatable dinghy once in a two years.
If you want truck adjacent vehicle, get Toyota 4runner or Highlander. Humongous cars, vast and closed cargo space. It will pull a trailer, it will haul all your stuff and family.
Because vehicles are a compromise. A truck can do everything a sedan can. A sedan cannot do everything a truck can. A flatbed truck can do more than a smaller truck - but it also is bigger and not easy to drive because of the size. The costs to own extra vehicles is very high and so people won't own different a vehicle for each use (renting is not a good answer - too often I've gone to rent something and it was sold out. Also most rentals have restrictions on use)
> To me trucks are the most useless type of vehicle apart from niche utilitarian cases in farming or construction. Super heavy, gas guzzling, open bed, compromised handling, pedestrian crushing death machine. If you want big family hauler, grocery getter: mini-vans, wagons.
Minivans and trucks get similar fuel mileage. For the average family there are not enough kids to need a minivan.
> If you are in trades: van, box truck or flatbed box truck (where bed is useful shape and size, and all sides can be removed if needed).
Obviously you are not in the trades and don't know anyone in them. I've heard plenty of people in the trades debate the merits of truck vs van. They are compromises and there is no clear winner.
> you don't need 3 tonne vehicle with bajillion horsepower as a daily, because you may need to pull a trailer with your inflatable dinghy once in a two years.
If I need to tow something even once every two years then I need to own a truck. I've tried to rent a truck to tow something - turns out most rental contracts don't allow towing. There are exceptions, but the cost is so high, and finding a place to rent is so inconvenient that I will just own my own truck instead - it is worth it.
I wasn't pro truck until I lived on an island with limited infrastructure. Once you need to take care of some of your own infra, a truck is a great tool, beating your full list. That said, a beater truck is generally preferred -- you want reliable, cheap and something that you don't care if it gets banged up.
Not a “truck guy” but I have a cybertruck because it’s the only self-driving electric car that has enough room to carry my family’s stuff when we go to the lake, ocean, camping, etc. My ideal car is a van or large SUV but there aren’t electric self-driving versions of those yet.
So this leaves Tesla with two car models, a Robotaxi that doesn't work very well, and a humanoid robot operation that didn't ship product on schedule[1]. Why is this worth a 1.4 trillion dollar market cap?
I really just wanted a cyber van. Cheap driverless car for a distracted mom to haul a bunch of kids. Why didn’t they deliver that. The model X with the gull doors hit my head. The model y is too small. If Elon were a soccer mom it would be better.
We can add the truck’s 25,000 annual unit sales versus Musk’s 250,000 prediction to the long list of his other failed and bogus predictions. The top of that list has many contenders: date of mars colonization, date of driverless car, everything about his ridiculous tunnel system in Las Vegas. Yet the media regularly credulously report, “Elon Musk says…”.
The cybertruck was announced like a bad meme and now dies as one too. What we see is the logical and long overdue conclusion of a story that lasted longer than it should have.
Someone knows the government infinite money machine, which Tesla, SpaceX, Solar City, and many other Musk companies took advantage of, is about to get cut off.
I still remember the marketing for the Cybertruck. Tesla teased a partial neo-noir silhouette of the truck which had everyone guessing which part it belonged to. Childhood fantasies about Blade Runner designs were conjured in people’s imaginations. Fanboys were truly generous with the design expectations. Embarrassed to admit now, I did go to the unveiling and when it rolled out I thought this must be a gag and the real Blade Runner would follow any second now, only to realize that this ugly thing was it. If you could only see the collective shock amongst the attendees. Only the drunks were cheering. Then the boss had the designer throw a ball through the window. Twice.
(Edit: the actual designer had the assistant designer throw a ball through the window.)
No fan of Elon here but I prefer Cybertrucks to Hummers based solely on observed owner behavior. Hummer drivers are DICKS. Cybertruck drivers are just driving around in some metallic 3-D geometry with little (observable) ill intent
He wishes. Delorean is a modern classic, regardless of commercial success. Cybertruck will go down like the H1/H2; something entirely emblematic of the worst excesses in the time it was conceived and marketed in, that later generations will go "did they really think that was cool?".
Well this thread has taught me that “I don’t like Elon, but “ appears to be the new pronouns for people that find it important to signal their left wing bona fides.
The Ford F150 lightning was killed because of low demand and loosing the company money. That looked just like all the other F150s and that didnt help it. I dont see you criticising them them.
I don't see a reason why there isn't a market for a EV pickup truck. Maybe the American public simply isn't ready for it. Or the Lighting may have been too expensive compared to its ICE counterpart.
But the CyberTruck is just one man's doodle-after-an-acid-trip kind of design.
I recently had a Tesla service call at my house (routine maintenance for my Y). He showed up in a darkly wrapped Cybertruck. It didn’t occur to me that they’re just dogfooding their own vehicles to use them up.
Hilarious but a logical end state option for them.
Realism has a chance again, now can Americans also wind down the cult-like following of figures like Musk, Trump, actors, athletes, and the likes? It's Unamerican.
European royalists never were this crazy about their objects of affection.
> European royalists never were this crazy about their objects of affection.
Michael Fagan (a British citizen who intruded into Queen Elizabeth II's bedroom in Buckingham Palace in 1982) was reportedly somewhat enamoured of the Queen.
The hardcore carriage way lining flag wavers of the UK queue for hours and often have homes that could feature on Desperate Hoarders for the sheer number of coronation themed teapots and tea cosies that line every sill and proto ledge.
Even the UK's most notorious anarchists and anti-christs sing God Save the Queen.
Car companies have long been on a cycle for their vehicles. It varies but generally we could say every seven years they're going to do a major redesign of a car. So I think it's safe to say the Model Y and Model 3 won't be sold in seven years. The question is, in seven years, will they have a different model, loosely based on the current Model Y and Model 3, that carry those same names? Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe Tesla goes bankrupt and the cars aren't for sale. Maybe Tesla continues and the names exist.
The cybertruck is baffling to me because it has the political connotations of a Hummer, but the beauty and gadget-obsession of a Pontiac Aztek.
IMO the Aztek is a perfect comp to the Cybertruck, actually. Both were crammed with features intended to revolutionize their market segments. Like the Cybertruck, the added value from those features was... dubious, at best.
Both are hideous. Both had a longer production run than you'd expect given their lofty goals and poor sales.
The Aztek has taken on a sort of ironic-cool status among some car nerds. It wasn't a bad car per se, just ugly and weird. Nowadays it's just a funny curio of the early 2000s.
It'll be interesting to see how the Cybertruck ages in the public eye. With time, maybe it'll be easier to separate it from its context as a Hummer for tech douchebags, and it'll just be a funny ugly car with some goofy features.
It did sort of identify/lean into something that I think many people don't really want to acknowledge, which is, yes the "truck" has become a status symbol rather than a work vehicle.
Had Musk leaned into it as the "luxury"/GT of trucks (like the H2), there probably would've been less pushback. Granted he's functionally incapable of not just lying about things being the best every and setting stupid impossible goals, but I do think there's outcomes where we see more things "akin" to the cybertruck, leaning into the Pavement Princess market.
I can only imagine how many people told Musk that the Cybertruck was a horrible idea and he completely ignored them and probably fired a lot of them. Musk basically re-enacted the Simpsons episode where Homer's brother lets him design a car and it is so bad it bankrupts the company.
The Zeekr with sliding doors that Waymo is using seems like a way better concept for a robotaxi. Still fits in a standard parking space but can carry a group at need without being terribly inefficient for a single person.
> A people mover that moves the minimum of people (2)
You meant maximum? Though minimum would be fun, too: taxi won’t start unless you agree to socialize and chat with a random stranger. As soon as silence is detected it pulls over and the ride ends.
90% of taxi rides are 1 person 95% 2 so its based on, you know, business intelligence rather than your hot take which is anti Elon rhetoric like most of this thread or any for that matter here (keep thinking this is reddit)
Tesla is now two cars away from offering no cars? There's just model x and y which was built off of x. It does seem like they'd do fine as a meme-stock company though.
I taught my now 4 year old that those are called dumpsters, so he very reliably says, "Hey Dad! A dumpster" whenever he sees one. The number of people he has loudly roasted while getting out of their dumpster is too high to count. Perhaps my proudest parenting achievement so far.
I just imagine what an incredible success Tesla would have had just making a "boring" Tesla branded competition to the F150. "Just" a model 3 with a standard pickup body.
Americans, for whatever reason, only buy SUVs and trucks. They've left the whole truck market untapped by creating a vehicle only a very small niche could/would want.
I don't understand what product marketing was up to, or if they just completely lacked the spine to stand up to Elon.
Surprise: a car that can only be legally sold and used on mainstream roads in the US makes poor sales, even in the US, after its design was widely ridiculed.
The Model 3 was a masterpiece of design, the Cybertruck is more like Cybercuck.
Outside of certain kinds of construction contractors, I rarely if ever see pickup trucks used for this purpose.
This anecdote might indicate why: We recently had a bunch of work done on our house. The siding crew had a pickup truck, and every morning the very first thing they did was unload the entire contents of the truck into our back yard. The plumbers and electricians would just get the stuff they were actually using and then lock the van.
I struggle with why I should care. A low selling, controversial truck that is the brainchild of an eccentric billionaire is being discontinued. It's a triumph of Tesla marketing that anyone should care.
They have sold 70k Cybertrucks since 2023. Ford has sold more than 10 times that alone of F-series. Toyota sells that many RAV4s every two months.
For anyone that bought one and loves it - I'm not questioning your choice and I hope the vehicle will be well supported. Many popular vehicles that sell better have been discontinued like the entire companies of Geo, Saturn, and AMC. The Chevy Malibu sold twice as many cars per year pre-Covid than total Cybertrucks have been sold, and they were discontinued in 2024.
It's relatively neat that Tesla tried something new but they should consider focusing on operations and not losing further ground to BYD globally.
I wonder if we will see less aggressive and generally hostile car designs in the future, now that public sentiment towards the tech oligarchs seems to have shifted.
Renault is designing cute things again, so that's a good development. So is Citroen, apparently?
The overall positive responses here are kinda...concerning.
This sharp edged, fire hazard which was aimed at a certain group of people who seem to be dangerous themselves is not really something that should be cheered.
And yes, it looked different but there are different looking cars all over the world. They usually serve a purpose though like kei cars in Japan.
Of course if there was an actual board of this public company with actual power the useless CEO would have been fire ten times over. But like in Meta and other Tech companies this will never be able to happen due to 10x voting Class B shares bullshit.
Why shareholders put up with that I will never know
All the clown show at Tesla had to do is clone the F-150. This was one of the easiest product failures to predict in recent memory. Musk can't help himself. Tesla continues to desperately need a Shotwell at the helm.
At present all Tesla has propping it up is bubble dust and one car model (one increasingly dated car model). Somehow after 14-15 years (Model S released in Summer 2012) these people still can't release a real SUV of any sort. The model Y is a grotesque joke of a fake SUV, a mutilated model 3 that doesn't really look like an SUV in any regard. The model Y is an SUV like the Cybertruck is a truck. They might as well have unlimited money to do it, and they can't do it. Same reason they couldn't release the roadster even after all this time. It's a fundamentally broken company because Musk won't get out of the way. Whatever Musk is good at it, it's not running a large scale automotive company.
Ok, I know I will take a lot of flack for this here with all the Enron fanboys but..
On one hand: "Ha ha!"
On the other, oh no, all these yahoos that bought this trash may make their money back if they hold on to this garbage long enough for the rarity to drive up the value as a collectors item.
Very happy to see this incel dumpster disappear. It's a great example of how aesthetics can be so horrible that they become a kind of moral contagion. The cybertruck's metallic exterior is the g4m3r equivalent of Trump's gold foil. Do love that Elon spent half a billion to get BTFO in Texas though. Good riddance. And lol at all the HN Elon fanboys. Guess I shouldn't expect more from this crowd. If there's one thing that MAGA slackjaws and SF tech nerds have in common it's zero taste.
Even if one assumes all tesla trucks.. share of electric trucks in USA is 0.3%.
Tesla cyber truck sales are going down from 38k a year to 20k a year. The Chinese net sales of electric trucks is massively more than Tesla's production if you look at the data that I posted.
We need this person to tell us all what we should like!
I notice this internet world we live in, networked behind screens, really demonstrates the average person's drift to totalitarianism. It's frightening to me.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. For better or worse, it looks unique, and while a truck probably should be functional rather than flashy, I appreciate the swing they took with the design.
...yeah? You should get an opinion from people who use the product, not people who dislike the company's CEO for political reasons and their dislike of it was a foregone conclusion.
There was nothing "new" in cybertruck. Delorean had bare metal panels!
It wasn't a good truck, vehicle, EV, anything. It was Elon's crayon drawing turned car. That's not "innovation" we should applaud
the cybertruck in its whole was new in that there is nothing else like it. even the ss panels are different alloy and rear steering is differently implemented. The polarization is probably its only real downfall- essentially suffering from ridicule and too often actual harassment. your argument against it is that you think it was drawn with a crayon(subjective and childish)when the motivation was to simplify the manufacturing>cost thru folding. and last, “It wasn't a good truck, vehicle, EV, anything”- what does that add to the conversation?
It was the first fully drive-by-wire production car, and it was the first car with steerable rear wheels. That's an innovation, on one of the worst vehicle of all time.
This is the world that the Supreme Court dreamed up for us in their Citizen's United ruling. Now that money is equivalent to speech, we all have to carefully weigh if our purchases will be used against us in our political system.
To anyone who is/was a crusader against cancel culture, recognize the source of it. Become a crusader against Citizen's United instead. It would be a much more productive coalition.
Hear fucking hear. Every time there's a Musk-related product release posted here, and people excitedly chatter about it without even mentioning the massive elephant in the room, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.
To be frank, I think this community's time has come and gone. It seems like most of the remaining members are just corporate mercs who don't care one whit about the trail of blood and misery this man leaves behind him. Certainly nothing to do with "hackers" of yore.
(Of course, these comments will be flagged into oblivion. But thank you for putting this feeling into words.)
Ah yes when I want to escape my insular, ivory tower life, when I want to connect to common, everyday Americans, the first place that comes to mind is Orange County, CA. These salt of the earth people don’t worry about frivolous little concerns such as the cost of living. Unaffected by petty concerns, Joe Mainstreet of Orange County, CA looks at a line up of electric car options for him and his family, and every the pragmatist says “give me the $80k giant toe nail clipper”.
> In a post on social media site X, Musk said that Ukraine had been violating Starlink's terms of service by using it for offensive military activity.
> On Saturday, Ukraine said that Starlink and the military's use of the related Starshield technology were back to high operating speeds after more than a week of disruptions.
> Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on X that the restoration began overnight.
> "The most important thing today is that Starlink and Starshield operations have been restored to the speeds we had before the restrictions," Zelenskyy said. "The speeds are now where they need to be."
After Helene knocked out power in parts of my area for a little over 14 days, I found out that a friend of ours used his cybertruck to power his house through the entire mess. He'd run the house on it for a couple of days, then drive the cybertruck over to a super charger station, recharge, then come home and plug the house back in.
The battery capacity on those things is equivalent to 9 Tesla Powerwall units or something close to it.
They may be ugly, but the emergency prepper in me always wanted one after hearing that story. Before, I always wanted to install powerwalls...but I never considered in an extended event being able to drive my powerwalls somewhere to recharge them.
This seems like an awfully niche case, no? How often does someone lose power at home for days, while also having a nearby and accessible charging station that stays functional the whole time? Most of the disasters I'm aware of people either get their power back in a short enough amount of time that they can use a normal generator for the gap, or things are bad and widespread enough that they aren't driving down the street to recharge their vehicle.
Also very important: the cybertruck is not the only vehicle capable of doing that (the keywords are V2H and V2L, V2H is the more convenient — the car just plugs into the mains and acts as a house battery — while V2L means you have to go and plug your stuff to the car's mains outputs directly)
> Most of the disasters I'm aware of people either get their power back in a short enough amount of time that they can use a normal generator for the gap
TBF an EV car has an absolutely massive battery relative to the electric consumption of a house, unless you're using resistive heating all around. Especially if you ration use.
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Most people (like me) don't have generators. But when I hear "oh, BTW this car can be a used as a generator for 48-72 hours in a power outage", that's a nice little selling point that might put me over the edge if i'm otherwise considering the car. No, this doesn't solve for Hurricane Katrina. But it does solve for a nor'easter.
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First, 'nearby' can be a 1 hr drive and still be worth it to commute every few days. Second, tornadoes, storms, and floods have exactly that pattern where damage can be block by block.
But it is still cheaper to stockpile some generators and gas than stockpile a cybertruck. If there's an EV charging station up within a 1 hr drive, gas stations are also going to be up.
Even if you can’t easily recharge, it’s a great way to power your home for a few days. It’s arguably a very cost-efficient home backup solution, assuming you were already in the market for an EV.
A Cybertruck has nearly 10x the battery capacity of a single Powerwall, and to buy that much Powerwall capacity would cost at least as much as a Cybertruck. Even a Tesla Model 3 (which now supports home backup) is over 5x Powerwalls.
You still have to pay to install home backup support on your home’s breaker (at least $10k), but you don’t need anywhere near the amount of very expensive supplemental home batteries.
Also, even an EV with a 120V outlet and no home backup support could be very useful for recharging a portable battery bank.
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In about 25 years, I've twice been out twice for multiple days and one of those was in summer which was a nuisance rather than a potential really serious problem. (Worst case, I buy ice for coolers and maybe need to toss some food.) But I live just off a (major) country road so I'm probably pretty high on the power restoration schedule.
This is one of those things that happens in rural areas, "the city" (which is not actually a city in any sense but the legal one) gets power on in a day or so but your neighborhood 10 miles away doesn't get power for another week because the population density is something like 50/sq mile at most. And that's just for the people in actual neighborhoods, if you're on a farm or something where the nearest neighbor is a mile down the highway I don't even know how long it takes them to fix your power lines.
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The whole point of prepping is to prepare for the unlikely events though.
If you can choose between a truck that can’t power your house and a truck that can, prepper mentality is to choose the one that can.
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That sort of thing happens all the time. All it takes is, say, a big fallen tree in the wrong spot. Its entirely possible for just your road to be SOL for days, if the local utility is otherwise completely swamped by bigger issues from whatever disaster is going on.
Also you can get that charging station fitted to your house aka solar panels. I've been "off grid" I.e. no import for weeks
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In places like Florida its absolutely something that would not be considered niche.
Greetings from Northern California! Multi-day power outages are not at all uncommon (though I've never seen 14 days). We had one about a month ago. Most people just have generators, but if you wanted to use a Cybertruck instead, the nearest superchargers are one hour away and do not go offline when we lose power.
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I live off grid in Sweden all year round with solar and an EV as battery to power everything except heating which I do with wood from my own property.
I'd have animals too but society is still stable enough to provide me with food.
Not niche at all. Loss of power for days is common in areas of strong storms with above ground power lines. States frequented by hurricanes and strong storms can experience days to weeks without power.
Ford has also marketed their hybrid F150 as being able to power home appliances for several years.
Preppers are just about as niche as you can get; they're still a valid customer prototype! I'm sure more than a few solar home owners chose it as a PowerWall.
At 6000lbs+ it's a section 179 write off; if you combine that with some of the previous incentives the car was not that expensive to the right population.
Living in Ukraine, I can tell you it's not niche here. Most homeowners without power walls already consider buying an EV because you also get to drive it to an area that has electricity at the time.
> This seems like an awfully niche case, no?
Not really. Some areas in California have multiple PSPS outages during fire season. Many people have gotten gas generators or powerwalls to deal with it, but using your EV would be ideal.
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Yeah... even powerwalls and equivalent don't seem to be a good just-in-case solution. A gas generator costs 5% for the same capacity, and you can just go get some extra gas when the storm comes. I'm all for electrification, but after doing the math, it doesn't work for this particular corner case.
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Other commenters are pointing out places where it isn’t that niche, but I just want to call out that there’s a whole cottage industry for preppers that would eat this up. I would consider a 30-pound bucket full of shelf-stable Mac and cheese “pretty niche,” but it flew off the shelves at Costco.
If you're already committed to owning a bigass $100K electric truck this is an inarguably awesome side benefit. It's a truck, so... you have a few hundred miles of range. Slightly better than "down the street."
But for the other 99.99% of humanity, there are certainly more cost-effective ways. A portable power station and solar panels are probably the better move unless you have some really massive power needs.
(Admittedly, a nuclear winter reduces the effectiveness of those solar panels somewhat)
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Actually, if my car worked as a whole-house UPS and base smart battery (charging at night when power is cheap, drawing during day when it's expensive), that's a pretty nice value-add for a vehicle purchase.
Doesn't make sense for what they are charging for it. But still!
I'm not sure it is. I've considered getting home batteries for power outages (due to fires), and frankly given the install cost, using a car is compelling. Not only do they have enormous batteries (a model 3 has a 57.5 kwh battery and can be acquired for 20k), but they can be driven to recharge every few days if need be.
Where I'm located, in most cases when there is an outage, neighboring areas do have power.
Specifically for my model 3, I've been considering tapping into the HV system manually to keep my Ecoflow battery topped up, but I wish there was a way to directly connect it.
>This seems like an awfully niche case, no?
No. It's like a generator except way more power and mobile. Rechargable via solar. So basically just a much better generator.
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pretty standard in honolulu actually. i lose power for 1-3 days on the regular, have to drive to town to do anything
Also an american only case. But anyway trucks are not popular elsewhere, little sense to buy it
Well, with climate change and weather getting more extreme, it might happen more often...
I've got a friend who does it simply to fuck PG&E and avoid an electric bill. He has workplace charging, a Cybertruck, and a powerwall + Tesla solar setup at home. He drives his truck to work, fills up on electricity, drives it home at the end of the day, and uses it to power his house. Repeat the next day. The Cybertruck was cheaper than the 13 PowerWalls or whatever that's the equivalent battery capacity.
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Actually no, and in fact almost all EVs are capable of powering a house for quite a while. It would be excellent if this was not just a Cybertruck-exclusive feature since here in the bay area we have shitty infrastructure too and power outages happen several times per winter.
I saw it happen during Katrina. Neighborhoods within an easy drive of each other where one had power, and the other not. Not to mention the fact that vehicle charging stations may well be prioritized to restore power.
It’s niche just because natural disasters are thankfully relatively rare, but I still think having good contingencies is worth it.
Fuck being seen in a cybertruck though.
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My silicon valley neighborhood lost power for two days in 2025 starting on Christmas day.
In what universe is backup power a niche use case?
Ice storms in the Midwest can knock power out for several days in rural areas. Urban areas usually get brought back online sooner than the rural areas. A few years ago a bad one knocked out power at a friend’s house for three weeks.
Niche until it’s life/death unfortunately.
Not uncommon in parts of California where certain legs of the grid are shut down for high wind events. If you live in Pacifica, you might have your power out for 3 to 5 days, but there will be reliable power in San Francisco 20 minutes away.
An awful lot Elon’s products seem uniquely capable in extreme niche cases primarily caused by America‘s horrendous track record of maintaining, upgrading, and filling in traditional infrastructure.
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Even outside of natural disasters, it's a very useful feature for people in the construction business and similar fields where mains power might not be always available.
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Another way to view this is that driving a cybertruck every day is quite wasteful (no different than driving a full size gas pickup every day). One recharge cycle in a cybertruck uses enough energy to power a typical home for 8 days, 130kWh. If you aren’t doing truck things with it, it’s better to drive a more efficient EV or hybrid car. It uses almost twice as much Wh per mile compared to a model Y.
I think this is why these EV trucks don’t do well (ford also cancelled the F150 lightning). For truck things, they aren’t particularly capable (you’d get less than 100 miles towing). For daily driving duty, a car or small suv is much more efficient. You can power your home during a storm from most EVs these days, you’d just have to top it up more often
Cybertruck uses like a fifth of the energy of a full size gas pickup truck and is only like 50% more than a typical smaller sized EV. The truth is that most homes don't use much energy apart from hvac. The Chevy Bolt can also power a home for several days if you only have the fridge and lights running.
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Driving is wasteful. Cybertrucks and Prius's use similar amounts of energy per mile. Cybertruck is 0.4-0.5 kWh/mile, the Prius is 0.6-0.7 kWh/mile.
Of course the Prius Prime on electricity is way more efficient than both, but it still uses a lot more energy than a house.
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>For daily driving duty, a car or small suv is much more efficient.
I have a lightning and it averages 0.5kwh/mile and my electricity price is $0.15/kwh, so it costs me $0.075/mile to drive. At current gas prices that's pretty much the same as a very efficient hybrid compact car (55mpg @ ~$4/gallon). If I had solar I could probably offset almost all of the lightning fuel cost based on where I live (sunny) but it's so cheap it's not worth it.
Do you mean "much more efficient" in places where electricity rates are significantly higher than the national average? Or only much more efficient when compared to when you're charging at charging stations?
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> Another way to view this is that driving a cybertruck every day is quite wasteful (no different than driving a full size gas pickup every day). One recharge cycle in a cybertruck uses enough energy to power a typical home for 8 days, 130kWh.
Driving in general uses a lot of energy. It’s the physically moving a 1,000 kg or more object that takes a lot of energy. Orders of magnitude more than a few lights or a phone. Same with flying of course; also moving a heavy object.
As someone towing every weekend with a Lightning, I get closer to 150mi.
ICE trucks are equally inefficient for towing. People just don't seem to be able to factor it in.
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If the underlying energy is coming from a renewable source, then it wouldn't matter all that much, would it?
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I own a pretty typical phev sedan (Gen 2. Volt), and I use more electricity on my 20 mile commute than the rest of my power usage combined.
All cars just use a ton of power moving a lot of mass. It is actually impressive, it's like 100KW at full tilt. I think i saw someone do the math for how much power transfer you would need to get EV charging as fast as gasoline refuelling: It's in the megawatts.
The only way you could signifigantly reduce power usage of vehicles is to reduce mass dramaticially with a motorcyle or autocycle. The Aptera is an interesting autocycle design based on this line of reasoning, but we are also seeing the emergence of a lot of electric motorcycles.
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In summer time with a pool and AC, we use 100kw in one day
Yeah the Silverado EV has my attention but it's the same issue: if you, like me, actually use your truck for truck shit, an electric truck is a substantial, notable downgrade from ICE.
That said if you have a Mall Crawler who's heaviest loads are your monthly Costco run, an electric truck would probably be great for you. I still wouldn't recommend a Cybertruck though.
Yeah, wasteful, like one day we will ever run out of energy lol
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This is now a feature of most new Tesla vehicles:
https://www.tesla.com/powershare/#vehicles
> Powershare allows you to draw power directly from your compatible Tesla vehicle to power your devices, your home or the grid.
> Powershare is currently available for all Cybertruck vehicles, and all new Model 3 and Model Y2 vehicles ordered on October 1, 2026 or later.
> To verify if your vehicle has Powershare, navigate to ‘Software’ > ‘Additional Vehicle Info’ > ‘Powershare Support: Enabled’ on your vehicle touchscreen.
The caveat is that Powershare is low wattage. You really need to pair it with a Powerwall and have an average draw less than the limited capability of the car to supply it.
To power a house directly from an EV, the main options now are the EV trucks -- Lightning, Silverado, Cybertruck all can have this ability, 240V 30A typically
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I ran the fridges and essentials with my Ioniq 5 the last time there was an extended power loss.
I don't think the residential power generator is needed anymore if you have an electric car.
I have a Tesla Y. It has almost a week of power sitting in it on full charge. There's no hookup. The only power outlet is usb-c pd.
Completely missed opportunity. I won't be buying an electric vehicle that doesn't allow powering my house, ever again.
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No association, but something like this is "the right answer", IMHO: https://www.cargenerator.com/pages/use-your-car-as-a-backup-...
1) if you're permanently modifying your home or electric panel you're over $1k. (General Motors "Vehicle2House" is ~$10-20k for hardware + installation... an EXTREME investment unless you plan on regular "emergency" usage of it)
2) if you're buying some portable solar panel "battery boom box" you'll likely run out and the folding solar panel it comes with is more gimmick than reliable
3) if you're buying a "real" gas/diesel generator, you have to run it + change the oil every 6 months otherwise it might not start in your emergency situation
...just buy a thing that clips to your car battery and dangles out the front hood of your car!
You already maintain your car every 3-9 months, you already (should) have at least 1/2 tank of gas at all times (especially in a weather / outage situation), you can generally idle your car for at least 2 days off a tank of gas in an emergency, and if this thing can charge your phone/battery packs, keep your fridge running (kindof?), and run a small space heater overnight...
It makes soooo much more sense to buy a $500-$1000 emergency accessory that piggybacks off the car you already maintain than trying to stand up a whole extra distribution mechanism for "survival-ish power, maybe 1-2 times over 3-4 years".
I don't think the residential power generator is needed anymore if you have an electric car.
As soon as we got the adapter for our Ioniq 5, I sold generator to a neighbor. The car will run what we need for four days, which is longer than the generator and five gallon can of gas is going to last.
If you have an electric car that supports V2H.
Despite the dealer saying the used one I bought supported it, it turned out to not be available in the trim I got. My fault obviously for believing something a car dealer said.
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It's worth noting that there are several other (nearly objectively better) EVs on the market with larger battery capacity than the CT and have V2H/Powershare tech.
If you live in a sunny area, it's much cheaper to install solar with a hybrid inverter (like a Sol-Ark) with some batteries, and a generator for the extended outages. The cybertruck's battery is 123 kwh, whereas a gallon of gas contains approx 33 kwh of energy. A mere 5 gallon container of gas is more energy than the entire cybertruck.
I camped in a yurt in rural Maine last fall on a motorbiking trip. Needed to keep my phone charged for nav; woke up to find it hadn't charged all the way.
Went looking for the campground host and bumped into another camper, who was pissed the power went out. "Don't worry though - if you need to charge something, you can put it in my truck."
Ended up on a phone charging expedition that landed me in a local library for the first time since I was a child.
Came back and met the host: "Sorry about the power last night - some dumbass tried to charge his truck and tripped the breaker to the whole campground."
Charging a truck does that? What's that campground going to do with someone plugs in their 50A 43 foot-long tour bus RV?
(I'm sure there's more to the story, and the details aren't important, but if charging a vehicle is tripping breakers for the whole campground there's something wrong.)
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If pulling 24 amps through a TT-30 or 40 amps through a 14-50 trips a breaker, then it's the host's fault for the campground having a shoddy electrical system, not the truck driver's fault.
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I would definitely be carrying a battery pack or two if going on a rural motorbike trip.
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The now defunct fully electric Ford F150 Lightning also had the feature.
This is a pretty common feature in High capacity cars.
Even my mid-range BYD came with power strip attachment so you run basic electrical appliance with it.
Yea, I hate that the Lightning didn’t work out. I loved the vehicle when I test drove it. I just couldn’t justify the price for the range.
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This is nothing specific to the CyberTruck; 123 kWh is a lot of battery but a better use would be to add home solar and then you're completely self-sufficient in addition to saving tons of money.
Of course there are two issues that are completely solveable if we had reasonable governance:
1. Adopting an Australia-style solar installation regulation and permitting scheme, which is literally 1/5th tho cost of the US method, and pays their tradespeolpe higher salaries than US workers get
2. Allowing EVs to feed back into the grid. This is something that naysayers would never be useful because nobody would ever want to waste battery cycles on their home. Which of course has always been nonsense. Don't buy EVs without this basic capability, IMHO.
I’ve looked at solar so many times and I’d love to get it…I just can’t make the math work based on the quotes I always end up getting.
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There are cheaper, more reliable, and easily repaired generators though.
But can they also be driven?
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This is obviously not the primary reason to get a Telsa. But a full home generator will run you $15k to buy and install where i live, and a whole bunch of hassle to install with permits. I don't have one because my power doesn't go out that much. But if i'm otherwise on the fence about a vehicle, I would absolutely want this as a feature.
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In our area, when a storm hit, the roads washed out, so the generators ran out of propane. Then the local propane companies ran out of delivery truck capacity because of the demand surge. Finally, the regional distributors ran out of propane.
Our solar panels kept the fridge running, but we were heating the house with a wood stove (it was very cloudy, so we were getting maybe an hour of sun a day). If we had bidirectional house charging, we could have had warm showers + used the heat pump: We would have been able to fast-charge the car at 100-200kw in town. The house can limp through 20-30 hours on ~ 25kwh, so the charger would charge the house at a few days per hour, including losses from driving to and from town + round tripping through the battery, and also running the house heat pump.
None of the other people around here stayed online. Some propane-dependent people had no electricity for > 2 weeks (with rationing, they managed to keep their generators online for about a week, and PG&E took three weeks to fix their lines).
This was in the outskirts of Silicon Valley, so better-than-puerto-rico infrastructure, but only just.
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You forgot "higher maintenance" that goes along with seldom-used things that run on gas. That gas doesn't drain itself, and if you don't do that, well, Amazon has carbs for Honda generators for $30. For something I might use once a year. No, thanks.
This works for the wealthy that can afford it, but would it be better to be press for a better grid for everyone instead? It amazes me how individualistic and wasteful the usa is.
may I ask why would it not be more sensible to have solar panels, battery and generators? Is that not a viable project? I'm consodering that for myself, never thought on a cybertruck
God, you just don't get it do you? \s
Ford had EV trucks that could do that before Tesla did.
The ford home integration setup never really worked as advertised. The idea is that if the home power fails, the truck will output high voltage DC to an inverter that powers the house. No owners have got this failing over reliably.
Most people just plug an extension cord into the onboard inverter. You have to manually flip it on and plug it in, but 240V30A is plenty for an emergency. Doing it this way isn't any different from any other vehicle with an onboard inverter though.
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No one is saying they can’t. Drop the whataboutism, please.
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Do they now?
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Interesting, This reminds me a V2V energy transportation. There was a study in the past to investigate how could it be designed in the public transportation:
https://digitalcommons.lib.uconn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?art...
Still imaginary though. (how come vehicles can exchange energy quickly?)
> how [can] vehicles can exchange energy quickly?
Currently in pilot on a small fleet of electric trucks in Australia (actual trucks - prime movers for road trains) - large standard swappable battery packs that can be removed and replaced with a fork lift.
Swap time ~ 3 minutes.
> They may be ugly, but the emergency prepper in me always wanted one after hearing that story
If all you're after is the V2L feature, you can get it for much cheaper: for 16% of the price of a Cybertruck, you can get 86% of the battery capacity (about 8 powerwalls) by buying a used Fisker Ocean Extreme with a 107kWh battery, vs. the cybertruck's 123kWh
It’s nice if the car you buy is made by a company still in business.
What appliances exactly did the house have? And does it last couple of days even for appliances with compressors and heating coils? If it did that then thats pretty impressive! And your friend is a genius
I used to have an inverter I installed in my vehicle, mainly to run powertools, and brew hot cocoa during stargazing events. During the great North American power outage in the early 2000's, I ran an extension cord into the house and ran some basic stuff off it (I recall us being the only ones around who could watch TV to keep up with the news). It was only 1200W (though had an extra deep cycle battery hooked up), but helped enough for a few vitals.
If that’s the only thing you care about you can DIY (or buy dedicated battery backup systems) with 10x more capacity for the same price. With heavier but cheaper Na-ion batteries in the horizon near future backup systems will be even better
Ford did the same thing, but that truck was built during the height of parts shortages.
Ford came in and bought up all of the parts from our suppliers and I had to qual random suppliers for weeks. Even at the time, I was thinking there is too much disparity and this will haunt us for years.
We were a bit more agile and I made a lot of kernel hacks to compensate.
Ford didn’t fare better for all their choices. Recalls galore. Honestly, they made my life hell so fuck em.
On to the truck, they had a proprietary charger and power wall solution but it could run the house for days.
My Renault Scenic E-Tech can also do V2H, it is not specific to Cybertruck.
The requirements for a home battery are vastly different than for a vehicle. For home, size and weight matter much less and capacity and discharge matter much more. Vehicle batteries would nearly always be the wrong solution to power a home.
The F150 hybrid is/was also supposed to be really good for this, and when the battery ran down, the engine would switch on and recharge it. So, you were not dependent on a super charger. All you needed is a working gas station. (This is based on an old video from Alex on Autos). So, you could buy a vehicle that is both cheaper and doesn't look like a dumpster and still be able to do this.
Battery capacity is just one side of the equation. You also need a strong output capacity otherwise you won't much. Also if you are to inject current in your network like that, then you need at least a source inverter to isolate yourself from the grid, otherwise it would most likely be illegal and very dangerous for technicians and neighbors. Also
I just have a gas heater, gas stove, and some spare 9kg cylinders of LPG. I can even hook them up to my gas hot water if we're desperate for a shower.
Delivering power back to the net is a standard feature on most EVs now.
Huh. That's pretty cool! Now I'm wondering about the potential to do this with any EV. Something to research.
The Ford F-150 Lightning has always been able to do that, way before the Tesla cars enabled vehicle-to-load (V2L).
Are the battery compartments water proof? We got hit by a hurricane a few years ago, and a few nearby teslas caught on fire from the floodwaters, torching people's houses.
that is not the only car who can reverse-charge the house. All EVs are theoretically capable of it, given proper power switching algorithm. (the hardware is already there, just how the four switches open/close to reverse the energy flowing direction.)
I've always like their look, and I feel the hate on them is more due to Elon and it being a Tesla which is fair.
Weird looking truck, glad they took the risk
Yeah, I don't know if I like the look, but I'm glad to see something that's at least different.
This is a feature on many new electric vehicles (such as the Kia EV 9). The obstacle is often the power company, which may require modifying your system to enable this.
Can you do this with other normal EVs? I assume they'd have lower capacity, but just getting some power for your fridge, wifi, and chargers might be worth.
Sort of. With my Kia EV9 I can use a V2L adapter to run an extension cord for essential items in my home. I understand in other markets there is a V2H connector so you can connect it to your home mains power but I don’t think it’s available in the US
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In theory, yes, but they need to have the hardware/firmware to do it. Pretty sure most of the full-size electric trucks do so, but not sure about any of the smaller crossover EVs.
You also need to have the house setup to run off a generator. You don't want the truck power feeding back into the grid. IIRC, that's usually done with a big switch near the main panel.
No, you can't even do it with most other Teslas. Current models will give you 20A of 120V out from the battery, but most don't have an inverter big enough.
There is a model of Ford Lightning that has power sharing and now that resale values are way down it just might be a cost effective home battery that you can drive around during non-emergencies....
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In theory, it requires ONLY firmware changes. V2G/V2H works by establishing a "fast charging session" that directly connects the inverter to the high-voltage bus. And then it just siphons off the energy from the battery instead of charging it.
Car makers are reluctant to support this. In case of Tesla because of market segmentation.
Vehicle to Home(V2H) is unfortunately not super common, but it is being added to a lot of newer models this year and beyond.
A generator would work better in this situation right?
Did Ford have Truck that did that and I am pretty sure a new and improved version is coming with the new Phantom.
I believe this but I'm curious how this works specifically? Did the home already have a transfer switch of some kind?
What are the chances that the supercharger station even has power after a hurricane? You want something that is already on the property. I've had roads blocked by fallen trees for days after a windstorm event.
If you are concerned about riding through a 14 day+ event you need a generator. Even a fully off-grid solar / wind setup could be compromised in these kinds of storms. I've seen entire roofs cleaned off by a <100mph storm. Anything not bolted down to a concrete slab cannot be depended on.
High. They typically need heavy power lines that are either underground or way up overhead.
Many EVs can do the same thing.
It’s unclear to me how a vehicle battery can be 9-10x the size of a house battery, be used as a house battery, include an highway safe cabin, motors and wheels and only cost 4x what a single home battery costs. Oh, and at least Kia rates their battery warranty based on miles driven, so using it as a home battery does not impact any 10-year capacity guarantees.
AI tells me they are completely different though, so I must be missing something.
What you are missing is home batteries have INSANE markups.
5kWh of battery cells at the moment run around $500. The rest of the cost of production is in the power electronics (probably around another $500).
It's why you can buy 4kwh worth of battery backups from Amazon for about $2k right now. Yet the same thing sold as a home battery backup costs $5k.
Lack of competition and likely low amount of sells is what's causing the margins to be so high.
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Permitting in California more than doubles the installation cost of home batteries + PG&E gets to screw with you if you buy one.
Propane generators here have the same problem.
That still doesn't explain the price gap. You can literally just get a V2H EV and use it instead of a home battery (or, you could if the ecosystem was more mature).
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Good question - different markets with different margins and supply chains?
The answer is mostly that the powerwall is an incredibly overpriced home battery.
They want ~9k for a freaking 13.5kwh pack.
I can buy a UL certified, 16kwh, outdoor rated pack for 3.5k (ex - EG4 allweather)
I can buy just the LFP batteries themselves for the new powerwall 3 LFP version (no BMS, no shell, no certification) for $1116... https://18650battery.com/products/byd-302ah-3-2v-lifepo4-pri...
Powerwall is a scammy product. WAY too expensive for the storage it provides.
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So the summary is: Cybertruck is using a different battery chemistry, Powerwall is a scam.
(I mean - to be clear, the Cybertruck is also a scam, but it's a different kind of scam not directly related to the battery capacity, since it's hauling around a 123kWh NCMA battery pack)
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I think "recycling" cybertrucks in this manner, basically to reuse their batteries, may give them a more practical afterlife then when they were a truck.
I just checked and prices are going to have to come way down. Who is buying a 2024 Cybertruck for $70k+?
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Recycling them to make saucepans from the stainless steel would give them a more practical afterlife then when they were a truck.
Not bad. The shell would also make a nice BBQ.
It's a cool car. I'm glad it exists. All SUVs look almost identical. I'm glad it was different, not for everyone but it was an attempt to make something innovative in a very stale market.
It's exhausting reading these kinds of articles from a tech publication none the less. It's just so negative. Here is a summary of paragraphs:
Cybertruck is ceasing production
Here's a mean tweet from some X account with 2,649 followers: "Fuck that shitbox"
The car rusts sometimes
Truck sold very few units
Even with low sales they're still going down
Wildly unpopular with design flaws
Mention embarrassing demo from 7 years ago
It just goes on, truly exhausting.
https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a36715409/why-does-...
You can do the same thing with an f150 or Silverado ev and won’t have to drive around in a discontinued rolling doorstop.
https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/franklinwh-...
https://gmenergy.gm.com/vehicle-to-home
> They may be ugly, but the emergency prepper in me always wanted one after hearing that story.
The cybertruck is $70k, which in a 14-day power outage is $5000 a day.
There are cheaper options to weather such a storm. Like flying first class to New York, getting a limo to the Central Park Ritz-Carlton and spending 14 days being waited on hand and foot.
Counterpoint: I live off-grid and am thankful I can just power my house with batteries instead of a massive car that looks like a Dumpster
The F-150 powerboost is perfect for this and has existed before the Cybertruck. https://www.nucarfordtilton.com/f-150-powerboost-explained/ big bonus, you get a real truck with it too. That can do real truck things.
I agree that it’s cool, but is it practical? If your goal is to power your house, you can buy a whole-house backup generator for about 1/12th of the cost of a cybertruck.
Are you prepared if a meteor hits and wipes out the grid ?
A cyber truck as a prepper rig is laughable. EV's do a lot of things well, but if it's a prepper rig, you'd need to have a generator and the fuel set aside to charge it. You can't assume that there will be power near by. If there is power, you can't assume that you will have access to one of the relatively few chargers available.
You can get a generator that will get the job done for under 1000 bucks and you can store diesel or propane to get the job done.
That's before we factor in the likelyhood needing to travel quite a distance (and assume there is no access to grid power), and that you won't have any of the cybertruck defeating issues like heavy rains or standing water that might void it's warranty and fry it's electronics.
A prepper rig is a mechanical diesel that can be roll started or hand cranked without batteries, has no electronics to get fried except the radio, and can burn almost any combustible fuel source on hand. Slap a 200 Gallon transfer tank on the back and keep it full and you can drive across the country without fueling up. And if you also have that diesel generator to power your house, you've got a years worth of fuel for that generator.
You can get all that done for around 25k USD, so, not sure how a cyber truck even enters the conversation.
> A cyber truck as a prepper rig is laughable.
It was. Everything was pathetic. The claims of being bullet proof, being an amphibious car, being all-terrain, rugged, etc.
Sometimes it sounded like it was all for political theater.
A real pepper would want a car that runs on gas with a carburated engine and is also a common car. Not a niche one off that requires fussy infrastructure just to refuel.
Generally a propane generator is a wiser, more reliable backup option. Propane doesn't go bad, and in disaster scenarios often the sun isn't shining or your solar panels could be damaged. Solar + battery is a good system when the weather is good and everything is going well, but for a fallback system a propane generator can't be beat.
Yeah, this is where I landed, too. Except propane bottles only get me about 3-4 hours per bottle and it's pricey. It ran $50 for one day of AC during the last outage.
I just bought a kit to convert to natural gas though. Most people who've done it are happy to not change bottles all the time. It won't help after an earthquake but the regular PSPS outages I get make natural gas a better fit for the moment.
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I'm looking into getting a large EV so I can move off of a propane generator. A generator needs service, it will cut power for 5-10 seconds while it starts up (so your PCs and whatnot will power cycle), and it's loud.
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I'm running an EG4 system with a decent amount of battery storage. I have a generator port on it that makes it easy to plug in a portable generator to assist the PV and charge the battery. It's really easy for me to roll my generator over and run it a few hours a day to supplement the solar. Even a cheap 5kW generator is plenty because it doesn't need to power the house, just provide a continuous charge to the batteries.
Wouldn’t a diesel or gasoline generator be better? You can carry both in a bucket found on the side of the road which isn’t possible with propane.
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The Hyundai/Kia E-GMP platform cars also support this (V2L), as do quite a few others.
This is becoming a standard called V2H (Vehicle-to-Home) and doesn't require a Cybertruck.
I would like to see more vehicle-to-grid capability out of cars, EVs, Hybrids, and Gas Cars alike.
My F150 Lightning has an even bigger battery pack in it... and a simple 240V outlet.
A gas generator is a lot more flexible in this situation, and under $500.
Very cool story! Love hearing neat use cases like this.
Just buy a generator and you don’t have to support a fascist? Some of you guys are sooooo fucking weird
sounds like you'll get a deal on a used one shortly...
If you need to worry about such extended outages, why not just do the normal thing and install propane tanks, a stationary generator, and a transfer switch?
I powered the house off a much less fancier 4XE Jeep, which has a generator, and so, arguably more versatile as you don't need spend time charging.
Almost every Chinese car does Vehicle to Home but of course Muricans have outlawed what competes successfully with them
Other EVs can do this. You don't need one that ended up being twice the price and half the range and not an actual steel exoskeleton as promised.
Just buy a diesel generator. Much simpler tech and more reliable in emergencies.
Get a Tesla semi when it comes out
why put in powerwalls without local solar panels?
hybrid ford f150 can do this too
You can buy the batteries installed at your home, charged during the day with solar or night with a small ICE generator. That plus a real same-class truck still costs considerably less than a CT.
You can get a lot of backup power for less than 100k.
my jelly neighbor story is that when our neighbors replaced their ice truck with a cybertruck, a calm descended on our block. iso of getting woken up by the rumble of that damn thing when they started it, they just zoomed off, silently. its the first time i internalized that electric vehicles are inherently better than ice. more human.
Or you know you could buy a $8k natural gas generator, seems like a really poor justification to buy such an expensive car.
>The battery capacity on those things is equivalent to 9 Tesla Powerwall units or something close to it.
What the fuck
what about balcony solar power or a turbine? Chances are if your power is knocked out by a storm the closest supercharger also would be.
Yes, drain your car to power your house, so in an extended outage your house will be out of power and you will be stranded. Risk management, people. You don’t know if power will go out in even more places, or stay off for an extended period of time.
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- Federal EV tax credits are over.
- The emissions credit market (where Tesla made most of its money) is dead due to lowered standards.
- Manufacturing costs haven't come down.
- EV sales share in the US is down to 6% (and falling every quarter).
- Chinese EVs are dominating every market outside the US.
- All the overhyped moonshots (sub-$30K car, unsupervised autopilot, autonomous robots) are nowhere to be seen.
It's hard to see where Tesla goes from here as a company. The stock is still surviving on Elon hype but has been stagnant for 5 years. The day he gets bored and decides to resign to focus on SpaceX full time the company is basically done.
> EV sales share in the US is down to 6% (and falling every quarter).
It's not every quarter, but it's steady and that spells absolute disaster for US car manufacturers:
https://www.coxautoinc.com/insights/q3-2026-ev-sales-report-...
US car companies have been protected and bailed out too many times and are now not only completely uncompetitive on the global market, but set up to be completely demolished as EVs take over.
Their bad leadership and overall inefficiency mean that either investors are going to pay a massive price, or US consumers are going to pay a massive price. If we keep on pushing up consumer costs by propping up bad manufacturers with protectionism and bail outs, the US's entire economy is drug down by that.
There needs to be some creative destruction, ruthless culling of the least efficient manufacturers, so that their best workers can go to the better manufacturers, if the US is ever going to be a top tier car manufacturer again.
I hadn't followed just how bad US manufacturers were failing at EVs the past two years, what with all the other disasters unfolding, thanks for the wake up call. Two years of wasted time, of the US falling even farther behind... such a massive fail and yet not the most massive.
It isn't just US manufacturers.
I'd say Koreans are probably the closest to the Chinese, but Japanese manufacturers have fallen behind. Toyota spent too much time with hydrogen. Nissan? Honda? Mazda? None of them have a solid lineup of electric vehicles.
I appreciate Toyota's hybrids, but that is not the future and every model year that they try to delay, they are missing out on developing the technology, experience, internal expertise, and platform refinement.
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I hate to see it and I hate to say it, but the last time I was in Europe there were A LOT more giant american vehicles, at least outside of city centers. I really hope this SUV plague doesn't go global.
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One state makes up over a third of all EV sold in the country EV’s have a way to go in the United States. Hybrids seem to be doing a lot better in recent times.
California accounts for roughly 35% of all U.S. EV sales, though some estimates put its share near 40%.
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> Two years of wasted time
Try two generations. I think it was obvious since the oil shocks that fossil fuels were not a good bedrock of the economy.
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Full disclosure: I have been driving an EV for almost a decade. I use an e-bike too. Electric commuting is brilliant. I'm glad for the sake of air quality that EVs and e-bikes exist and are increasingly popular.
That said — let's be realistic and dispassionate.
> There needs to be some creative destruction, ruthless culling of the least efficient manufacturers, so that their best workers can go to the better manufacturers, if the US is ever going to be a top tier car manufacturer again.
Inflicting job losses at that scale is not going to happen. US protectionism (a euphemism for ahem current federal initiatives) is alive and well. The legacy US auto makers have a huge domestic market and their survival is a primary motive for the US trade/tariff war. (Does the thoroughly corrupt administration face any comeuppance? That is a different discussion.)
The lack of EVs has not been a pivotal concern of voters. US voters want cheap fuel. Affordability was a fundamental concern for voters. The mid-term election result is not about loftier environmental goals.
> Their bad leadership and overall inefficiency
Yes, "an American vehicle" is known for grotesque size and high cost of maintenance. And now after two years of a despicable administration, "an American vehicle" is also a Trump-Miller-Hegseth-Bessent-Lutnick-Musk-*.arsehole symbol.
Even so, Tesla sales success is real, domestic and abroad. People who can afford them buy them.
> - Chinese EVs are dominating every market outside the US.
Not so in Europe, where the top 10 EVs sold in 2025 [1] has not a single Chinese car.
[1] https://autorai.nl/tesla-van-de-troon-gestoten-als-populairs...
Chinese EV have heavy import taxes in the EU. Also in France, (I don’t know in other countries), you get more subvention when buying an EU-made EV. This heavily distorts the market to try to save VW and friends.
I see sources saying BYD sold 187,657 vehicles in Europe in 2025, and MG sold 307,812. Interesting.
Your source only says: “Top 5 best-selling EV brands in Europe in 2025 Volkswagen – 274.417 (+56%) Tesla – 238.765 (-27%) BMW – 193.186 (+15%) Skoda – 172.100 (+117%) Audi – 153.848 (+51%)”
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How long until they are devoured by the Chinese? Geely already owns Volvo.
Things have changed a lot since 2025. In fact in October BYD sold a ton of cars in Europe.
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>The stock is still surviving on Elon hype
I wish people would stop saying stood things like this and consider the structural and technical reasons why TSLA share values might be disconnected from the company's performance. (No one wants to do that because it might point to misbehavior by market participants.)
Hundreds of billions of dollars do not move because of "hype"; someone, somewhere is making a calculated decision.
I think they have a future as a "normal" car company, but in order to do that they'd have to manage to deliver a new "normal car" model at some point, and accept normal stock prices.
That EV market share direction in the US, though .. really bad compared to non-petrostates (except Norway)
They’ve never been a normal car company. And that’s the problem.
They don’t do a good job at the car company part. They make nice cars, but the company part has issues. Quick example… I was very happy to drive a model 3 for many years. But the constant changes in price of their new cars destroyed any resale value mine had. Every time Tesla was having a bad quarter, the value of my car dropped. That’s not the way to get me to buy another one.
There are certainly other areas where they could improve too. But my point being - they’ve never been all that good at (or interested in) what it takes to drive long term success in selling cars. It’s just too long of a time horizon for them.
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The problem is that transition would require a ~95% drop in stock price, and the company isn't going to survive that.
GM - $74.5B market cap (6.2M cars sold annually)
Ford - $50.2B (4.6M)
Volkswagen - $40B (9M)
BYD - $100B (4.6M)
Toyota - $256B (11.3M)
Hyundai - $57B (7.3M)
Tesla - $1.4T (1.6M)
The numbers simply don't add up.
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Musk has said Tesla's future is cybercabs and robots, not a normal car company.
Oooh, normal cars. Now there's a concept. Can we get a real EV minivan? Not a gimmick like the Buzz. I've got kids and go on long road trips to visit family. Seats, cargo capacity, range, and 800V charging speed.
Closest thing is like the Ioniq 9 but the cargo space really sucks.
For a polished product that ticks all the boxes, I would pay a premium for this.
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Wikipedia maintains a list.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_predictions_for_autono...
I live in SE Asia and travel regularly for work in this region. Chinese EV's are everywhere and completely dominate the market, except perhaps a few fans in Singapore, it's living driving in the future (Denza D9 anyone?) compared to Western countries (tech-wise, not the questionable production and market flooding)
It's more likely he'll merge Tesla with SpaceX.
I get all my news from Matt Levine and this is what he keeps saying.
> unsupervised autopilot
They are running a fleet of taxis around the Bay Area. It's kind of scary because they aren't that safe, given the lack of LIDAR. But they are doing it anyway.
They all have someone behind the wheel. Tesla doesn't have a driverless permit in the Bay Area.
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In the Bay Area they have human supervisors but in Austin they are autonomous.
Is there data to suggest they are unsafe in Austin - as in less safe than a human?
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What makes you say they aren't safe? The numbers say they are about 4-6x safer than a car with a human driver.
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Photogrammetry + AI has developed to the degree, that there are 3D scanning apps on iPhone that don't even use the Lidar when available, so you can certainly make do without and get comparable results.
https://www.tesla.com/robotaxi/safety
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A fleet of hundreds of cars, right? Maybe even thousands including Austin? All with no LIDAR, and operating perhaps up to 18 hours a day?
So then where are all the horrible accidents if they're not safe?
Why do you assume lidar is must for safety. So far the Tesla auto pilot record is better than human drivers
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I don’t see why it’s scary. Most cars on the road have a driver and no LIDAR. The cybercab is no different.
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> unsupervised autopilot
Robotaxi is live in some markets. I've used it twice here in Houston. Works quite well.
I was under the impression there were teleoperators for their taxi fleet: https://electrek.co/2025/05/16/tesla-robotaxi-fleet-powered-...
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> - EV sales share in the US is down to 6% (and falling every quarter).
Wow. Compare with 41% in France (in October), 37% in Germany, 60% in China.
From what I've heard, the autopilot is very good and getting better. It is hard to distinguish the haters from the hype.
I rented one for a road trip. It was nothing short of magical. Scary to give it control. And I can believe there are edge cases … but it’s real.
I’d guess that it’s going to take a while to catch up because the real world data is the moat. Maybe if someone partners with Waymo but the price point will be higher.
The thing that gives me pause about buying one is: what happens if the company loses interest? Is it like “owning” a game after the company shuts down the servers?
It's actually easy. The media would love to print stories about robotaxis having chaotic accidents, so you can trust that you will hear about it if that starts happening.
You might be waiting a while, though... If it's not happening now, it's unlikely to ever happen.
I have it. It is shockingly good but not as good as a person. And anything below 100% is dangerous.
For instance, how it detects pedestrians. Ive had instances where someone is looking to cross, the FSD either ignores them completely or it slows down a little, baits them into going forward, then resumes running them over. It detects car to car problems very well but doesn’t try to interpret pedestrian’s intent outside of the actual road.
I’ve heard the same but I think the question is “is autopilot worth basing your entire car purchase around it?” and “will competitors be able to replicate Tesla’s success?”.
If autopilot is basically the only thing Tesla has going for it then they’ve got a risky path ahead of them.
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I, and many others, could never go back to a vehicle that doesn't have this level of self-driving. It really is such an improvement it's crazy how little people who haven't experienced it understand.
> Manufacturing costs haven't come down
That’s not true in general but the Cybertruck in particular is stupid expensive to manufacture. And then there’s the 4680 fiasco. I think it’s more of a personal political design than a realistic product.
I’d say Tesla’s charging network remains a very strong suit for them. Problem is it’s nowhere near strong enough to justify their current valuation. But we’ve been saying this for years and the stock price still stays irrationally high.
Do you ever see any legacy American car companies getting close to what Tesla can do, even with a 10yr timeline?
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It’s slightly amazing how persistent the Elon hype is. Quite a few of those problems are at least partially due to own goals that Musk himself has been scoring.
I realize that some of it is just a cult of personality, and that part will be unusually sticky because of things like cognitive dissonance. But that can’t be all of it. My next best guess is a bunch of it is a whole bunch of institutional investors are privately thinking these companies are way too risky, but keep it to themselves because it’s not their money they’re putting on the line and taking a contrarian position would risk angering a presumably vocal subset of clients of unknown size. Which isn’t a great way to make yourself popular with your boss.
If he had delivered Neuralink alone, the hype would be valid. Doing that...plus SpaceX, Tesla, Boring, etc.
The biggest knock on him is that he says something will happen at a certain time and then it comes later. Even the sub-$30k EV. Cybercabs cost < $30k.
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> a whole bunch of institutional investors are privately thinking these companies are way too risky
What's that saying? "In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority than to be right alone"?
There’s a severe lack of focus and the only endgame that still makes sense to me for Tesla is basically turning into a cab service like Waymo. Perhaps you own the car perhaps not.
Hundreds of Cybercabs are driving around cities right now with no steering wheel or pedal making money and growing 20% a week, Model Y is the best selling car (of any type) in the planet. European sales are going through the roof, they are doubling production.
Cybertruck was a mistake but rest of the business is printing cash hand over fist.
> European sales are going through the roof
A side effect of Trump's war with Iran is that every country which doesn't have sufficient domestic oil production, which is most countries especially in Europe, has accelerated their EV transition. Buyers are grabbing every EV they can get their hands on, and yes Tesla are the leader there.
https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/uk-electric-car-registratio...
"Tesla (TSLA.O), led the UK BEV market year-to-date, with registrations up 25.4% from a year earlier and a 9.53% market share South Korea's Kia (000270.KS), and China's BYD (002594.SZ), continued to compete for second place, with market shares of 6.9% and 6.8%, respectively"
The Kia model breakdown: https://www.kiapressoffice.com/releases/1975 (mostly Niro, now withdrawn, then EV6)
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If something is growing 20% a week, it should see more than 1,000,000% growth after 1 year. I call bullshit on this one.
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> Model Y is the best selling car (of any type) in the planet.
Depends on the year. It and the RAV4 switch places now and then.
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> European sales are going through the roof, they are doubling production.
Only when compared to their recent record lows... the broader trend is still downwards. This is disingenuous. They are losing ground to other manufacturers in Europe
Also the Teslas that Europe is buying are made in China not the US.
The countries where EVs are increasing the most are those that have access to Chinese EVs.
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> Hundreds of Cybercabs are driving around cities right now with no steering wheel or pedal making money and growing 20% a week
Huh? The cybercab with no steering wheel is only operating in Austin, in tiny premapped areas. There are 45 registered in Texas, and they have only been operating since September.
This isn’t Twitter, you’re generally expected to at least attempt to provide factual information here.
https://www.fox7austin.com/news/tesla-launches-cybercab-aust...
“Printing money hand over fist” is an interesting way to frame the dramatic drop in their margin on every vehicle sold.
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Not sure what numbers you are looking at but Tesla vehicle sales peaked in 2023 and have been falling every year since then. The "sales going through the roof" narrative exists on Twitter, not their balance sheet.
Poe's Law is still in effect. You have to add an /s at the end.
The proliferation of over-the-top EVs around 2019-21, not just from Tesla, did make me think something was wack with the subsidies. Gas was insanely cheap for part of that too.
> Federal EV tax credits are over.
It's crazy that Democrats were the pro EV party because of the environment, and half the reason liberals bought Teslas, but Elon's white supremacy overrode his business interests and he went all in with the fossil fuel party. And Tesla shareholders rewarded him with an insane pay package for this genius move.
Democrats abandoned the environment in lieu of this weird obsession with socialism- starting with the unions. First, Tesla was repeatedly snubbed when the Biden administration poured billions into every other car company to make them produce EVs- gleefully declaring GMC of all companies to be the Leader of EVs. Then, the COVID situation where the local staff member in government made it illegal for Tesla, and only Tesla, to continue operating. That's when Elon finally got the message that the Democratic party had abandoned him, and cared more about raising money than any kind of environment or progress. He then went on twitter, called it out, and then the entire democratic party reformed under the banner of Anti-Elon (since the whole trans and immigrant stuff was settling down a bit too much to encourage passion).
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It's hilarious to me when Democrats crash out over Elon's reliance on EV credits, as though acting on the incentives they created was a moral failure on his part.
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He'll just fold Tesla into SpaceX to cover up the ashes.
This is the most realistic scenario. Hide the stock losses by folding it into SpaceX. Dare the US government to nationalize it. Walk away a “business martyr”.
Lol what ashes? Tesla has the best selling vehicle in America, only faces real competition from Google and China.
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Elon leaves the company, maybe they focus more on quality, good UX, and a lot of people not currently buying Teslas because they are owned by a nazi and have bad UX and quality issues might start.
> It's hard to see where Tesla goes from here as a company.
Probably will get acquired by SpaceX to hide the poor financials
Federal EV tax credits are over partly by Elon's hand. Masterclass level foot-gunning.
And subsidies in California, which he hates, are responsible for an outsized part of sales.
He seems to suggest that the future is Cybercabs and Optimus.
But if Optimus ends up with a HW3 problem (current manufactured Optimus bots aren't autonomus yet because the software isn't finished) he'll have a pile of Cybertrucks and early-model Optimus units rotting in a field.
Personally, I just don't see it. If he merges Tesla and SpaceX it won't really be about cars or vehicle autonomy.
Their current stock valuation can't ride this uncertainty forever. At some point he has to have new products that work, no caveats.
He's also looking at an incoming congress that is going to give him a colonoscopy that he didn't ask for.
The only people I've seen driving cybertrucks tend to be asian or older white guys that likely think Elon is great. Yes, this is a generalization, but an observation over thousands of miles between the Bay Area and Vancouver, BC.
I think Tesla is in for more hurt over the coming years, which I don't think is necessarily a bad thing in my opinion on how Musk has handled himself in the public arena with Tesla and Starlink.
He'll trigger the sale of Tesla to SpaceX so he can get his tranche before that happens.
Don't forget, they built a truck that's near impossible to sell outside the US due to the fact it's way too big and deadly for other road users.
Elon made this into something cool, but creating a whole model line for a single country is risky. Especially if that model is already in a small niche and has an incredibly controversial design.
Not sure why you didn't mention Elon Musk zeig heiling at the inauguration he helped buy which led to a mass boycott.
They already pivoted to AI.
Also, the truck was ugly, awkward, and not good at being a truck.
Elon resigning from Tesla and just letting it run as a reasonable car company making just regular incremental quality and price and new model improvements on normal vehicles people want to drive could be the best thing for the company. The Model 3 is a huge success. That they didn't follow that up with just a regular pickup truck in a similar niche, and instead got distracted by this cybertruck nonsense is an indictment of Musk's poor leadership at this point.
They should just be the Toyota of EVs -- mass produce quality vehicles people want to drive -- instead he's trying to be Tony Stark and keep pumping it as a meme stock.
Tesla remains excellent at engineering and manufacturing. They need not seek the exotic.
He's a liability to that company, not an asset, at this point. And his name has become a brand liability.
The weird contradiction of musk is that his name is what’s propping up most of his companies/projects but his proximity to his companies is also a threat to them.
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My wife took an overhyped Moonshot for a ride when she was on holiday in Texas last month and sent us all a video - just saying
Did it fly?
>The stock is still surviving on Elon hype but has been stagnant for 5 years.
People may actually start buying Teslas again if they're no longer associated with a fascist trillionaire. The number of "I bought this before Elon went crazy" bumper stickers is very high. The people who would buy an electric car are turned off by his association with the brand. He's more of an albatross on the brand than a hype machine.
Throwing his first-mover advantage into the dumpster to get in bed with the political party who despises not only his core customer base but the very premise of his business is forever baffling.
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- When it released, people were lighting Tesla stores and charging stations on fire, flipping off drivers, spitting on the cars even when kids were inside, and defacing them. This was generally supported, and for some reason a lot of people sided with the vandals in an effort to still be considered a Democrat and show hatred of The Other Side.
It's still week 1 and we're already in full on persecuted mode?
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Elon's honestly their biggest problem. Can't focus on finishing one thing to save his life and alienated the shit out of the European market with his fascist beliefs.
https://bestsellingcarsblog.com/2026/10/finland-september-20...
Seems like your conclusions are wrong
From my perspective, owning a truck and SUV and using them differently for various use cases, the cybertruck is neither. So even if I ignore everything else I feel about it’s aesthetic, Musk, politics, etc. It simply does not serve many real world needs that I have. It put itself in a very narrow box of, only people that really like this quirky design and also like/feel indifferent to the tangential stuff will want to buy this truck. Oh, also you have to be able to afford it too. This is such a small addressable market for a vehicle to target. Was never going to work.
However, it provided content and distraction and kept the stock high longer than it should have and I feel like that’s what Musk continues to excel at.
I found out the same with pickup trucks generally.
I got one, years ago. The bed was not large enough to readily hold full sheets of plywood (the minivan I owned before could hold full sheets!). And yet, the truck was long such that parking, maneuvering in parking lots, etc, was a pain in the ass (here the minivan was about tied with the truck).
So sucked as a regular errand-car, sucked for hauling sheet goods.
(Sold it during the tail of Covid when used car prices were skyrocketing for whatever reason. Never again.)
Nailed it. I considered buying a truck for years, but the minivan has everything I want out of a vehicle. I'm so glad we got one. It's strictly better for hauling dimensional or ply, strictly better for long road trips, for gas mileage, etc. It even tows more than my jeep did, but not as much as a full size pickup. and it has a really nice reconfigurable roof rack, so adding a trip carrier on top is simple. Add to that the optional bench in back, the built in vacuum, the built in TV + entertainment, the full length moonroof, on and on.
It's a luxury vehicle that beats SUVs hands down, and most functions of urban trucks as well.
It just gets soccer mom vibes, so it's not $120,000
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> The bed was not large enough to readily hold full sheets of plywood
Many trucks are sold as not much more than vehicles to haul around some plants. But, what I would consider 'real' trucks tend to have 8' beds. My old Toyota Tundra was great at towing, had an 8' bed and was generally an all around great vehicle. It was long, but it was meant to be.
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This is why I don't get trucks with tiny beds. I've had a few Chevy 1500's and those were great with the full length bed. I've got a 2nd generation Tacoma with its longer bed, and its just on the edge of too small for some things.
I see people with trucks with 4ft beds (like the weird Jeep thing) and they just seem useless. Gimme an 8ft bed, ideally a bit longer! I don't need a big cab, but I have a truck to be a truck!
(Really, my 2nd gen Toyota Tacoma is pretty close to perfect 95% of the time for me, especially with a cap on the back)
Sheet goods fit in my truck, but I don’t want to load/unload them to that height. The bed is mostly good for dirty stuff I don’t want in the interior of any vehicle. Muddy boots, bags of concrete, kids sports gear, etc. for sheet goods and bigger heavy stuff I have a trailer and the truck the towing capacity for most needs. Occasionally I still need a heavy duty and just rent it.
The Tahoe I had last was a great as I keep tools and what dry in the truck. It only had 2 rows of seating and I don’t need more passenger space in my vehicle. My wife has the city vehicle SUV that we keep clean and use for passengers. Mine is the work / utility vehicle.
When I replaced it recently , the same trim level cost twice as much as a Silverado. And they all have 3 rows now, which means I lose most that space.
It’s all about trade offs. No vehicle is a perfect all rounder. I’d prefer the Tahoe but didn’t want to pay extra for it and have to yank out the 3rd row. I could own a Corolla but it would be overly inconvenient, and probably more expensive over time, to rent a larger vehicle every time I need it.
I'm not a car guy, buy there's a car podcast I really like where the host often tells people that even though they think they want a truck or an SUV, they probably need a minivan or a station wagon.
Sports cars are for the track, trucks are for hauling, and most drivers don't need either.
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I always encourage people to consider a two door if they're planning to use the truck for utility purposes.
I picked up a 70k mile 2011 Silverado from an Ontario government auction for $3000 and it's worked great. Tows my boat, carries my dirt bikes, and has enough room in the cab for me, my partner, and my dog between us. Who needs a backseat!
The Ford F-150 Lightning also failed and it was a full truck. It similarly was way too expensive, both for consumer and Ford, and had some issues with towing (range).
I had a friend who 'preordered' to get Cybertruck and he couldn't justify the price which was $140k CAD, so he bought a new Chevy pickup truck instead for $70-80k CAD.
I think a lot of the F-150s failure comes down to dealers. You can read myriad stories in the EV subreddits of dealers putting "market adjustments" on the Lightning and Mach-E of tens of thousands of dollars. It was if they didn't want them to sell, and I think we all know why (lower revenue from regular maintenance like oil changes and other fluids).
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That’s a hard comparison point though when the ICE F-150 was the perfect substitute it was competing against. To me, that mostly proves that people didn’t want to go electric or pay the premium for it. The F150 design itself, does fit the bill as a truck doing what a truck needs to do.
I also bought a new Chevy truck recently for less than $40k USD, mid tier trim. Other trucks can be very affordable. The trim and budget options are quite wide. Tesla was never going to get to that as it requires volume.
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No idea why it "failed" or was discontinued. From what i remember there was a huge waitlist to get one. I know lots of people that wanted on. It looked amazing IMO. I dont think it was a demand issue that caused it to be canceled
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The Lightning didn't really fail. It was the best selling EV pickup in the US by a large margin.
I think it was killed for political reasons: They repurposed the plant for AI datacenter batteries. I predict we'll have EV pickup trucks again if the 2028 election looks like the 2026 election.
Anyway, my next full sized pickup will also be a pure EV. If I can't get a Ford, then I'll get something else. (The lightning is far better at truck stuff than our late model GMC and Ram trucks were. Maybe I can get a truck from China + register in Mexico? Is that a thing?)
The new Lightning has a useless serial hybrid setup and gets 700 miles of range (who needs that?). I suspect it'll end up being like other serial hybrids, and an option to omit the gas engine will be available, and also substantially lower the price (or enable a larger battery). In the meantime, they'll tell Trump that he managed to kill EV pickup trucks.
I don't know, seems like there was a lot of demand for the Lightning, still not sure why Ford canned it.
If:
Fuel economy regulations had not been suspended and the electric vehicle credits hadn't expired I'll bet there would still be a Lightning.
Unlike the CyberTrash. The question (to me) is did Ford make a semi-rational short-term financial decision at the expense of its future competitiveness?
Van like Fiat Ducato is superior to american pickups: more volume, more payload great fuel economy for half the price of f150.
I remember when this thing came out how Walter isaacson came out with his biography treating it as if it was Steve Jobs envisioning the personal computer, celebrating the design process as if the cybertruck’s success was a foregone conclusion.
I lost all my respect for isaacson at that time as it was clear he’d entered a bubble himself.
This also seems along with a lot of other recent moves to reveal that money is getting tighter over there.
IIRC Issacon was sleeping with Musk’s mother while he was writing the book too.
That’s wild, I’ve never heard that. And to be clear my issue was not that I’m a perma Elon hater, it was Isaacson’s total impartiality to this biography and seeming desire to get swept up in the bubble which has at least in part been debunked.
I’ve heard that before but all searches come up completely blank, unsurprisingly
There are a lot of lenses through which to view the failure of the cybertruck: aesthetics, not enough truck not enough SUV, size, association of aesthetics with politics, etc. But I think the main one that is ignored is price.
The cybertruck was built in an era of high truck prices driven by zero interest rates. It bet on the price of trucks going up, just as the Ford F150 electric did. That was the wrong bet.
If it was a $40,000 truck, it would have a much bigger market despite all the other explanations of its failure. The market moved under it.
The average price paid for a full-size truck in the US is north of $65,000.
- https://www.theautopian.com/the-average-full-size-truck-now-...
- https://www.ceicdata.com/en/united-states/new-vehicle-averag...
And there has been 31% cumulative inflation since the cybertruck launched, so perhaps I should have said if it had been a $49,000 truck. But either way, it’s clearly a luxury vehicle that was disproportionately affected by interest rates.
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Do you know what the median price is?
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No longer...
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That's taking into account farm purchases though, which have a unique shape of "a new truck at any price" in good years zeroing out profits.
I think median, agriculture-excluded would be more representative.
Granted, that's still pushed up by loaded in-town trophy trucks without a spot of mud on them.
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Yeah, when they said $40k I thought I might get one. $100k, no, not me.
I think another big one was the time from announcement to release.
When it was announced, for those who wanted an electric truck, it was going to be the only game in town. By the time Tesla delivered, there were several options already on the road from various companies. The people who really wanted an electric truck were already happy customers of another company by the time the cybertruck shipped. I see a fair number of Rivian, F-150 Lightning, and Hummer EVs around me.
When it comes to price, I expect to see a lot of Slate trucks once it starts shipping, with its low price.
I thought their announcement coincided with the Lightning announcement and likely threw a cheap price out there to undermine it.
True still thru today: Trucks priced higher than the Cybertruck sell at higher volumes than the cybertruck.
Which undermines / invalidates your point.
See: F150 Raptor: 20-25k units per year (estimate), avg price: $100k
Yeah, but those ppl want trucks, not an EV "truck"
Worst thing Musk did in context of Tesla is to alienate core demographics for EVs with his politics.
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The article even said it was a rounding error in terms of Tesla’s earnings, and expectations were tepid to begin with, and other brands such as Ford also failed with electric trucks. It is not as big of a deal as people have made it out to be. The cars are Tesla’s main business by far. The Cybertruck was a distraction basically.
> expectations were tepid to begin with
Tesla projected selling 250k of these a year or $15-20b in revenue per year (20%+ of vehicle revenue for Tesla). This is a big number and would’ve added significant total vehicle sales. Instead, they’ve sold less than 70,000 total trucks over its production history. That’s why it’s a rounding error.
This is an absolute disaster and failure by any rational analysis. Its failure helped puncture “Tesla sales will continue to increase” and stock price justification storyline.
> It is not as big of a deal as people have made it out to be.
No more of a big deal than any other $2 billion loss.
I think the aesthetics are quite important. One thing that set Tesla apart was that they didn’t build weirdmobiles. They started out when manufacturers made “alternative” vehicles look weird to set them apart. The Prius is the classic example. The Leaf was another obvious one. This weirdness has an important impact on the market, because it meant that you called attention to yourself when you were driving one. When you drove a Prius, you weren’t just getting great gas mileage, you were figuratively shouting to everyone around you “look at me, I drive a Prius!” (With an implication of “I’m saving the planet,” and a further implication of “and you’re not, you philisitine.”)
Then Tesla makes an electric car that’s just a car. Surely, they put their own design touches on it, but it mostly looked like an ordinary sedan. Then they made something that mostly looked like an ordinary SUV. And then more ordinary-looking models. They looked distinctive but they didn’t look weird and didn’t make a statement the way a Prius did.
And then they make the weirdest weirdmobile that there ever was. And released it right before making a loud statement of “I’m driving an Elon Musk car!” became really unattractive to a lot of people.
> They started out when manufacturers made “alternative” vehicles look weird to set them apart. The Prius is the classic example.
The 1st gen Prius (97-01) looked utterly conventional though, just like a slightly taller Yaris due to the batteries. It was the second generation onward that looked "weird", I think due to aerodynamicsmaxxing.
It’s pretty easy to buy a $80k full size ICE truck.
Yes and:
Tesla scaled up CyberTruck production before finding product market fit. Somewhere tween SUV and truck, and without a clear purpose. (I thought Tesla's initial market segment was going to focus on who ever buys Jeeps, boondocking, outdoorsy stuff.)
IMHO, CyberTruck would have been a modest hit if first production run was 100. Treat CyberTruck like Roadster. A niche vehicle for a niche market. Grant enthusiasts the earliest access to the best technology.
I honestly thought that was the plan.
It would have been the cheapest, fastest way for Tesla to de-risk all of the innovations used in CyberTruck. Major stuff that Tesla's could not gracefully, incrementally add to their other models (eg 48V).
And a perfect precursor of for the Robocab (neé Model 2), that would benefit most from the innovations.
Oh well. What do I know? Musk is a trillionaire and I am not, so clearly not much.
> (I thought Tesla's initial market segment was going to focus on who ever buys Jeeps, boondocking, outdoorsy stuff.)
I'm part of that market and was initially curious about the cybertruck but it was clear that tesla was totally unserious about building an actual 4x4 overlanding vehicle. I'm not sure EVs are even there yet for a true exploring vehicle since it's the extreme end of the range problem. There are places people go that are a couple hundred miles from the nearest supercharger, and I bet rock crawling kills the range like towing does.
The actual target market was probably a guy who spends 100k on a heavily upgraded Rubicon that never drives on dirt or gets a scratch, and happens to be a huge elon fanboy.
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It didn't fail, more than Model S did, which saw the same fate.
It certainly did not "fail" on aesthetics. Few people would not take note of it, and it wasn't overly impractical. Some people hated DeLorean too, which just made it even more popular as well ...
> It didn't fail
Tesla forecasted selling 250,000 trucks per year by 2025
Actual sales
2024 - 38,965
2025 - 20,237
2026 to date - 11,586
This includes trucks that have been “sold” to other Musk companies.
This product was a complete failure, making the Ford Edsel look like a roaring success
The Model S was released when Tesla had sold a grand total of around 2,500 cars. It sustained the company for years and did most of the work bootstrapping them from tiny niche to a mass market car with the Model 3.
The Cybertruck was released when the company was selling millions of cars a year. It did pretty much nothing for their bottom line, didn’t break them into any new markers, and fell far short of expectations.
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> Some people hated DeLorean too, which just made it even more popular as well ..
They sold 9,000 DeLorean's _total_. It was a punchline in Back to the Future, it wasn't seen as cool at all.
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> Some people hated DeLorean too, which just made it even more popular as well
If you see CyberTrucks and DeLoreans as successful, I'd hate to see what you call a failure.
I like the aesthetics a lot. It recalls the DeLorean, which is one of my favorite automotive designs.
But the cost is steep when I'm more in the market for an SUV or offroading vehicle than a truck. Not to mention that the extent to which Musk and Tesla are intertwined with politics is really not an easy sell for me.
Yeah I'm another who actually likes the rough idea of the aesthetics.
A sedan built by another company with similar aesthetics without completely ignoring...well basically everything from safety to build quality, would probably be on my potential list.
Also the things are built like utter shit. The panels come unglued, they rust in the rain, the engine, suspension and steering malfunction, the trim cracks, they leak, they burst into flames, then the door handles don't work when your Cybertruck bursts into flames.
I have to assume that politics or sunk cost are the only reasons people keep these things because they are objectively awful vehicles.
Full disclosure: I work for a competitor to Tesla so I'm a bit biased.
The Cybertruck I thought was initially kind of neat but when you try to use one as a truck you quickly can see some glaring problems that most people who buy a truck want. Towing with an EV is terrible. I've heard there's power stations with pull throughs but havent' seen them personally. The truck bed isn't practical for anything but a lawn mower. When I ride in one it rides like a car. It doesn't look good dirty. I just think they were going for warthog from Halo and thought the rest would work out. It's also super expensive for all these issues. It's a hobby vehicle. A toy.
I think Tesla is struggling personally. The marketing tactics of showcasing cars we'll never be able to buy just to cause a scene. Don't get me wrong the new Roadster my jaw dropped and I agree with Elon now that SpaceX and Tesla are the 'same' company I think it's great but let's be realistic. Most people want cars that are cheap, dependable and sort of cool. Not everyone can afford multiple cars, and a corvette that isn't feasible. Like I said I work for a competitor (GM) and I fear China is going to eat our lunch. Unless we make infrastructure for charging better and make it a no brainer.
I would buy an electric car tomorrow, I have access to cheap charging, and I don't even do long commutes. But there is zero chance I want a spyware car that's like another cell phone.
The U.S. is being protectionist because of Chinese cars that can spy on U.S. soil-- just do the right thing and stop all the car spying nonsense. Require manufacturers to open the code and let us even develop alternatives.
Tell GM.
I have an electric Hyundai and you can disable all internet connectivity fairly easily. I have mine disabled and the car works fine. It never connects to any internet connection. I suspect that most other modern cars are similar. The firmware is closed source, but it works fine. It supports CarPlay and Android Auto, which are effectively open standards, so you can replace the infotainment system with whatever you want. This is standard for modern cars.
America is the only country where buying private data is legal so this is a flawed idea. Ford would definitely spy on you for those adbucks.
Heard of Slate Auto? Full electric, simple, no cellular modem at all, hand-crank windows.
IDK. Grok bot works with Tesla’s grok so today I learned I can just ask how’s my house is doing. It responded how much solar I’m making vs consuming, hows batteries are doing, is garage door open and flagged that my heatpump water heater is off (i shut it earlier because it can get little loud).
Yes you can sort of get there with Siri and HomeKit, bug nowhere close to sophistication.
Yes please. Make it a selling point and people will buy it.
Here in Australia, it's interesting how well the Tesla cars are still selling.
The model Y is still the best selling EV despite the wide choice of other brands. BYD out sell them in aggregate, but Tesla are holding their own pretty well. Of course, all the Tesla cars here are made in the Shanghai Gigafactory, but still, I don't think Chinese brand dominance is a forgone conclusion. I think the real danger is if American protectionism makes Tesla feel like they don't need to innovate any more.
Software is everything when it comes to EV's. As an American, I've had many years of experience with software from around the world. No one makes software more suited for Americans, than other Americans.
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China is bringing their more expensive cars first to make money once the market gets saturated then we might see more domination as they try to compete for more market share
How well does the self driving work over there? That's the real innovation and personally it seems to work well enough in America so I'm curious what your experience is with that.
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> now that SpaceX and Tesla are the 'same' company
Did I miss something big on the stock market or are these actually still two different public companies? How do the shareholders of both of these (ostensibly different, kind of unrelated) large publicly-held companies feel about them being conflated like this? Is there any historical precedent for this situation?
I read this as 2 phrases
“I agree with Elon now”
Meaning now I agree, and
“that SpaceX and Tesla are the 'same' company”
With ‘same’ in quotes meaning they are not literally the same but conceptually they are the same.
FTR I do not agree they are the ‘same’ company and I think the circular relationships between Musk’s companies is kind of like a shell game.
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They are still distinct public companies and they want to merge them. And even today the amount of cross mingling between those two entities however is quite significant. You would not necessarily know that they are independent from each other.
The roadster uses Space X propulsion tech, the cybercab uses starlink, grok is in all Tesla cars, both companies share Terafab. But then Tesla also supplies batteries and cybertrucks to Space X etc.
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They might be confusing X, which is a subsidiary of SpaceX. The IPO was just a vehicle to pay off X’s debt.
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There is a rumor going around that Musk is going to merge the two in December before the Democrats take power.
As I understand, electric motors deliver instant maximum torque. Isn't that advantageous for towing? You can get a good list of pros and cons from an LLM with a prompt like this: "towing with electric motor vs ice engine".
What is your opinion on the upcoming Tesla Semi? I expect that it will be successful, useful, and efficient.
Nobody expects an impressive 1/4 mile time from a vehicle towing a trailer. That's not what makes EVs bad at towing.
My towing-capable gas vehicle sees at worst a 30% decrease in range from towing my camping trailer, and my towing-capable diesel vehicle sees closer to a 10% decrease in range.
A while back, I read a comment on here from someone who lived in a trailer full-time as a digital nomad. They were also dedicated to driving an EV. They towed their small trailer with their Model Y. I grant you, the Model Y is not optimized for towing the way that the Cybertruck (ostensibly) is, but they described the process of travelling between Grand Junction, Colorado, and Moab, Utah, a distance just over 110 miles. With the trailer, they had to drive to Cisco, about halfway in between, drop the trailer, drive back to Grand Junction, recharge fully, drive back again, pick up the trailer, and drive the remaining 60 or so miles to Moab, where they could recharge again. Because without the trailer, they could drive the entire 1-way distance 3 times over without recharging. With the trailer, they could not make the whole trip once.
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It is reductive to say it is terrible. The issue is that the current range we are putting in trucks, adjusted for the range loss from towing a large trailer, is insufficient.
The Tesla Semi proves that this is the issue: with an extremely large battery and high-speed charging, the Semi solves these problems.
A regular truck that can TOW 300 miles would certainly not be "terrible for towing."
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They provided a concrete example: Trying to charge when a trailer is attached.
> As I understand, electric motors deliver instant maximum torque. Isn't that advantageous for towing?
Your understanding is not wrong, but quantity of torque is a minor piece of what matters, so that doesn't move the needle.
Towing lowers the range of an EV by so much that it becomes nearly useless. This is much more important with an EV than an ICE, because EV charging is less available and takes much longer.
It's understandable that you might not fully understand the magnitude of the pros and cons from your LLM prompt, those sorts of responses usually assume certain levels of experience and familiarity with the topic. It'll make more sense when you get older!
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The downside of electric motors for towing is that they require electricity.
And towing requires a lot of electricity. How do you bring enough electrons?
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Always thought it was designed after the '79 toy the Big Trak. Even the initial concept of the trailer looked like it was from the aesthetic.
Wow, I'd forgotten about these. Thanks.
I don't think the towing aspect matters much: I live in a semi-conservative rural area of the US with a lot of truck drivers, and about 90% of pickup trucks are used as glorified minivans / SUVs anyway that are kept clean at all times. The only pickup trucks I see towing anything are much older trucks (late 80s-early 2000s). Very old 80s Toyota Hilux / Ford Rangers are a common sight as well for filling the truck bed which carries a lot more volume that even modern trucks (most of the drivers don't care about going over the weight limit).
The Cybertruck failed because it's an awfully designed vehicle, along with all of the baggage of being associated with Elon Musk's politics (whether you agree with them or not).
I think it matters. There are lots of people who have a camper or a boat or some ATVs or whatever. Maybe they only take the camper out once or twice a year, and so you never see it hooked up. However, on that one week per year, they do need it to be able to tow.
Gas/Diesel trucks lose range when towing too, but dealing with a shorter range gas truck isn't too big of a problem on a trip beyond the extra cost. Gas stations are everywhere and it takes 5 minutes to fill up. At most gas stations, filling up while towing a trailer isn't too big of a problem. Even if your truck only had a 150 mile range while towing, it would only be a minor annoyance, and the reality is that you'll probably get at least 250 miles out of a tank.
If you're towing with an electric though, you probably are looking at less than 150 miles. Now every couple of hours you have to stop for probably an hour or so, even with a fast charger, because you're probably going to want to charge the truck to full, not 80%. You're also probably driving somewhat out of your way to hit charging stations that frequently if you're not in a very populated area.
> Towing with an EV is terrible.
If you have to charge, it can be a pain. It's fine for towing short distance. It can tow up to 11k lbs.
> The truck bed isn't practical for anything but a lawn mower.
Hard disagree. I've hauled gravel, lumber, furniture, appliances. It can fit a 4x8 sheet of sheetrock with the tailgate down.
> When I ride in one it rides like a car.
It drives like a sports car. Literally the most fun vehicle I've ever driven.
> It doesn't look good dirty.
Disagree, I think it looks better dirty. More dystopian.
> It's also super expensive
The price for the AWD dual motor is comparable to other pickups.
It's also the safest pickup truck you can buy, according to the IIHS and NHTSA.
Make it make sense. A silverado Turbomax can tow 12k and the bed can handle cargo up to 2500lbs and it's around 45k and a cybertruck easy 85k. Don't get me wrong some of what I said was opinionated.
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> I think Tesla is struggling personally. The marketing tactics of showcasing cars we'll never be able to buy just to cause a scene
I think as a car company they're doing alright. They sell two of the most popular vehicles on the road. But the valuation of TSLA is 15-20x what it would be if they were valued at a car company, which is why you get over-the-top demos like the roadster.
>Towing with an EV is terrible
Why?
I explained this in my other comment but I'll paste it here:
The thing is that ICE vehicles are so inefficient to begin with, but a towed trailer needs the same amount of energy regardless of what is towing it. Imagine a trailer takes 1 unit of energy to move, and ICE truck takes 5 units to move itself, and EV truck takes 1 unit to move itself.
The ICE truck towing it would go from 5 units to 6 units, reducing the range by 16%.
The EV truck would now go from 1 unit to 2 units, reducing the range by 50%.
So the better your efficiency, the worse you are at towing. Ideally EV trucks would have such a huge battery that even when the range is reduced by 50%, it is still as long as a gas truck's range, but modern battery technology is still too sucky to achieve this.
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The charging port is on the rear of the Cybertruck, which means if you have a trailer attached, you would have to find a charger with a long enough cable, or one that lets you pull all the way through.
If the charging port were on the front of the vehicle, you could pull straight in, but now your trailer is probably blocking traffic.
Of course you could disconnect and reconnect the trailer, which adds an extra 5-10 extra minutes to your 15-40 minute charge time depending on your battery level.
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Aging Wheels on YouTube basically concluded that EV towing from a handling perspective is actually quite superior, but the charging and range is so much worse that depending on what you're doing it's likely a dealbreaker.
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How do I pull into a charging station when I'm towing a camper?
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Range is cut in half for starters.
I've seen pull through charger spots at the Rivian stations where I charged my VW.
We have Rivian charging stations in Montana and Idaho that have pull through bays.
The top comment says that the cybertruck is neat?!?!?! TS;dr. Is there a sort order that improves HN comments?
China (e.g. BYD et al) is basically banned from selling in your USA country. They will not eat your lunch there.
Everywhere else on the planet, though? Most certainly.
> I've heard there's power stations with pull throughs but havent' seen them personally.
FWIW Rivian has pull through charging stations along I-5, so they do exist. In general, their charging infrastructure is very reliable, uses renewable energy (matching), and is fast (even for my non-Rivian EV) and is not associated with a fascist.
> Like I said I work for a competitor (GM) and I fear China is going to eat our lunch.
AFAIK outside of trucks GM is mostly a reseller of chinese cars these days.
> I agree with Elon now that SpaceX and Tesla are the 'same' company
Why? Doesn’t make any sense to me although there is much speculation as to why Musk wants to merge them.
I mean the synergy is there to do some amazing stuff with vehicles.
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People intuit cost per mile, if states stop making it illegal for Tesla to charge less insurance themselves with FSD, it’s possible they win.
China can produce 7M more vehicles annually than the entire world (including them) needs, so the world has to decide whether to give up all their manufacturing to let china do it, or china has to increase worker’s rights and pay so that they can afford to buy more vehicles (their currency and financing tactics essentially reduce purchasing power at scale to fund their manufacturing infrastructure).
It'll likely be both
Towing with EV isn’t exactly truck or Tesla problem. So I kinda agree for those particular cases it’s pretty bad choice. But most don’t do that and just like big cars with utility.
> Towing with an EV is terrible.
Why? I saw a Cybertruck towing a Porsche 911 racing a Porsche 911 and winning. That seems like decent torque.
Range is the problem, of course.
All EV trucks suck at pulling, so that's a category problem. It's designed to ride like a car, as truck dynamics of leaf spring suspension on a solid rear axle isn't actually good technically. The feel, though, is a personal preference. It is not a hobby nor a toy: it is fully functional as a truck other than for pulling long miles. It is way more capable than other trucks on certain dimensions. Other trucks are outrageously expensive with similar features. I feel like you are biased.
How do you not understand the trickle down effect of motorsports, given that you work for a competitor? The tech in the roadster trickles down to normal cars (e.g., its drivetrain advancements), and possibly to off-planet rovers (Earth is the brutal case to test the equipment on, but I don't know enough about the potential to reuse here).
>there's power stations
you lost me here, laughing. Nobody calls them that. You’ve never driven an EV long distance, much less actually towed with one.
I’ve towed 5000+ lbs, including a mid-size SUV on a trailer, cross-country with another EV half of a dozen times. Stopping a lot is bit tedious, but it drives so well. The Rivian and Silverado both have big packs and work well. The Lightning didn’t have enough range for long-distance towing.
Moving a trailer around in town or taking a boat or camper to a lake nearby would be comfortable and the torque makes the drive effortless.
5,000 lbs is not some kind of grand feat.
A 3.6L V6 can do that easily and they are dime a dozen.
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The absurdity is the best part of it. Finally it was something new, in a landscape where every car and truck has looked the same for the past 20 years. I'm happy someone designed and built something so crazy and different.
It probably would have been better had they not been mass produced, and maybe did a very limited quantity run - make it more like a collector item... I suppose thats what it'll be now. I see quite a few on the road, it takes away from the uniqueness.
Tesla's mission was never to built "something crazy and different". In fact it was kind of the opposite: when Model S came out, Tesla showed the world that EVs don't need to look or drive differently than traditional cars, because all EVs which came before Model S were either looked like a concept car or a small toy-like car. Tesla continued this success with Model 3 and Model Y. Then they started deviating from their mission and came up with Cybertruck. All they needed to do was to show the world that an EV truck can be just as practical and capable as a gasoline truck. They didn't need to go crazy with the design, make it bullet-proof, choose stainless steel which made the manufacturing harder... They shot themselves in the foot.
I find the auto market stale as well. However the CT could have been so much better if it sought to answer that demand with a positive vision rather being a reactionary revolt. Somehow a food critic has given the best critique that I've seen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEcZSM6xS80
The Oscar Meyer weiner truck is also unique
I really agree with you here. I would never buy one (vw buzz is more my style) but I loved it in a weird “thank god something new and unique” way. Like my love for good brutalist office buildings even if I’d never want to live in a brutalist home.
The amount of hate it gets has been yet another clear indication to me just how annoyingly tribal people are. It shows you’re in the in-group and definitely-a-righteous-good-guy if you hate on the cybertruck. Not hating on the cybertruck is basically admitting you’re a fascist (I’ve had a friend literally tell me this non-jokingly). I think that’s really what 80% of the hate comes down to.
Hating the cybertruck might be tribal for some people, but definitely not everyone. I thought it was stupid and ugly from the moment it was announced, and I still think it's stupid and ugly, and it is demonstrably bad at the job of "being a truck".
You can celebrate Tesla for trying something new while still hating the actual thing that they tried for being bad.
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lol, no. I actually saw one at a client's and beside being uglier than what a 5yo would be able to draw, it was also built like shit. I'm talking about going to the hardware store for aluminum panels and bend them, cut with scissors and some soldering job here and there kind of bad.
thank god these monstruosities were forbidden in europe
This is a false binary.
The design aesthetics for automobiles can be stale and this could also be a terrible, unworkable, ugly design.
The Ioniq 5 leans into the same aesthetic too and that car is everywhere now, so it's not like there's anything fundamentally keeping that from working.
I'll take boring sameness over sharp pedestrian-mangling edges, thanks.
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As much as I dislike Musk, it was nice to see someone try something that didn't look identical to every other car/truck on the road.
This take is widespread on this venture capital fan forum, but it's both incorrect and a retreat. The Cybertruck was poorly thought out, sold teribly, and is now dead. By example it has discouraged future diversity in automotive design.
Good design that breaks the mold and then succeeds for that reason is what changes the world. Bad design that starts from the desire to be different without understanding the forces that led to the preexisting equilibrium is what we got. If you start out with hundreds of billions of dollars you can fake it for much longer, but if your premise is fundamentally economically incorrect then it will only last as long as you can subsidize it.
It is impossible for someone's statement of preference to be incorrect. You may differ in your opinion, but the gp is not wrong for having their own opinion.
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I am tired of grey painted eggs too. The design language has gone downhill.
My understanding is more that economy and safety standards have driven us towards these aerodynamic and impact absorbing shapes. I may be quite wrong though!
The cybertruck had good enough safety ratings, but kinda just decided to not care about the aerodynamics and economy side. Which freed Elon up a lot in terms of style.
Personally, I also agree that it was refreshing to see something bold out there on the road. It's just that the final product looked just 'off' enough to make it look bad in the end.
Like, it's wheel base is about 6 inches too long and the ride height is about 6 inches too low, making it look a bit toddler-y to my eyes. The bed was also just not practicable and too small (something I see on a lot of trucks these days). The speed was good, the torque was great, the giant screen you can't feel when driving was not. The seats were uncomfortable for my build.
Overall, the car was a statement, one that just barely missed the mark to my eyes, but it did miss
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No more flat primer gray cars.
That’s a platform we can all get behind.
Except it is very ugly and the triangle profile created a impractically large windshield and caused the bed cover to completely block the rear window when closed.
Thr angular Cybertruck design was actually not primarily for show. It comes from the fact that its body is made from cold-rolled, full-hard stainless steel that can't be stamped into arbitrary shapes. Ordinary car bodies are made from steel that can be stamped but is not stainless, so they require paint.
The original design was that the body would be made from these panels. The exoskeleton structure.
The Cybertruck that was released did not have that, instead the panels are just normal body parts connected to a standard car frame underneath - like any other car.
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Nice? It's a machine thst kills pedestrians. I rather no one try anything different if that keeps pedestrians safer.
They didn't go for looks though. The whole premise was ease of manufacturing. An interesting idea that soon proved to be invalid. But they pushed forwards anyway for some reason (and we all know that reason).
I prefer not to drive next to dangerous art projects.
Instead they ripped off the design of a garbage container.
Meanwhile all other Tesla models look exactly the same. Doesn't help that people buy them like the other appliances in their lives, meaning that they're almost all white too.
Oh, what could have been. https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/tesla-electric-pickup-truck-...
I want an electric El Camino.
Isn't that kind of the dream of Slate? I reserved two, btw, hard agree.
I think you're about to get something similar with the Ford Fathom.
Who wouldn't?
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If you build it, they will come.
Yet again I consider the disparities between the US market, as described by commentors, and the UK market. Cybertrucks never made it to road legality here, and would probably have required an HGV license (if the maximum manufacturer permitted vehicle+load weight is over 3500kg).
The US style pickup is pretty rare. There are some Ford Ranger/Raptors, which look comically large but are apparently smaller than the common F150 (??). People who need a truck bed get a Ford Transit or similar with the bed variant.
Agricultural use cases are handled with actual tractors (who can use the cheaper "red" diesel!)
The pickup in the US is a staple of the plumber, roofer and other tradesmen, and as you say; this use case as a tradesman’s tool is broadly filled by the panel van in Europe.
To some extent you even see this in New York too. Certainly there’s a need for these vehicles in rural areas where road conditions may be poor or absent altogether and the work needs done regardless.
The cybertruck on the other hand isn’t a work vehicle, it’s bought by the same people who buy the super kitted out models and who have no interest in using it for work, let alone taking the thing off road.
Ultimately I think of it as the modern Delorean, but I don’t think it will engender the same level of good will when it ages out and becomes less common due to the increasingly negative profile of Musk and his connections to the politics in which the vehicle was created.
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It can be, if you let it
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxus_T90 (EV version)
Could be: https://www.slate.auto/en
If their range was better this would be my next vehicle purchase…
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Sort of glad I wasn't tempted to buy a Tesla yute.
Edge Trucks starting next year
I think about this a lot
It looks so smol IRL
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EV trucks sound good but you can't haul anything heavy or your range plumments. Unless the battery is huge but that is weight. A truck that can't haul is just for show.
Even gasoline trucks are stupid no low end torque, you need to rev it. I had a 6 cylinder Cummins diesel and at 500rpm idle on a hill it could move the 10,000 pound truck up the hill.
I feel like this is less true nowadays. Or at least, less of a concern.
I have a Rivian and my 400mi range gets cut significantly (down to 200 or 300, depending on the trip) when I have 7k lbs on the back, but never enough to stop me from towing. And with good charging in the area, it's a non issue. And waaaaayyyyy cheaper than diesel.
Maybe if I was towing daily, I'd feel different. Your mileage may vary. (Couldn't resist the closer!)
Edit: btw instant torque is a game changer. You can't beat an EV on that front
I used to think this way, but it turns out that EV trucks hold up on range better than one would expect thanks to regenerative breaking. The added weight of cargo requires more energy to get up to speed, but you get most of that back when breaking, so it's not lost energy. Meanwhile, a gas or diesel truck's range plummets when hauling since all the energy used to accelerate the load is lost in breaking. I'm not saying that EV hauling is perfect or a solved problem, but that the trades offs aren't as intuitive as they might seem.
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You should watch this video - aero dominates vs weight (factors very little), especially with strong regen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmKf8smvGsA
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> A truck that can't haul is just for show.
I borrow my brother’s truck all the time to transport various DIY supplies. I could probably get a roof rack for my car for things like plywood and drywall, but borrowing the truck is easier.
Are you from 2010?
My EV has 470PS, it can hauul plenty heavy for long range. Weights 2.2 tons.
Even the Ford F-150 Lightning was already able to pull 4.5t and has a range of 300 miles.
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First, the intended customers of the Cybertruck don’t need to haul anything; it’s a lifestyle vehicle. Second, EVs have solved the torque problem.
A huge fraction of the truck owners barely (if ever) haul anything, so that's not a dealbreaker for an EV truck.
It just has to look manly and rugged, any actual offroad or hauling capabilities are at best a nice-to-have.
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Some gas engines have low end torque, big block V8s and anything turbo. But yeah if hauling uphill is your thing diesel is a no brainer. It would be great if our half ton and midsize trucks had diesel options but as usual other countries have better options.
Personally I'm going hybrid truck next time. The advantages of electric (torque, 240V inverter) with the flexibility of gas. Payload is lower but I'm hoping they fix that by the time I need a new truck
I get so much joy from seeing these on the road. They are not to my taste, but it’s so nice to see something new on the road.
I still remember years ago seeing one in a grocery store parking lot, with a banana yellow wrap and the Zelda unlock sound as its lock chime. A brief moment of inconsequential joy.
Lastly, having the cyber truck drag race a Porsche 911, while towing a Porsche 911 (and win) has to be one of the best marketing stunts of all time.
As a pedestrian I certainly don’t enjoy being around them, or any of the absurdly oversized American trucks.
As a pedestrian a tesla is the least likely vehicle to actually hit you.
The best collision is no collision.
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I feel so much anger seeing these on the road.
A bad design that costs too much, the only people who bought these were ideologues committed to the vision of a man responsible for millions of unnecessary deaths, the gutting of the American state, and some of the most destructive politics of hate in living memory.
I celebrate their passing.
Some of us just got one because it’s a fantastic self driving electric family car. I have a family and live somewhere nice, life’s too short to get so wound up about politics. And you’ll still be seeing them on the roads for many years to come :)
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Probably every third car in my area is a Tesla.
The drivers are like 98% East Asian or Indian. Like half the cars have a "new driver" or "baby on board" sticker.
Teslas are unpopular in rural areas.
So ironically I think the ideologues (on either side) are the only people NOT buying Teslas.
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> ideologues committed to the vision of a man responsible for millions of unnecessary deaths
Utterly insane take. Your media sources have filled your mind with poison.
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I own one. I hate Elon and everything that he has become. I wanted an EV truck that can drive itself on my road trips.
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I hope you find peace and a better use of your time
You sound very ideologue yourself.
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Either missing /s or you’re one of those “terminally online” people that the interwebs keeps telling me about.
This is nothing but comic villain energy. Sorry for whatever happened to you.
I get that.
I'm not an Elon fan in the least, but it does feel like most cars are designed by committee and converge on a few well-defined shapes and segments. And they sell a ton of them, so sure, of course.
But there's certainly some charm when you see a weirdmobile that doesn't conform and somehow got by the bean counters and into existence. The MINI Clubvan, for people who needed something compact and cargo-focused. The Cadillac CTS-V wagon, for people who wanted to haul ass ... and the family. The Toyota MR2, which felt like Toyota engineers decided "let's take these Corolla parts and build them in the shape of a Ferrari".
With the high costs of certifying a new car for sale it seems like we see fewer and fewer of these oddballs, and that feels like a shame.
So even though I'd never personally consider driving a poorly rendered dumpster from a 1980s video game, perhaps the world is a bit more interesting due to its existence.
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I saw someone sleeping on one on a highway. They should be regulated out of existence.
I agree. I was personally getting really sad on how all design appeared to be converging on one 'allowed' shape without considering any other possible -- ah ha - angles. I posted on this before, but I will repeat it here, because it is relevant.
Those cars did have uses, but those uses revolved around drawing attention ( think advertising ). Whenever I saw one in my neck of the woods, they were selling something.
> Lastly, having the cyber truck drag race a Porsche 911, while towing a Porsche 911 (and win) has to be one of the best marketing stunts of all time.
I suppose, if you don't really like cars much, this was interesting. No one debates the ability for EVs to have absurd 0-60, 0-100 times, but there's almost no overlap between why you'd buy a Cybertruck versus a 911 besides status symbol, which gets back to... maybe it's neat, if you don't really care about cars much.
Agreed. Even if the design is polarizing, has quality issues, whatever about elon and politics, it is refreshing to see something different and distinctive on the road in a sea of blobby SUVs and extended cab trucks.
Joy. Heh. What they remind me of is the atrocities that Musk committed, and also that the driver probably doesn’t give one iota of a fuck about them.
Can we just make the world a better place by bringing back dopey, happy cars like the Cube?
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Kids really love these things and get very excited to see them on the road.
They are going to be very valued collectors items in 30 years once the kids of today have enough disposable income to buy whichever are left roadworthy by then.
My experience is the opposite. My kids, and any friends of theirs riding with us, will boo whenever they see them on the road
Emotions from both ends of a spectrum are positive indicators of future's collection value.
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Clearly this behavior is not original, but taught. Kids don't "boo" things out of nowhere. They are indifferent as hell to things on their own sure, but not a CB ...
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Very clearly behavior introduced and encouraged by the parents, driven by politics, and not the merits of the object itself. Though it is an interesting commentary on the extreme, enforced conformity and politicization-of-everything we see in the world today.
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Old enough to be haters, I guess.
Mostly I've seen younger kids love it. I was at the park and a little girl saw a Cybertruck pull up -- "Look, Dad, it's from the future!"
I think Cybertruck is probably ultimately a failure, but the amount of hate it gets when they are at least trying to push things outside of the normal makes me sad. The amount of negativity towards anything new that's not perfect is insane.
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Doubt you had anything to do with that
I’m an ultra lib, despise Elon, hope he faces a jury of peers to answer for all he has done, but this seems like learned behavior. My toddler son thinks they look really good (wife and I think they look atrocious and our anti-Elon bias doesn’t help).
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>My kids, and any friends of theirs riding with us, will boo whenever they see them on the road
Because adults around them groomed them for those actions. Kids don't just start booing at objects out of the blue, they parrot the learned behavior of the adults around them.
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My kids and their friends play a game where when you see certain cars, you do certain actions. Like "punch buggy" with VW bugs but with a bunch of different cars. Cybertruck is "cyberslap" and you get to slap someone when you see one.
I live in Dubai. There is no lack of super cars on the streets. The other day a cybertruck was parked outside my window and this group of teenagers spend a long time posing in front of it taking group pictures and individual pictures.
You don’t see that with a Ferrari or Rolls Royce.
It is definitely going to be a collectors items, if it isn’t already.
That’s not gonna pay the bills for Tesla, but I guess it’s something.
You know what else you don't see with Ferraris? People lining up to spit on them.
https://youtu.be/L3oO510dyVI
Kind of like a delorean
I think this is exactly it. They are different and unlike anything else on the road.
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s/cocaine/ketamine/
There is absolutely no chance these will function in 30 years.
It certainly could, but likely very Ship of Theseus'd. I feel like enough of the parts are DRM'd hard by Tesla you'd need to Frankenstein the thing to do it.
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De Lorean status in the future.
Definitely not, not only is the De Lorean a cooler car (by far) it wouldn't even be a collectors item if it wasn't in one of the most popular movies ever made. The cybertruck has the exact opposite associations, instead of being in a cool movie it's the pet project of one of the most hated humans alive.
Maybe there needs to be a new Back to the Future that uses them instead of a DeLorean:)
I know a teenager who got a Fisker Karma. Maybe he bought the dip.
no one is going to care about this in 30 years.
no way the batteries last that long
I mean the 4680 cells are used in the model Y and the pack assembly isn't that complicated. I don't expect it to be financially ruinous to replace over time.
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Will they work in 30 years?
I can’t imagine why not. EV’s are generally more reliable than gas/diesel vehicles, and Tesla makes the most reliable EV’s.
I grew up on Big Trak, Kitt, and the Landmaster from "Damnation Alley". The kids are right.
That's because adults taught them that behavior
I think if you were to compare the cybertruck with other things kids like, you'd see that it looks like a hot pile of garbage. There's nothing about it that would attract a kid, it looks like a refrigerator.
I think there's a lot of kids (and parents) being influenced by politics more than pure ascetics.
The classroom of kids Ive seen (my kids attend 3 different schools), all of them are amazed by them - age ranges: 3, 7, 9 all their classrooms loved them. Same with some of the older kids I've been around. They're all boys, I do imagine it's a very boy-friendly car.
I personally don't have a cyber truck, not big on it personally, but never put my own opinions into my kids. The kids may not "like it", but they are amazed by it.
I'm in an area that doesn't really hate Musk, so I think that does have an impact.
I've never met or known a person IRL who cares about Tesla's ownership. I know people who hate Teslas cause they drive in the carpool lane or because they had bad experiences owning one, that's about it.
You must have different kids than I do. Mine point at them and observe that they spotted another dumpster.
I suspect you influenced them to feel this way.
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Same. Mine like calling out "cyber-yuck!"
Yeah. The kids I coach (1st-4th grade) generally call them 'stupidtrucks'.
My toddler saw one and got really excited "Look, Mama, a barn is driving!"
yeah, my kids will call out, look another "Cyberbarf"
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This theory backs up my opinion that every rich person who drives an exotic car is just an eight year old who had a Lamborghini poster on their wall growing up
I own a exotic car for the same reason I own mechanical watches. I love the engineering and craftsmanship. (But yes, I had several Lamborghini posters growing up) ;-)
Yeah my 5yo falls in this camp and is resistant to nuanced political discussions about it FOR SOME REASON
I suspect we’re going to discover a depressing future for today’s era of cars. 40 years from now will the Cybertruck software even let you turn it on? When will the last update have been? What servers does it communicate with that’ll end up long since decommissioned?
(FWIW my kids giggle at the Cybertruck and say it looks silly. In a sense they do love them but I’m not convinced they’ll long for one in years to come)
> Kids really love these things and get very excited to see them on the road
Unsurprising, as they look like they were designed by an 8 year old.
> They are going to be very valued collectors items in 30 years
There's going to be 3 owners perpetually going to Cars and Coffee with theirs, rotating with their pristine Pontiac Aztec.
And that's all they'll do with it because there is no way a CyberTruck is going to last 30 years otherwise.
You’re right kids really do love these things: that’s the entire target market.
maybe small kids i guess? teens in my experience mock them gleefully
Every kid I've ever met hates Elon Musk, so I'm 100% sure that this failed product will not be a "collectors item".
> Kids really love these things and get very excited to see them on the road.
Do you have anything empirical to back this up? This feels like someone kind of hoping something is true. It's like the Harley rider sure that everyone thinks they're super cool with their super loud bike.
The Harley example is ironic because little boys are exactly the ones to find that cool
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Every kid I know hates the cybertruck, they literally call it a boomer-mobile.
I'm sure they will hold value as Hitler's paintings do
politics aside, Cybertuck is/was an engineering breakthrough.
48 volts, steering wheel, no paint ( better durability), trunk, wipers etc. the car pushed the boundaries. If you compare level of creative thinking of cybertruck vs lets say electric ford, it's not even comparable. I respect that despite one person behind it. I don't care how it looks. It's polarizing. oh well.
My 11 y.o. relative from abroad asked me to take rl pictures of the truck, after he heard my neighbor bought it.
I think Tesla did some cool things with it, but I think it's a little too early to label it as an engineering breakthrough. I'm not convinced some of the things they did and decisions they made (one large wiper, the stainless steel is susceptible to surface corrosion, various pinch points, weak control arms) will hold up over time
It's not very durable though:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PK_EJ3DyiiA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yn4XzbMf9nY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey0ZAaF2L4E
The lack of paint is the only cool part
And Delorean did that 40 years earlier.
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It's a hulking pile of shit built to be hostile to the people and things it shares an environment with. The middle fingers and thumbs downs people aim at them are fully deserved by the buyer and driver. They don't fit in parking spaces and are driven by people who think they're the main character of earth. I look forward to the day when the last one melts from a faulty battery fire.
> no paint ( better durability)
And yet there were still durability issues with the truck? My understanding is that there were many manufacturing issues, and it also experienced several recalls.
The etherloop between zone controllers and the resulting reduction in wiring is pretty cool.
Maybe through a very specific engineering perspective it was interesting. From a broader engineering perspective it was embarrassing. It is called a truck, very much not a truck. Nearly no actual utility. No hauling capability. No durability. Falls apart because it is glued together. Shows every place where someone brushed up against it. Poor fit to the operating environment.
I'll give you that it was a unique design. But if we're talking about engineering... it could not have promised more or delivered less.
>48 volts
Questionable choice, 12v works just fine OEMS just need to stop putting it in stupid locations.
>Steering wheel
??? the weird actual steering wheel or the terrible steer by wire?
>No paint
It's ok the panels just fall off their weak plastic attachment points instead
>Trunk
The one that would crush your fingers?
>Wipers
The singular poorly thought out wiper?
The only boundary the cybertruck pushed was NHTSA safety regulations and recalls
> no paint ( better durability)
instead of paint/clearcoat getting scratched you can pit / etch / scar the raw metal!
Its made from hard steel, which is much harder to scratch and damage than ordinary car paint (or indeed ordinary car bodies, which are made of softer steel).
And you can do that without even being near the vehicle, because the panels fall off.
It was an engineering break something, for sure.
Is that a joke?
How are any of those things engineering breakthroughs??? What?!
I think the main breakthrough was cost-engineering: glued on panels, cast-aluminum frame, "metal" accelerator pedal glued onto a plastic component. Which is ironic considering how expensive the thing was.
I blame Tesla and their "giant iPad" interiors for many of the cost-cutting trends we see in cars today.
I really thought it would have had a lot of potential for cheaper manufacturing. No paint process is huge. And originally they were talking about basically building it like origami from a sheet of steel.
The steel exoskeleton idea didn't survive to production. The production truck has a mix of aluminum castings and welded steel unibody, with the stainless panels just acting as the skin. Maybe they bring some structural rigidity, but not like the origami plan that was originally discussed.
The end result is a vehicle with all of the costs of a normal unibody design plus the costs of dealing with cutting, folding, and attaching thick sheets of stainless steel.
It never delivered the promised $40k starting price or the promised 500 mile top spec range either.
It’s staggering how much money they wasted because Musk didn’t want to listen to real experts. It was years late because stainless steel is so much harder to work with, especially when it has so many complicated geometries, and every one of those delays was a chance for him to say “maybe the people I hired for their expertise know something I don’t” rather than “I’m the boss, make it work”.
They could’ve done something like the Slate truck a decade earlier.
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I mean once you buy the tooling, it’s still probably cheaper to produce stainless steel trucks than paint normal steel. I agree on everything else though
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At least it delivered on being bulletproof unless you shoot it.
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Would be interesting to know how much the useless steel body detracts from the range compared to a lighter material.
Even more interesting would be how much the steel hurts the tons-to-orbit in the Starship.
Painted piece of plastic gonna be cheaper than sheet of stainless steel. Stainless is significantly more expensive than typical materials used on car, which would be normal steel or plastic depending on panel.
Also painting IN THE FACTORY isn't expensive. Re-painting the part on repair is because of all of the prep work required (take apart, clean, color match etc).
Might be break-even, but I doubt it would be cheaper
"It will be cheaper" is a perspective of ignorant "smart guy" that thinks because he got successful in one thing that they can weight in on industry processes they have no idea about
They developed, at great cost, the process used for the cars with the giga press and the plastic. It would've been a fine process for an inexpensive truck.
Speaking out of my ass here, but I would not be surprised if it's much cheaper to paint cheap stamped steel, compared to using more expensive stainless steel that's treated to remove all surface marring/scarring from the stamping process. Those panels don't come out all brushed from the metal presses...
Stainless steel is far harder to work than regular steel. There is no way that process was cheaper.
What happens if you scrape your fridge getting it into the kitchen?
You go to the DIY shop and buy a tin of white spray paint.
What happens if you scrape your brushed stainless fridge getting it into the kitchen?
Well, now you get to either live with it, or come up with some really clever ideas on polishing out the scratch and then sanding it back to disguise it with the rest of the surface which will never really look right.
Stainless would be standard on economy cars, and the Cybertruck would be painted so as not to look like a Ford Pinto.
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I don't think the poor sales is primarily due to the cost - it's just a design with limited appeal.
The original design is what gave them millions of pre-orders, it was the reduction in range and increase in cost that made most people cancel those pre-orders.
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A folded stainless exoskeleton without paint has the potential to make low volume car manufacturing much cheaper.
A press brake is generic and cheap. Molds for presses are cheap if the cost can be spread over many vehicles, but are expensive for low volume manufacturing.
Paint shops are similar. They're not expensive if you're running a lot of cars in the same color through it, but at low volumes with custom colors they are fabulously expensive.
Of course the final production Cybertruck didn't use the exoskeleton design so it was the worst of both worlds, but it does feel like the original design wasn't expected to sell well and was designed for low volume manufacturing.
Bending stainless steel requires special tooling and strategies to overcome its tendency to work harden and high springback.
The folded steel exoskeleton has no potential, it was a bad idea that was abandoned. It was always going to crack at the folds.
This idea was never going to work out. In my opinion Slate have got a far more sensible approach with their replaceable body panels.
I live in the UK so I'll likely never be able to get one, but I'd love a car I can just buy new panels for and wrap them with minimal tools.
> No paint process is huge
Replacing a well-known manufacturing stage with a completely unproven one for no good reason is rarely a good idea.
Same. Initially I was optimistic about the Cybertruck because I though “flat metal panels and no paint is going to make both manufacturing and repairs so much easier and cheaper”.
Paint has been well studied. We know how to do it really cheap and automated these days. Cheap is relative. I'm sure that we're talking tens of millions of dollars to get all the equipment needed. But on a scale of factory and for how long it will last, that's cheap.
Flat metal is more expensive than curved metal. Curved metal, you design the curves to help support the stress points: you can get by with thinner sheets. Flat metal requires thicker heavier more expensive sheets of sheet metal in order to be strong enough.
Curved metal also lets you design the whole thing to be more aerodynamic. which is an important consideration even with something as un-aerodynamic as a truck.
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They built that truck backwards and upside down. The single-piece forged aluminum frame was basically impossible to repair and brittle. Typical truck frames flex, they're part of the suspension. For small accidents, the frame can be bent back. The CT would just crack, requiring extensive aluminum welding to fix which is waay harder than welding a steel frame.
I thought this is not relevant tbh.
Either you have a modern expensive car and insurance which knows how to handle it properly, or it doesn't matter anymore and you got to a cheap car doctor.
There were no flat panels. That was a sales pitch. In reality, a slight curve to a panel adds so much strength that it can be made considerably lighter/cheaper than a flat panel of sufficient strength. Flat panels also tend to dent inwards very easily, which is not a good look for a car. Then there is the issue of thermal expansion. A pre-bent bit of metal will expand in a predictable way. A dead-flat panel could buckle in multiple unexpected ways.
I had a jeep wrangler once. The window was "flat" but not if you looked at its reflection. There was an almost imperceptible but complex curve, no doubt for strength.
Repair will be easier and cheaper? :D
As the DeLorean community will tell you, repairing unfinished stainless steel to aesthetically pleasing levels is almost impossible.
Take a piece of tinfoil, crumple it, then try to uncrumple it to its factory finish.
Repairing painted bodywork is easy and cheap: hammer it to get a rough shape, apply fillers, then paint & polish to factory finish. Simple as.
how you repair steel panel and also make it look nice ?
...you don't. You replace it in whole. You can't use filler to mask small dents and paint over it, if you want it to look as before, you have to pretty much replace it.
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I think they are mostly not doing paint going forward. CyberCab also doesn't use paint, but uses cheaper materials than stainless steel.
That original process was what should have led to lower prices. Instead, they couldn't do it and had to resort to gluing steel panels onto a body-on-frame design which is much more expensive. They still managed to keep it just as hideous, so kudos there I guess.
I doubt that replacing painted regular steel with fancy stainless steel is going to be cheap. Paint is expensive, but so is stainless steel. I also can't imagine the "origami" technique to be cheaper than stamping, the reason they suggested that is because their fancy stainless steel can't be stamped. And in the end, Tesla couldn't even do it, so they glued the parts on...
I don't know any item where the unpainted stainless steel version is cheaper than the painted steel version, thinking about kitchen appliances for instance. For cars, the most famous car with a stainless steel body is the DeLorean DMC-12, which was notoriously expensive, even without the time circuits.
In that way the Slate pickup seems to be the truck Cybertruck promised to be
Slate hasn’t made a single delivery yet, so in that sense it’s definitely the truck Cybertruck promised to be.
> originally they were talking about
Elon talks about a lot of things. Consider if you might be part of the media ecosystem that enables that strategy.
They were also talking about how it could become a boat. All the hype in the world eventually has to meet reality.
Elon promised a lot but delivered almost nothing when it comes to the Cybertruck.
A “truck” that’s can’t haul, tow, or offroad is a very interesting product decision. Right up there with a two-person taxi.
It’s like they completely forgot the “what do people need” phase of product management.
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There's a pattern here: when an Elon Project is successful, he jumps in with Elon innovations, like cyber truck. The next example that will follow this pattern is building a rocket that's too big for orbital payloads, but takes 22 refueling flights to get beyond orbit.
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> And originally they were talking about basically building it like origami from a sheet of steel.
It turns out that sitting in your office wearing an adult nappy and snorting cat sedative until your bladder no longer functions might give you a lot of quite "creative" thinking, but it doesn't make you an engineer.
At some point Elon has to climb out of the K-hole and realise that these things are better left to proper engineers.
The original wasn't what shipped. From what I read the cheaper easier process wasn't, which isn't unusual.
It's also an ugly-ass car. If it had turned out to be super-reliable and cheap and "hackable" that would make up for it, even earn its strange look a cult following, but no it just ended up as an overpriced weird ugly-ass car.
Why would Tesla make "cheap" ? That's not their customer base.
Cheap hackable electric work truck (I imagine chassis with basic cabin that you can expand in various ways, like the EU van options have like half a dozen chassis) would be great but it's not something Tesla ever wants to make
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https://www.xkcd.com/37/
I'm curious to see how the Slate trucks work out: https://www.slate.auto/en
I know its not fashionable to have such pesky concerns as priority in US, but pedestrian safety was simply non-present, hence it was banned all over Europe. Not missing it here, not missing that fugly ego whim of a sick man at all.
I’ve been seeing complaints on the internet about how all cars look the same nowadays. I think the cybertruck proves why. A lot of design has coalesced around the same thing, not just for cars but for websites and apps, logos, furniture, etc. because people like that stuff.
Something new and fresh can be accepted and loved, but it still needs to be familiar and somewhat iterative. A radical change like the cybertruck is hated for that reason. (People also hate it because of Elon, but they don’t hate the other Teslas nearly as much as they hate the cybertruck)
When the Cybertruck was first announced, Musk was still the darling of the left and progressive wealthy. It was daring and different and cool, and it was explicitly meant to be an experiment in making cars differently.
By the time of its delayed release, Musk had become deeply unpopular with many of that original coalition of fans and buyers, the truck was more expensive than originally promised, his new ‘base’ probably couldn’t afford to buy many of them, and it was structurally a fairly normal car underneath the steel panels. It also suffered plenty of embarrassing issues, which people were of course gleeful to publicise.
It could have been a cool funky status symbol, but Musk screwed it all up.
> When the Cybertruck was first announced, Musk was still the darling of the left and progressive wealthy. It was daring and different and cool, and it was explicitly meant to be an experiment in making cars differently.
People still hated it when it was announced, the online discourse was largely negative surrounding it. I remember being in my tech office at the time and we were all talking about how bad it looked.
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The Cybertruck announcement was a couple years after the Thai Rescue Divers "pedo" incident, which was the tipping point for many people (including on the left) to realize he wasn't actually the Tony Stark character he pretended to be and actually a pretty shitty person.
This was well into the Tesla flamethrower/short shorts/funding secured/etc period of $TSLA meme stockification. Also pushing Dogecoin/crypto.
He certainly wasn't the "darling of the left" by then. But you are correct that his image was significantly less tarnished by political meddling and later obsession with woke/trans/culture war of the day stuff.
He was the darling of the emerging meme stock day trader/gambler/WSB crowd which in broad strokes tends to anti-correlate with the "left".
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Agreed. When it was first announced, I was kind of interested. I laughed at imagining it as a screenshot from an N64 game.
But it didn't live up to the selling points, it is very expensive, has design issues that weren't necessary for the aesthetic, and the company's owner turned out to be a really horrible person contributing meaningfully to changes in my country that are dangerous.
> Musk was still the darling of the left
I can assure you he was not.
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This is rewriting of history. It was ridiculed even by the reddit shitlibs that hung on to Papa Elon's every word. Breaking the glass twice was a meme.
No he was not. Progressive left noticed who he is first, long before that point.
And positive first reactions to that car came only from Musk fans bubble. I was seeing people calling it ugly from basically a day 1.
One thing I think gets overlooked in cybertruck discourse that I didn’t appreciate until I saw one in person is that it’s really big. It FEELS really big. With all those hard edges, it also seems more imposing and aggressive.
It doesn’t give me the impression of “radical change.” It felt familiar and iterative of the modern, oversized F250-style pickup truck in all of the worst ways.
The design isn't what led to its demise, the $80K-100K sticker price did.
Cars look the same because they're trying to his specific mileage and safety standards. There are a few common shapes that can do that, and every angle you flatten into a curve gets you a couple more MPG.
Trucks don't look quite the same because they have different standards to adhere to.
Or maybe "I am not like other girls" is not a good personality to hang on. An exceptional athlete stands out. But so does the village drunk. Just being different is not enough.
The product failed because it was a shit product. In the grand scheme of unreliable American built cars, it was just another one. It was certainly not as bad as a Jeep. But it was ugly, and did not do what it was supposed to do; be a truck.
This is every top comment ITT, and I am checking user's post histories to confirm they are real. I understand I might be in the minority, but this belief that just being different is a merit unto itself is ridiculous.
There’s a school of thought that anything is better than blandly conformative design. In that school, the Cybertruck counts as progress.
To me, it’s more like answering a complaint about the blandness of pop music with electric bagpipes and nails on chalkboard: if you can’t be different and good, maybe don’t try so hard to be different.
I think a lot of the reason most cars look the same is they all have to pass similar pedestrian crash standards. Once you account for all of that, the basic shape of the vehicle is set and there is only so much unique styling you can attach.
Have you seen any of the videos where they push fake kids in front of Teslas versus other cars?
I don't think the safety argument holds up here when you're comparing Teslas with standard automobiles.
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People don't just hate it because it looks different. They hate it because it's ugly, unreliable, and a symbol of the modern idolatry of the billionaire class.
Exactly so.
It's a massive, gaudy symbol of unfathomable decadence, and every purchase was made to visibly support the passion project of the world's most influential white supremacist.
It's one thing for a vehicle to be "ugly," but this one stands for so much more.
All other things aside, the worst part of the Cybertruck's design, to me, was its sloped truck bed walls (on the sides). Anyone who frequently uses their truck bed will know that getting access to stuff quickly and easily is key. And the Cybertruck's sloped walls go too high for anything in the very back of the bed to be reached. That just seems like such an unnecessary functional miss.
The whole part about the "sharp edged design" is quite misleading.
Yes sharp edges are an issue as they can very much make the difference between people getting killed in a car accident and them surviving.
But this wasn't even the biggest problem for selling it to the EU.
E.g. cars sold in the EU there are a bunch of standards for safety of pedestrians for slower speed impacts. The Cyber Truck is kinda not passing any (most?) of the standards. This also isn't just the Cybertruck in general US style trucks are more deadly (for pedestrians; especially for children) and the Cybertruck is just the cherry on the top.
Lastly even if it could be sold in the EU it is questionable if it would be profitable, given some of the quality issues surfaced, the likely small production/sells quantity (trucks aren't exactly beloved in large parts of the EU, neither needed and as an actual truck it doesn't do the best job as others have pointed out).
Even if it were fully compliant with the standards, I don't see large trucks selling well outside the USA.
The good: someone trying a radically new design. Polarizing like the Fiat Multipla or Pontiac Aztek or even the first Chrysler minivan, but credit for trying.
The bad: didn't seem to be very good as a truck (eg build quality). That would not have been too bad, but it's dangerous when the design already alienates some buyers. Carmakers need time to get it right, and that needs sales.
The terrible: Elon torching his reputation in all sorts of ways and essentially insulting his past and future customer base. The politics, the bait and switch over features, etc etc. Eventually people tire of it.
It's tragic, because for better or worse Americans love their trucks, so the team that solves the electric transition is doing the world a huge favor.
While I will happily admit, the initial Multipla looks awful both inside and out to my sensibilities, I have to defend it vs the Cybertruck. Purely from the practicality standpoint, it was ingenious, having three seats front and back while being small, light and cheap solved a real need and I do still see quite a few, especially compared to other Fiats from that time, because of it. It also has what I feel is the most impactful facelift of any vehicle ever.
Had the Cybertruck brought forward the manufacturing innovations that were alleged to cause the weirdness in its design, I could draw the comparison with the Multipla, but as it stands, it has all the visual appeal of one, with none of the practical reasons for it. Having something ugly for good reasons, I can appreciate, function over form to the nth degree. Looking awful just for the sake of looking awful, not so much. Cybertruck is the car equivalent of intentionally bad Balenciaga releases (like the plastic bag), wherein even with taste being subjective and beauty in the eye of the beholder, there is a point where it just becomes as close to objectively ugly as is possible.
Can't comment on the Pontiac, have never seen one outside Breaking Bad.
The Fiat Multipla is one of the ugliest cars ever. But it was a very good compact.
The other two cars you mentioned look pretty run of mill.
The day Chinese EVs are available in the US market we'll all have access to sub 15k cars perfect for commuting.
Make it a federal law that the cars wifi/SIM card phone home crap needs to be easily removable.
This protectionism around American cars is a hidden tax on everyone of us.
It's cheaper to let Tesla, Ford, etc all collapse and arrange direct social support for laid off workers.
I want a 15k byd. I don't need a 25k Slate.
Chinese vehicles are cheap because they're sold under cost. It can't continue to be that cheap and places with a car industry like Europe are crazy to allow them to be sold there.
Chinese vehicles are cheap because their manufacturing process is light years ahead.
I don't think you'll ever see that day considering the bipartisan hawkishness against China.
People forget that Biden put the 100% tariffs on Chinese cars, not Trump.
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Laws and regulations around car dealerships are deeply ingrained into state and federal politics. I don't think we will see Chinese or Mexican EVs anytime.
It's a double whammy. We underfund public transportation so most people need a car.
We then add all types of strange protectionism around which cars can be sold.
No reason I shouldn't be able to order a new EV straight from Shenzhen.
Why do you spend time thinking about outcomes that will never, ever be realized? There is bipartisan support for anti-China protectionism. There is not bipartisan support for paranoid FOSS neckbeard concerns about radios that have been built into most cars since Onstar.
I remember 15 years ago when liberals were absolutely furious at companies relying on Chinese "slave labor" for making shoes cheap and cutting into US wages.
I myself have no strong opinion on the issue, and think protectionism can often be quite bad, but it's weird how things have flipped. Presumably because of reactions to one man's views.
Chinese EVs are not made with "slave labor"
I must say, America is very much isolated in the World of EVs. The Chinese have pretty much conquered the rest of the world.
Also, all the top level comments sound the same. Is there a reason?
I kinda like that it existed. It was ridiculous, like a production concept car. I just saw one the other day with a pink wrap.
I have very little interest in electric vehicles, Tesla, Elon Musk, etc. But I still think the Cybertruck, at least the design, looks awesome. It looked like something you'd see in the "Another World" or "Out of this World" intro cinematic.
Agreed. I see it as the successor to the angular style of the Lamborghini Countach, which far more people are willing to admit looks cool.
Both look extremely cool to me but Elon's behaviour is the only reason I'll never buy a tesla. Even though the cybertruck looks awesome but it's impossible for me to be seen in this. I wouldn't be surprised if they'd used a cybertruck in a BTTF remake
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The cultural element is the difference. It's a suburban vehicle who wants to pretend it's a truck, exactly like the pompous suburbanite assholes who want to pretend they are rugged alpha types just because they drive a truck they don't really need: both would fall apart in a minute when faced with real problems.
The Countach was just the usual Lamborghini luxury scam, and I say that as someone who grew up a few km from the factory. Nobody cared if it was kinda crap inside, because it existed just to look like a cool car. A truck is supposed to, y'know, be a truck.
Having seen both in person, a Countach actually looks cool. The Cybertruck looks like a shitty unused model from a PS1 game.
Just because something is "angular" doesn't mean it's in any way comparable to a Cybertruck.
You don't see how an angled polygonal shape sold in 1974 might be more loved than the same angled polygonal shape sold in 2020?
You realize style evolves right?
That style was futuristic in the 70s. It is not futuristic anymore. A lot has happened since the 70s to change what the future should look like.
Ironically, I am finding myself thinking that all the supposedly "bland" electric cars nowadays finally look like cars from the future, simply by being normal car looking, with very slight and subtle styling accents.
Because that's what a future car looks like: Roughly the same aerodynamic profile but with electric motors. That's literally what everyone wanted in the first place, as was Elon's thesis for Tesla as more than a niche car company.
The Cybertruck aesthetic is stupid because it is literally a middle finger to what people want, as Elon himself noted.
I don't get why people are so stuck on "But it looks different" as a good thing.
It's a car. Why are you so stuck on needing your car to stand out? Why is it a problem for you if cars look the same?
I also think the design is rad.
Doesn’t the new ~flying car have similar design vibes?
For an "unwanted" truck, I sure see a lot of them on the road.
Less than 50,000 of them ever built. And didn't SpaceX and the DoD (thanks, DOGE) buy about 2-3,000 of those between them? (I think SpaceX bought a thousand).
You might see "a lot of them" because they stand out and are "memorable".
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It looks like something that would be fun and cool to drive around in a video game. I would never get a Tesla for unrelated reasons, and would especially not get a Cybertrunk because it's not fit for purpose, but I thought the hate for the aesthetics was overblown.
But then I saw it in-person, and it looks indescribably weird and bad, akin to the uncanny valley. The problem is that it's a real vehicle and not in a video game.
As with most marketing gimmicks, they have little to no value outside of their insane marketing.
Used resale value is around $80,000.
I kept thinking the design was going to grow on me as I saw more of them on the road, but nope. I still think it looks unbelievably ugly. I do not think it looks like something that you'd see in Another World, it looks more like something I would have designed when I was fourteen playing with Lightwave.
Personally, I think it looks like a silver dumpster.
To those that downvoted, I’m sorry my opinion offended you.
A fugitive ice machine that escaped from Motel 6
There's someone near me who has one with a white wrap over it. I see it parked, and I thought:
"If Kenmore had the wherewithal to manufacture 4wd electric chest freezers...that's what they'd look like."
...but I'm not offended by it. I think that sort of whimsical craziness is all too often missing from modern durable goods, so I'm glad it got built.
I'm even happier that its existence upset mincing, peevish little eurotwee Conde-Nasty scribblequeefs like this Wired author. If it'd guarantee him leaping off of a tall pier, I'd pay MSRP for a Cybertruck.
I legitimately would have bought it if they made it look more like a regular pickup truck, and if Elon didn't go full crazy.
I did buy a Model-Y shortly before his Trump endorsement, and then sold it for technical reasons.
On a cold January morning, I was pulling up to a stop-sign, didn't have any autopilot turned on, and the car accelerated.
I think there is just too much software between gas pedal and the machinery of the car. They're honestly kind of dangerous vehicles. The average person can't handle the responsibility of a self-driving vehicle.
I told all of my friends and family that I would not recommend the vehicle yet to a non-technical person, even when I was myself driving it and loving it.
Setting your experience aside, my national transport agency in Denmark recently approved Tesla full self driving because the data confirmed that it’s safer than the average driver. I think it’s both true that these cars can fault, and that they’re safer on average than humans. To be clear, Denmark is not alone. Many European countries have approved it for the same reason, and many more are evaluating. Holland is the toughest to pass, and they passed.
Self-driving cars have fat-tailed risk.
Some outside factor might cause a signal failure, causing cascading destruction.
I assume you meant full self driving supervised, not actual full self driving.
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"Safer than the average driver" is great if all the below-average drivers start buying Teslas. But if you're converting drivers on the other end of the spectrum then the roads become less safe overall.
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Yeah same. It was too strange looking for me and Elon’s turn to the far right kind of ruined Tesla for me. I ended up getting a F-150 lightning instead and it’s been a great experience. Unfortunately they stopped making those too.
> I think there is just too much software between gas pedal and the machinery of the car.
There's a shit ton of software between the gas pedal and the machinery of just about every car on the road today whether that be an ICE, hybrid, or EV. We're a long ways away from the go-go pedal directly pulling a cable opening the throttle plate.
Electric trucks in general seem terrible. You only see Rivians and Cybertrucks in urban settings, the electric F150 was discontinued. Anybody who knows how people that actually need trucks use trucks saw this coming, I never once saw a cybertruck used as a truck.
I always got the impression that the vast majority of the F150s are never used as trucks either. Americans just like really really big cars because fuel is cheap there and none of the cities are old enough that big cars are impractical.
Obviously it doesn't affect the electric vehicles but light trucks being excluded from CAFE def did a lot to acculturate americans to always buying a big car
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SUV#1980s_to_1990s
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No, the F150 has great sales numbers but this is mostly due to commercial/work use. And commercial buyers need trucks that can tow, haul, be fitted with large toolboxes, booms/cranes, winches, plows, etc. The F150 electric solved none of those problems.
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Plenty of our cities predate cars. We were able to bulldoze walkable neighborhoods to build highways through them because of racism.
Big cars are certainly impractical in SF, but it's more due to parking than anything else :)
> Anybody who knows how people that actually need trucks use trucks saw this coming
I'm a current truck driver and very excited to swap out my ICE truck for a Slate next year. I need something that can haul my trash to the dump, grab a load of wood chips for the garden, and bring home the occasional sheet good from the home store.
I agree with your assessment as it applies to the Cybertruck or F150, but not the idea of an electric truck. Some people buy trucks because they need a light-duty hauling solution; unfortunately, the market seems to only want to sell luxury SUVs that happen to have truck beds.
cough small dump trailer (<3000 GVWR). Can be pulled by a light SUV. No shoveling those wood chips. Depending on where the trash is going, no having to lift that a second time either. I've carried 25 sheets of 3/4 ply in mine (and unloaded them by myself, as the tilting bed meant I could tilt up a bit and easily slide them off)
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Most people driving trucks in the US don't use them as trucks, especially in cities. I think most people willing to take on a $1000/mo truck payment for their personal vehicle in the current economic climate are doing so for social reasons anyway. Whether the electric trucks on offer at the same price can compete on that front is a much more slippery question.
If we can get some affordable electric trucks in the US, it will be very interesting to see how the more rational segments of the market react once they are no longer priced out.
I've only ever heard positive things from every electric truck owner I know and this is coming from a market that's very truck-forward in terms of culture.
Unlike electric cars, the price for a used F-150 lightning is still a substantial fraction of new price. There is still substantial demand.
Work trucks are a very different market than for passenger vehicles. Their usage is a lot more consistent and known. This means that electric works very well for some work trucks and very poorly for others.
The other aspect of work trucks is that they're generally purchased by very conservative businesses who don't want to buy the bleeding edge, they want several years of reliability data before committing. The F-150 Lightning was cancelled just as that data was starting to come in.
Of course, most F-150's are sold as passenger vehicles rather than work trucks. Along with almost all Cybertrucks.
In my observations it appears there are 3 kinds of truck drivers.
1. People who need to haul stuff in the bed
2. People who need to tow stuff behind them
3. People who buy them for some form of self expression.
Electrics are probably fine for people in 1 & 3. But for 2 I have yet to find one that both tows and gets range.
I would suggest there are 4 kinds:
1. People who need them for work. 2. People who need to carry bulky loads 3. People who need to tow. 4. People who buy them for some form of self-expression.
The only real use case for electric trucks, imho, is construction site supervisors who do most around-town driving but may occasionally need to haul stuff. Their towing range is absolutely abysmal (F150 Lightning range dropped to about 90 miles when towing a moderate trailer!).
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I have seen rivians being used as trucks pretty often in small towns.
I see electric Silverados and Hummers (not a truck, but effectively the same vehicle as the electric Silverado) all the time, usually pulling landscaping utility trailers (flatbeds with huge commercial lawnmowers, etc.). I have no idea if this is economic or not (they definitely aren't cheap) but I've heard electric towing can't be beat for responsiveness, torque, etc.
It's pretty economical. Towing about halves your range. So you're still paying quite a low gallons/mile equivalent. However, that decreased range is a killer. So it makes sense why you'd see them doing lighter duty local work like landscaping.
An acquaintance saved thousands of dollars (over ten thousand, easily) by using his Cybertruck while building a cabin up in the mountains. All those trips to the hardware store and picking up random building materials add up very quickly when you are going up and down the mountain for materials and the big box hardware store is two hours away.
I definitely see them from time to time here in Austin loaded up with stuff being used as real work trucks. (But mostly not.)
The use-a-truck-as-a-truck market seems too small to even address…
Truck brained people are notoriously stubborn. If it isn’t like daddy’s old truck they simply can’t see past it
I live in the PNW and you see people not using their trucks as trucks every single time you go out on the road. This includes urban areas.
I’ve owned an F150 and an R1T and for camping, overlanding, snow trips, etc the Rivian is hands down the most capable vehicle I have ever driven. You couldn’t pay me to go back to a Ford
We recently had a guy drive 146 miles out of the cascades, to Oregon City, to get a replacement radiator for a Jeep after a trailside wreck. We don't know how to fix a Rivian when it breaks down, or where to get parts.
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Given US pricing of $6.50 diesel, the cyber truck with 11,000 lb towing capacity actually makes a lot of sense.
It just looks too weird.
People who are towing a lot may like the idea of electric. However they need range, and EVs when towing don't deliver. It is too bad, I'd like a electric truck, but when I tow I'm trying to get someplace and EVs don't deliver.
It doesn't help that nearly all chargers are arranged such that I'd block important parts of the parking lot for half an hour if I was towing when I needed a charge, then I have a complex back out (where something is behind me that I need to avoid). Most gas stations are designed so my trailer might block a pump from someone else using it but otherwise I'm not in the way.
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The standard F-150 uses gasoline, not diesel. Not that gas isn't expensive right now either.
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I know people with Rivians and F-150 Lightnings and they love them.
Indeed that target audience (people that actually need trucks) should be looking at a diesel vw passat from the 00's instead.
Truly terrible for pedestrians. Modern trucks are already death traps with their super high front grills, multiplying the weight compounds the problem.
Vehicle mass is a significant factor in collisions between vehicles because taking two thirds of the impact is a meaningful increase over taking half of it. Heavier vehicles are much more dangerous to lighter vehicles.
It's basically irrelevant in pedestrian collisions because the pedestrian is already taking ~95% of the impact even from a lighter car and the <5% difference between that and an arbitrarily heavier vehicle is completely dwarfed by any of the other variables like the speed of the collision. For a pedestrian it's better to get hit by a freight train at 35 MPH than a 3000 pound vehicle at 39 MPH.
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You think cutting the weight of the truck is going to make it safer for pedestrians?
This is the silliest argument against the Cybertruck, IMO. Its forward visibility is significantly better than other full-sized trucks, yet people continue to bring up pedestrian safety every time the Cybertruck is mentioned.
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The BYD Shark is all the rage in Asia.
F150 Lightning was ruined by the dealership network who had 0 interest or financial incentive to sell them. When they did sell them, they added huge markups.
The quality of the vehicle is actually quite high.
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I wonder how much of this is due to politics. I always thought it wouldn't matter much to most people but earlier this year I tried to convince my wife to get a model Y for the family and there was no convincing her. The interesting thing is she doesn't even care about politics but just didn't want to buy a car that is associated to any political view. I guess that happens when you take such a hard stance, you alienate one entire side and the people in the middle that wanna stay out of it.
> she doesn't even care about politics
hmm the rest of the post is describing someone that does care about politics
They wanted Cybertruck for the exoskeleton, made giga casting instead and then proceeded to never make the cheaper versions, hence never reached units of scale as well as a bigger market. I do believe they could have avoided this but instead stayed in the luxury market.
I noticed that the cyberpunk wedge cars that inspired it are 2 seaters… maybe this shape isn't right for much larger cars?
DeLorean is the real life 80s reference of course, but in cyberpunk revival media like the coupe in Ghost in the Shell 2017, the spinner in Blade Runner 2049—those cars are all much smaller cabins than the cybertruck
The first two series of the Lotus Esprit had similar design language as well.
The dimensions felt off to me. I had it as a loaner and enjoyed it a bit, especially since it had HW4. But I would never buy one.
The size is just too impractical. It would never fit in my garage. On top of that, the standby drain was significant. Just sitting idle, it would lose 10 to 20 miles of range.
I would have liked a 3-row SUV based on the Cybertruck; but the Cybertruck was just too expensive to be competitive. At least the Model Y's price dropped (right after I bought one) to something more reasonable.
What's most frustrating is that I had to trade in my Model 3 for a 3-row SUV, and Tesla just didn't have anything competitive in that segment.
You could run much of this discussion about the hummer. Not all of course, because a bunch of half and mis truths about EV are being floated.
90% of this is "I liked it" or "I didn't like it"
The rest is "it didn't suit this use case so it's useless"
Fwiw I thought it was stupid, but it doesn't define what an EV truck can do, or their utility. I've no problem if people poke fun at them. I've no problem if people like them.
We don't even realize how big production of optimus and cybercab are going to be. They need to make room.
Why would they focus on "cybercab" over this. Everything that makes the cybercab cool will never be legal in a consumer product. Cybertruck is definitely more useful to an average person.
An average person has no use for a truck that costs more than twice what an average person makes in a year and half or more what an average person spends on an average house
the economics of Tesla , a company with lots of capital, renting out their fleet make more sense in a market of consumers with little disposable income.
I liked the styling. Thought about getting one. Got a chance to get in one the other day. and it was so uncomfortable. felt like sitting on a park bench. I thought this was supposed to be not a real pickup. Rather a suburban big old thing with blade runner styling and reviews said lots of comfort. No, just a big old vehicle, that's not even that roomy on the inside (hip room felt like that of my old integra), with the comfort of an 80's pick up. not much of a point to it.
That’s unfortunate, I quite enjoyed the brutality of its aesthetic.
I don't like the design but don't hate it either. At least the jaggedness is for a functional reason. There are uglier cars, about 10 of which are from Kia and Hyundai.
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There's nothing wrong with an interesting design. It's not a serious market however. The Cybertruck was a pet project forced onto the market by an out of control CEO (there's a large disconnect between Musk and the consequences of his actions). Tesla requires very high volume selling vehicles to prop up its comical market cap. The entire company is resting on one car model. They desperately need another highly successful model, the Cybertruck could never be that.
Frankly Tesla is dumb lucky the Europeans and Japanese have botched the EV market so badly overall. Tesla shouldn't even exist at this point with how trivial their lineup is.
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simply put, they are ugly.
Fun fact from Denmark: you could never buy one here anyway. It never got EU type approval, mostly due to pedestrian safety rules (sharp edges, rigid steel body). Curious whether that limited market was part of why volumes stayed low.
I think what also contributed to the commercial failure is that it actually looked great at the early prototype stage, but the production car turned out to be uglier. Most people don't notice this, but they feel it subconsciously.
Go find early pre-production Cybertruck photos and compare with the actual prod car. It became subtly bulkier, uglier, less streamlined, and IRL it looks even worse than on the photos. Probably they had to do this due to production difficulties or to meet some standards, or to cut costs, whatever. But it was a mistake.
I had a pre-order. The reason I canceled was because the delivered product had a lot less range and was much more expensive than previously announced.
There were other things that contributed to the decision, too: the announced "stressed skin" exoskeleton was panned in favor of adhering the body panels to the body with glue, it became clear that Tesla's profit and valuation were funding Elon's right-wing political project, and I would have preferred a solid-axle design.
The absurdity was not what was wrong with it. It's OK to be absurd. I really liked the stainless steel design. Less trail damage when off-roading and no need to worry about paint scratches causing body rust. The door wedge design? Meh. But it enabled the stainless steel body.
In the end, I want what the Cybertruck failed to deliver: a full-size electric pickup at a good price with excellent range. I currently have my eyes on the RAM REV. We'll see if that one gets axed, too.
https://archive.is/Q8NSx
Disabling Javacsript lets you read the article already. There's no need to visit archive.today, where you participate in executing DDOS attacks against anyone who criticizes the site's creator.
I live in SF (and sometimes NYC), so those are the only places I've really seen them. They're enormous, and incredibly unwieldy in an urban environment.
I think they'll be a hard sell in rural areas, too... where the Cybertruck isn't really competitive with traditional pickups for the actual things they're used for.
It's cool, though. Even if you don't like the look, there's something whimsical about seeing a vehicle that doesn't look like every other car on the road. I just don't think there's a big enough market for it.
Truly one of the most baffling stories in recent automotive history. All they had to do was make a normal pickup truck with Tesla tech. Hell, go ahead and use it as the testbed for 48V, steer-by-wire and whatever else if you want to - but the amount of time and money wasted to make what was in the end an absolute monstrosity that failed to deliver on any of its price, performance and range promises strains credulity. Cybertruck is the most visible inflection point marking Elon's descent into madness.
They look quite silly but I really love it when a car manufacturer takes a chance and does something out of the ordinary. In a few years these are going to be really popular at car shows.
They can cancel it, but it will always symbolize the time period and culture associated with its creator, that probably just ended. I bet future generations will use its image that way.
Hopefully they make some sort of "Signature Edition" version as a last hurrah.
The upsides were the steer by wire which once you drive it feels amazing and an exterior surface unlike painted vehicles you can choose to neglect and it doesn't matter.
The major downside was the price. I feel if they could have gotten it in the mid/low 40K range for an entry model it would have sold more units.
I still hold that if they made a cyber van with steer by wire and an exterior surface, it would have sold like hot cakes. An electric van with long range, tight turning radius, and durable kid resistant body panels? Yes please.
Yeah something that fits below the large Rivian van. Something similar to the small Nissan work vans.
I suspect the semi truck will be next on the chopping block. Tesla being merged into Spacex would have resulted in the shutting down of the car business and a focus on robots. I doubt that robots will be a money maker, it's only useful on mars because people can't live there.
It was absurd, which is fun actually.
But not useful. I don’t have truck use-cases.
The tech inside would have been way more useful inside a CyberVan or CyberSUV.
It was a great idea, and there's some amazing technology in it, but it's absolutely terrible implementation.
I'm not a fan, but I was hopeful that the direct sales model would drive others to confront the dealership tax. Ford floated the idea with the Lightning, but faced a mutiny.
I am the exact target audience of their new Fathom, but I abandoned my preorder sign up process when I saw the phrase "dealerships set the final price".
May I post the comedic bit about cybertruck by Dan Docimo? I find it hilarious https://www.instagram.com/reel/Dax16Nxuu4b/?dlrf=MW43dms5M2d...
For posterity, the HN thread of the Cybertruck's announcement from 2019 (1765 points, 1943 comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21602437
I don't understand why anyone ever bought one of these in the first place. Fads are a crazy thing.
If they had made this an SUV the size of the Rivian R1S it would have sold far better. Big truck people weren't ready for this.
I've rented a Cybertruck, and whatever you think if you drive one you'll be blown away.
Model S,X,3 was the plan of the founders of Tesla. Cybertruck was Elons plan.
48v and other tech lives on in Semi and Cab https://driveteslacanada.ca/news/tesla-cybercab-48v-system-4...
Wow, its real! I just looked it up on iPhone.
but electric trucks are very successful in China. Why not in the rest of the market?
I think the cybertruck appeals to a very narrow market. It's too expensive for most people who just want a big vehicle to get groceries and run kids to around, and doesn't really have any qualities that make it useful for commercial use, outside of being a rolling billboard. Unless it just really appeals to you and you have cash to burn, I don't know why you'd buy a cybertruck over a Ram/Ford/GM. A RAM 1500 w/ etorque costs half a cyber truck and gets decent fuel mileage... If you need a work truck a RAM 3500 is cheaper and will reliably haul 30-40k loads 12 hours a day and the warranty isn't void the second your tires touch dirt.
It’s a status symbol masquerading as a utility vehicle.
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The Slate and Fathom are going to sell like hotcakes in the US.
I think the Fathom will outsell the Slate 10 to 1 despite costing more, because U.S. buyers have adapted to "luxury" in every trim level of vehicle. I mean, yes base level Corollas still sell quite well (but these days even those have features you dreamt about in a luxury sedan not too many decades ago.)
The Slate represents an ideology that combines the nostalgia of what trucks used to be (especially the Ford Ranger) with a modern EV powertrain, but most people don't actually want the stripped down basic vehicle, even if their eyes light up over the idea.
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Everything that's cheap will sell like hotcakes, but that doesn't mean the companies selling them will make much profit from them.
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I have a slate preorder but it's a niche vehicle. It's a small 2 door 2wd pickup that can't meaningfully tow and has a 200 mi range.
It's not going to appeal to people who want a truck as a symptom of fragile insecurities around their masculinity and that's a biiiig part of the US truck market
I don't think this is a failure of electric trucks, it's a failure of this specific design.
Look at the F150 lightening to see the failure of electric trucks. Chevy, Dodge and Ford all have, and it shows. Chevy's electric Silverado has a lot more range because more people want a truck for towing than the 1% that hacker news claims, and so range became and issue. Ford and Dodge are instead looking at plug in hybrids for the future: use an engine when towing, and battery for acceleration and shorter trips.
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Trucks are a status symbol in the USA. EVs were becoming acceptable in the mainstram, hence the initial surge in sales, but that has cooled off since 2024. Now very few outside of the big tech cities are spending money on EVs. Hence the fate of the electric F-150 as well.
Cybertruck is only available in countries that don't want EVs.
That's electric semi trucks. The market for pickup trucks in general in China would be pretty small.
The Cybertruck is not very good at being a truck, but it is very good at being a social signifier.
This isn't about the idea of electric trucks.
This is specifically about the Tesla Cybertruck, which has been shown to be fairly shoddy in construction AND is tied to a very, very divisive figure.
Overpriced, not good at being a truck, eDong, yep.
Because cybertruck is a bad truck.
It's also illegal to sell in EU because of how bad it is for pedestrian safety.
bad truck suggests it's bad at being truck not just... at everything related to transport
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I have very mixed feelings about the Cybertruck. Personally I absolutely hate it, it's just not my cup of tea and I would never in a million years buy one. However as a general lover of cars, I have to appreciate just how striking the design is and how it was a complete departure from pretty much any other car on the road.
There's nothing quite like the Cybertruck and I don't think there ever will be again.
Largely agree with your mixed feelings. When the Cybertruck was revealed, I thought it was atrociously ugly, but I appreciated something radically different in a market of converging (and IMO boring) styles. I could see the style being more successfully applied as a Cybercar / Cybercoupe.
Brings me to a point I'd like to make: it boggled my mind that Tesla decided to execute the 'Cyber' aesthetic via a pickup truck, particularly after the US auto industry ramped up marketing the pickup truck's familiar shape as a cultural facet during/after the Great Recession and the fuel economy regulation changes.
Tesla could've capitalized on the billions Ford, Chevy, Dodge, and others spent in the 2010s marketing pickup trucks as God's gift to humanity, but instead decided -that- was the best market to try a complete novelty in. It makes no rational sense -- I've heard it ultimately came down to Musk stubbornly wanting the Cybertruck, but I don't know if that's factual.
I love my Cybertruck. It's absolutely amazing for road trips with my dog. I watch movies and work on my projects (using a voice app I built) while FSD drives. It's basically a mobile apartment for me. I sleep comfortably in the truck bed when needed. I installed MOLLE panels on the L-tracks in the bed and 3D printed various accessories.
Sad to see it go but glad I got mine. Oh and kids love it. My Sentry mode clips are full of kids asking their parents to take pics with it.
your car automatically photographs children without their consent?
Hot take. Do doorbell cameras next
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I imagine we will see it reincarnated into a moon rover variant.
One of the dumbest, worst vehicles ever. The very symbol of a dreadful, wasteful, degenerate era for our species
Tesla's insistence on disrupting themselves is exactly why they're going to be successful.
Archive link
https://archive.is/Q8NSx
Winding down production of this abomination isn't enough. The ones already on the road should be rounded up, crushed, and recycled. This is urban blight on wheels. Citizens have a right to streets free of these eyesores.
it has to be said that it was the most revolutionary car design in the past decade
Musk was a fool to mistake the hollering of a small group of enthusiasts for that of the truck-buying U.S. population. Nobody was actually wanting for the CyberTruck. He should've listened to his marketing people and not be guided by social media and his right-wing instinct.
Then again, he's a con-man who's now quietly distancing himself from CyberTruck ("I had nothing to do with it") and moving on to the next con-trick: the CyberCab.
Tons of people wanted (and still want) a CyberTruck, but at something like a $40k price point.
Those people are just as loud as others, but never actually buy, because a $40k CyberTruck never existed.
I would want one for $40k in Europe.
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Well, if you're dreaming, instead of a cyber truck at 40K, wouldn't you want instead a Chauffeured Rolls-Royce and the Swedish bikini team to keep it maintained?
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That would have been antithetical to his existence.
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And sold 70,000 total. The fact that ~96.5% (likely more) of preorders were cancelled should tell you all you need to know about popularity.
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Based on the lie about how much it would cost, how many they could produce, and how soon they would be delivered...
Even very ugly cars will sell if they give you a really good deal for the money. The Cybertruck at $39,999 was a shockingly good deal. It was just a lie.
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I’m sure we can trust a sharp business man like Musk to learn from his mistakes and come up with better ideas
Btw have you seen the roadster??
The Cybertruck is the symbol of the Trump era. It's over.
Original announcement by Elon: https://xnotme.com/elonmusk/status/2118591788701421573#m
Not worth clicking.
No added information, with a thread full of ad hominem attacks
Worth clicking. Ton of people who actually want the cybertruck to continue. I can't believe there are still people who still didn't realize what colossal idiot Musk is.
best vehicle ever engineered
Sad, but reminds me of the Model S line teardown in making space. CB truly was ahead its time in how it pushed Tesla's tech, and will always be futuristic. Still, I can't help but to feel like it died too early. Its spirit lives on in the Roadster, and I sure hope this won't be the last "truly exceptional" Tesla among their "quality sleeper" EV's.
No other car is as awe-striking to see on the streets, especially in the EU. This will be the Mustang Fastback or Testarossa of the 2040's ...
As this is a thread of its discontinuation, might be worth looking at the thread of its announcement.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21602437
Haven’t explored it yet, but it might be interesting to see how the sentiment shifted.
Open source it entirely from parts to software, and let whoever wants to maintain it themselves to keep it.
I mean as much as I love thd idea of actually doing something bonkers, the lack of sales seemed inevitable to most I assume, so that should come as no surprise. Should have stayed a concept car.
Like most things it came down to price most of all. Cars are way too expensive in North America.
Even if it was half the cost, say $40K rather than $80K, I think most people in the market for a vehicle would choose something else!
I wouldn’t be surprised if cost were the only reason its sales weren’t even lower. If it’s expensive it’s at least a plausible status symbol. At a reasonable price it’s just an incompetently designed utility vehicle.
Cybertuck should do a security check for all the new models.
Oh! Oh!
Back to the Future #4
Can’t wait to see it!
Behold the Toyota Hilux [1], a truck so reliable that it is the truck of choice in many developed nations and even less developed ones. It's so cheap and reliable it became the platform for a war [2]. It also has a truck bed equivalent to a Ford F150, a vehicle significantly larger. But you can't buy a new Hilux or equivalent in the US because cars younger than 25 years cannot legally be imported [3] (to stop grey imports on Mercedes in the 1980s, originally) and because of CAFE standards [4].
Electric vehicles obviously don't have the hurdle of meeting emissions standards so Tesla, or any other company really, had (and has) the opportunity to create a small, cheap, mass market utility truck that no gas-powered vehicle can compete with. This is what the Cybertruck should've been.
There have been breakdowns of the Cybertruck and it is such an incredibly bad design. Things like the weight of stainless steel panels but with an aluminum frame. Why is that a problem? Because aluminum is prone to catastrophic failure with the up and down motion of towing a heavy load than stainless steel simply isn't [5].
The rumor has been that the only thing propping up Cybertruck demand is Elon forcing his own companies like SpaceX to buy them [6]. Other than that, the Cybertruck became a weird political statement [7]. Those people are getting crucified on resale. It's even a trend on Tiktok and elsewhere to watch these trade in videos. People who paid $150k+ are getting <$70k less than 2 years later.
Anyway, I'm shocked no US manufacturer is tackling the EV small utility truck market. Yes there was the F150 Lightning but it's still too big (and thus expensive).
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Hilux
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_War
[3]: https://www.octane-magazine.com/articles/features/usa-25-yea...
[4]: https://www.thedrive.com/news/heres-how-regulations-accident...
[5]: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/nZcb9TTyneFbxiDav/the-giga-p...
[6]: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-04-16/tesla-lea...
[7]: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/02/12/tesla-...
https://www.slate.auto/ ?
Oh man, I was wondering if anyone was gonna bring up Slate.
I try not to get excited about stuff, but the idea of The Next Big Thing in Cars being a total lack of garbage nonsense screens and giving us back CRANK CRANK WINDOWS -- this is pure joy.
Wheels. Seats. Motor[1]. Box to keep rain off. Done.
Oh you attached a bed to that? Double awesome.
[1] Enough top end cruise speed for American interstates.
> But you can't buy a new Hilux or equivalent in the US
A Tacoma is basically the US model of the Hilux.
The Tacoma is more like the modern Hilux. I should've been more specific. The 1980s and 1990s Hilux weighed in at 1000-1200kg. Now it's 1700-2100kg. It's a lot bigger truck. Those 1980s and 1990s trucks were indestructible and so easy to service.
Now I get why the gas powered Hilux has changed. Emissions standards have changed. Fuel efficiency is more important. Modern cars are full of computers and microcontrollers. But an EV is relatively simple. It's one of the big advantages. Yes you have an OS and it's not just turning the ignition but the drive system itself is fairly simple, the thing that turns battery power into movement (compared to ICEs). No moving parts (in the engine), basically.
You could absolutely make a small EV utility truck. Remember that part of the reason why people were excited about the Cybertruck when it was announced was the price point (~$35k). Of course it turned out to be 3 times that.
Look at what BYD is doing [1]. Now these are PHEVs rather than pure EVs. Other automakers are making smaller pure EV trucks.
[1]: https://www.carscoops.com/2025/12/byd-new-compact-pickup-pro...
> A Tacoma is basically the US model of the Hilux.
This is a very common misconception Americans believe about the hilux. I’ve owned multiple generations of both on different continents.
The Tacoma is much heavier, but has a much lower payload rating. It has way less torque, and gets much worse fuel economy. The Tacoma only comes with a regular bed- no cab chassis, no tray back, etc.
The Tacoma is much more expensive. The Tacoma only exists in two countries. The hilux is one of only a few truly global vehicles.
One is a genuine work utility vehicle, one is a lifestyle vehicle.
They have never shared a frame, engine, transmission, axles or body panels.
They are not related, and are not similar.
Fun while it lasted
CT looks too sharp
I always stare at them and wonder who designed them. Hideous.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPc-VEqBPHI
And also, who would buy one?
Lots of people, based on the number of them I see on the road.
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As a Tesla owner and fan, their 5 year consumer strategy is unclear. Their 3 upscale / luxury products have been canceled, and there's no clear "growth" roadmap for their existing owners. And although they have exceptional technology, innovation for the Tesla badge has stalled.
I can tell they are likely investing all of their production capacity into Cybercabs, in order to tap into a growing rental market (mostly short term, possibly some long term), and adjust to shrinking vehicle ownership.
But as someone who enjoys driving, car ownership, road trips, spontaneity -- I don't have a clear picture of what my next Tesla purchase would be in 5 years.
The Cybertruck wasn't really designed as a volume item, it was designed as the testbed for Tesla's next gen tech (ethernet-based fieldbus, 48V tech). You can do only so much in the lab, and sometimes you have to push your tech into production to find the last few% of failures, which will cost you dearly if you actually put them into your volume sellers.
I mean it's probably not that comforting for owners to unknowingly have signed up for a beta test, but that was the plan for Tesla for a while with the Cybertruck.
This was also the reason for sloppy stuff like steel panels glued to the aluminium frame, and not following up on their initial promises - the car morphed from a serious project into a low volume testbed sometime during its production.
Tesla seems to be killing its non volume cars the S and X are dead as well, I've heard rumors the Model 3 might be on its way out.
The wrapped versions of them looked very cool imo. Without wrap, they looked like a fridge.
It's good to dare to try things more than a little different.
Who would think we could get satellite internet that works?
I can only believe this car is unpopular if I step outside of my mental bubble. In suburban Washington DC I see these things everywhere.
I love that they took a swing for the fences. Car makers are so fucking safe these days. Sadly it didn’t land, but it’s awesome that it exists. I think if it had used a more conventional design it would have done so much better. Owners report an incredible driving experience. I also think battery technology held it back. It was originally advertised as having much better towing range, and production came in very underwhelming. This made it much less appealing as a utility vehicle. It ended up being used for picking up groceries and this wasn’t broad enough a market.
Not every swing is a home run. You can win with a few home runs or a lot of singles.
The only guaranteed way to lose is if you stop swinging. And Tesla has stopped swinging. They haven't revealed a mass market consumer vehicle since 2019.
There is some incredible technology in the Cybercab that allows them to be built cheaply in high volume. Instead Ford looks like they are going to be the first Western consumer vehicle out of the gate with the unboxed production method with their Ford Fathom. Unsurprisingly, the Chinese are ahead here too.
They've stopped swinging at the consumer market. I'd argue that they are swinging at other markets though (Cybercab and Optimus).
Hasn’t Musk been clear that he’s abandoning traditional passenger vehicles? He’s retooling for Cybercab and Optimus. Model Y and 3 are selling too well to abandon but there won’t be new models. We’d be lucky for refreshes.
Agreed, I love to see long shots even if they don't land, and in this case the price/performance fundamentals were likely the biggest problem. The "limited TAM for a bold stand-out design" was probably another, but Elon also didn't do any favors by vigorously adopting the opposite politics of his customers at the same time he was trying to launch a bold/iconic design.
Was the unusual design a "swing at the fences" or was it just a vanity project?
I disagree. Teslas used to be nice designs and pleasant to see on the street. Cybertruck and Cybercab designs are an affront. Intentionally ugly. I’m glad we don’t see a lot of trucks on the street, and I despair at the thought of millions of Cybercabs about.
The 3/Y and the screens had lots of design and product innovations. Iterating on those lines would’ve been quite nice.
The Y redesign to adopt more of the "Cyber" ethos is such a mistake. It won't age well, but then again neither will the brand.
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For better "swing for the fences", have a look at Renault.
It's not admirable to "swing for the fences" if you're holding the bat upside-down
The Cybertruck is today’s DeLorean
However, if it showed up in a movie as a supposed “cool car” it wouldn’t be taken seriously
The DeLorean wasn't taken seriously when Back to the Future was released either... it looks like a cool car now, mostly because of the movie, but back then it was considered a joke of a car and the company went bankrupt less than two years after it began production.
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The owner has not (yet) been arrested for cocaine trafficking, though.
(The history of John DeLorean is quite the read!)
The DeLorean was yesterday's Tucker Torpedo.
no one here will say it because the Musk glazing is crazy, but it was always his own little pet project, he really pushed for it and now it's obvious that it's stupid and a failure and he was wrong for entertaining this idea
Headline of article is: "RIP Cybertruck. You Were Unloved, Unwanted, and Utterly Absurd"
No point in editorializing it.
concerning?
I'd like a cheap basic pickup with an 8 foot bed please.
Truly the peak of 2020s antisocial car design. The car looks designed to plow through other vehicles, barriers, and pedestrians without slowing down to count the bodies. "Bulletproof bodypanels" is only a selling point on a mass production car if you routinely piss people off enough to make them grab iron. Folks who need pickup trucks for the utility they provide have stuck with trucks that are actually fit for purpose. It was a way to signal to the world that you had extremely poor judgement and low standards.
I feel like cybertruck’s main issue is that driving one is a political statement. Maybe not intended. A lot of people just think they’re neat.
But where I live (deep blue territory) most people would not be caught dead driving Musk’s favorite car around
There are plenty of people who drive pickups because they like them, not because they fulfil a utilitarian purpose, and not all of them are assholes.
I would say the issue is more that there has been little to no progress in mainstream consumer car aesthetics in the past 25 years. It used to be that you could clearly tell a 50s car from a 60s car from a 70s car from an 80s car, etc. Everything from the past 25 years or so is pretty indistinguishable, so something comes along with a clear but possibly misguided aesthetic vision, its naturally going to appeal to some people.
> Truly the peak of 2020s antisocial car design
Don't speak too soon, we have a few more years to go.
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modern cars are literally designed to deform on impact to keep the passengers safe. they're called "crumple zones" and they exist to dissipate kinetic energy to keep everybody involved safer. adding "more rigidity" isn't serving any meaningful purpose.
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> I guess we all just want something that “looks like a pickup”, is heavy, and guzzles $7 a gallon diesel fuel
No actually the lightning and the R1T are pretty well loved by the people who took a chance on them
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I have an acquaintance who bought more than two cybertrucks at launch because they would be self-driving ubers making money while not in use.
They are not self driving.
They are not making money.
Im curious about the timing of this announcement.
On the surface, it seems to take the wind out of their sails.
They told us the cybertruck was awesome.
They told us flying cars soon.
Now we see the fate of the first promise.
I would have delayed this announcement for as long as possible after the flying car show from a PR perspective.
Which makes me think this announcement is throwing a bone to the financial bean counters ahead of the potential merger with SpaceX.
Cleaning the companies books of fat before the big game.
You have it backwards.
The Musk strategy is to quietly drop failures/broken promises from a previous hype cycle after kicking off a brand new hype cycle to take its place.
This is entirely consistent with his tried and true strategy to constantly redirect attention forward to the distant future, and never stay idle long enough to encourage looking back at the ever growing pile of ideas that didn't work out.
Aw yes, I have it backwards, because I was thinking of the public.
And this strategy isnt Musks. Hes copying politicians and government. It's a very old strategy. Someone even wrote a song about it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate_the_Positive
You've got to ac-cent-tchu-ate the positive
E-lim-i-nate the negative
Latch on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mr. In-Between
They have also renamed the 'Full Auto Driving' feature to 'Driving Assist'.
Literally nothing Tesla promised is coming true.
It's called Supervised Full Self Driving (FSD) and that is an accurate name given it controls every aspect of the vehicle's operation, only requiring the driver to pay attention as a supervisor. And, essentially, the same software and hardware available on a Model 3 and Model Y is present on the CyberCabs that are driving people around a few cities, now, without input mechanisms. Elon is a PoS, and it took a decade longer than he said, but the cars are driving themselves.
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This isn’t news to anyone following the business. I’m pretty sure it was announced months ago that model X and Cybertruck (and maybe Model S too) were being discontinued.
And Model 3 and Y have always been 95%+ of the cars Tesla delivered.
It was also mentioned in the Roadster presentation that the Roadster would be the only nonautonomous car produced by Tesla long-term.
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Just to be clear, the earliest possible date for no further increase in temperature under the most optimistic IPCC scenarios is 2050. Actual decline to pre industrial levels at best around 2100.
Oh man... if you want to start a professional career as internet troll you have a really long road ahead of you.
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*flying car shaped air tank and thrusters
I'm convinced that Elon made it just because he thought it would be funny. "Let's make a truck that looks like it came out of a 90s low-polygon video game! That'll be hilarious!" He never cared for one moment if it was actually a good product.
The poor people that bought them were the butt of his joke.
No, he legitimately thought it was edgy and cool. He has the taste and desires of a 10 year old.
It is cool, in terms of it doesn't care what people think and doesn't mind people hating it (like the parent post).
There's nothing wrong with nostalgia and the Cybertruck felt like it was from Hard Drivin' or 4D Sports Driving/Stunts.
The first Tesla was based on a Lotus Elise. It was stunningly good looking. It changed people's minds that an electric car had to look like a glorified golf cart.
Later cars from Tesla looked more generic but still like looked like regular cars.
The cybertruck seems like a throwback to the old electric cars that looked like something out of nerd's sketchbook.
Compared to other pickups on the road, he's not wrong. It wasn't a good design, but the competition isn't very fierce.
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Tesla's forgotten how to make actual products people want to buy thanks to its meme stock status, government handouts, state & federal tax and carbon credits, not to mention the absurdly high tariffs on foreign competitors. It has received zero actual feedback from the market so the new products are based on ketamine high visions rather than market needs.
It'll probably be folded into SpaceX by the time the feedback arrives.
Tesla's forgotten how to make actual products people want to buy thanks to its meme stock status, government handouts, state & federal tax and carbon credits, not to mention the absurdly high tariffs on foreign competitors.
It has received zero actual feedback from the market so the new products are based on ketamine high visions rather than market needs.
It'll probably be folded into SpaceX by the time the feedback arrives.
That quote was about the new glue, not the old glue?
If they read their own link, that never happened?
Who's doing the proofreading at Wired now? Is it all just AI?
https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/tesla-recalls-cybertru...
https://autos.yahoo.com/ev-and-future-tech/articles/tesla-cy...
I can't remember the specific video, but I recall seeing someone breakdown some of the poor materials/engineering choices for "truck" use cases and of the mass of the CT.
Found: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_scBKKHi7WQ
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That article seems to be fairly flattering of the technical tricks tesla used to make the demo roadster flip? Your claim about "paying his mortgage ... critiquing everything Elon does" is certainly not backed up by this citation. Dude clearly doesn't like the cybertruck, but to a first approximation, that pretty much describes everyone.
As someone who described himself in an earlier post as a "Big Elon fan boy", perhaps the source of bias here lies in a location other than the author of the WIRED article.
So the big plan here is to just keep making Model 3 and Model Y?
I'm guessing the Model 3 will be next on the chopping block.
FSD is a serious moat. I'll give Tesla that. But they've really decided to stop being a car company. Maybe they're just scared of Chinese brands.
I think Musk has some specific things he'd like to do in the next 10 years and running a car company isn't something he cares about. So he's willing to destroy the company and the hard work of thousands of engineers, to build stupid robots, stupid cyber cabs, and phenomenal electric trucks in stupid angular wrapping.
I have no idea what the Tesla board is smoking, because Musk does not care about money, the company, its customers, or its employees.
in the past ten years:
60,000 cybertrucks? 350,000 model X 200,000 model S 0 roadsters 0 cybercabs (stupid)
a ton of model Y, which is why nobody wants one but are forced to buy it anyway because of FSD.
it's amazing how one guy gets to destroy an iconic car company and absolutely nobody in the organization pushes back.
Why would they stop making the model 3? It still sells well and many markets aren’t crossover obsessed like the Americans are.
The Cybertruck should tell you how stupid Elon really is. Its a coffin on wheels, and rightfully banned in the entire EU. His next stunt was to make a flying car, thats basically vaporware, and, also banned literally everywhere.
>The US EV maker only began delivering the Cybertruck to customers in late 2023. According to Kelley Blue Book, the company only sold 20,237 Cybertrucks in the US last year, down 48% from 38,965 in 2024. Before the pickup truck launched, Musk had predicted annual sales of 250,000 units.
ouch
Ugliest car ever screaming insecure and politically controversial owner who can't shut his mouth, what could go wrong
They are probably the ugliest vehicles ever produced. They're an eyesore. Good riddance.
I can assure you there are much uglier vehicles out there. I once stopped at a stoplight and there was this car ahead of me, I don't know which make or model but when I saw it I just laughed out so loud. I think it was Korean or Japanese, but I'm not sure.
You rarely see them, probably because they're so dog-ugly that hardly anyone buys them.
No Wired love for the Incel Camino? The Deplorean?
side-topic: why trucks are so popular (especially USA)? Is it all in the fake testosterone virtue signalling and pretending to be hard working country people?
To me trucks are the most useless type of vehicle apart from niche utilitarian cases in farming or construction. Super heavy, gas guzzling, open bed, compromised handling, pedestrian crushing death machine.
If you want big family hauler, grocery getter: mini-vans, wagons.
If you are in trades: van, box truck or flatbed box truck (where bed is useful shape and size, and all sides can be removed if needed).
No, you don't need 3 tonne vehicle with bajillion horsepower as a daily, because you may need to pull a trailer with your inflatable dinghy once in a two years.
If you want truck adjacent vehicle, get Toyota 4runner or Highlander. Humongous cars, vast and closed cargo space. It will pull a trailer, it will haul all your stuff and family.
Because vehicles are a compromise. A truck can do everything a sedan can. A sedan cannot do everything a truck can. A flatbed truck can do more than a smaller truck - but it also is bigger and not easy to drive because of the size. The costs to own extra vehicles is very high and so people won't own different a vehicle for each use (renting is not a good answer - too often I've gone to rent something and it was sold out. Also most rentals have restrictions on use)
> To me trucks are the most useless type of vehicle apart from niche utilitarian cases in farming or construction. Super heavy, gas guzzling, open bed, compromised handling, pedestrian crushing death machine. If you want big family hauler, grocery getter: mini-vans, wagons.
Minivans and trucks get similar fuel mileage. For the average family there are not enough kids to need a minivan.
> If you are in trades: van, box truck or flatbed box truck (where bed is useful shape and size, and all sides can be removed if needed).
Obviously you are not in the trades and don't know anyone in them. I've heard plenty of people in the trades debate the merits of truck vs van. They are compromises and there is no clear winner.
> you don't need 3 tonne vehicle with bajillion horsepower as a daily, because you may need to pull a trailer with your inflatable dinghy once in a two years.
If I need to tow something even once every two years then I need to own a truck. I've tried to rent a truck to tow something - turns out most rental contracts don't allow towing. There are exceptions, but the cost is so high, and finding a place to rent is so inconvenient that I will just own my own truck instead - it is worth it.
I wasn't pro truck until I lived on an island with limited infrastructure. Once you need to take care of some of your own infra, a truck is a great tool, beating your full list. That said, a beater truck is generally preferred -- you want reliable, cheap and something that you don't care if it gets banged up.
Not a “truck guy” but I have a cybertruck because it’s the only self-driving electric car that has enough room to carry my family’s stuff when we go to the lake, ocean, camping, etc. My ideal car is a van or large SUV but there aren’t electric self-driving versions of those yet.
So this leaves Tesla with two car models, a Robotaxi that doesn't work very well, and a humanoid robot operation that didn't ship product on schedule[1]. Why is this worth a 1.4 trillion dollar market cap?
[1] https://optimusk.blog/blog/tesla-optimus-production-timeline...
Good riddance from the taped on glued on pump and dump scheme for fElon.
Can't believe I had to scroll down this far to see anything other than Musk bootlickers.
I really just wanted a cyber van. Cheap driverless car for a distracted mom to haul a bunch of kids. Why didn’t they deliver that. The model X with the gull doors hit my head. The model y is too small. If Elon were a soccer mom it would be better.
We can add the truck’s 25,000 annual unit sales versus Musk’s 250,000 prediction to the long list of his other failed and bogus predictions. The top of that list has many contenders: date of mars colonization, date of driverless car, everything about his ridiculous tunnel system in Las Vegas. Yet the media regularly credulously report, “Elon Musk says…”.
The cybertruck was announced like a bad meme and now dies as one too. What we see is the logical and long overdue conclusion of a story that lasted longer than it should have.
Good riddance.
They have big plans for optimus and cybercab that is going to blow our minds.
Someone knows the government infinite money machine, which Tesla, SpaceX, Solar City, and many other Musk companies took advantage of, is about to get cut off.
What government money do you think Tesla gets? Consumer tax credits went away a long time ago, and that benefit went to customers, not Tesla.
A government credit still means Tesla gets paid the full price from a sale. So yes, Tesla got government money.
But yes, those credits have been vanishing for a while.
Oh, so where is this 1 or 2 million of reservations ? Would Musk lie about to investors ?
It's just mind blowing what this guy is getting away with. Hopefully not for long anymore.
What a shame. They were a good way to filter out folks to avoid whenever you saw someone driving one.
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If you're driving a cyber truck you won't have to.
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I still remember the marketing for the Cybertruck. Tesla teased a partial neo-noir silhouette of the truck which had everyone guessing which part it belonged to. Childhood fantasies about Blade Runner designs were conjured in people’s imaginations. Fanboys were truly generous with the design expectations. Embarrassed to admit now, I did go to the unveiling and when it rolled out I thought this must be a gag and the real Blade Runner would follow any second now, only to realize that this ugly thing was it. If you could only see the collective shock amongst the attendees. Only the drunks were cheering. Then the boss had the designer throw a ball through the window. Twice.
(Edit: the actual designer had the assistant designer throw a ball through the window.)
No fan of Elon here but I prefer Cybertrucks to Hummers based solely on observed owner behavior. Hummer drivers are DICKS. Cybertruck drivers are just driving around in some metallic 3-D geometry with little (observable) ill intent
Elon truly was inspired by Delorean
That's disrespectful to a guy who made a nicer car and had a less destructive drug habit.
In what way? That's a strained way to poke fun at someone just because.
"That's gold, Jerry. Gold."
>"Elon truly was inspired by Delorean"
He wishes. Delorean is a modern classic, regardless of commercial success. Cybertruck will go down like the H1/H2; something entirely emblematic of the worst excesses in the time it was conceived and marketed in, that later generations will go "did they really think that was cool?".
A modern classic, thanks to Bob Zemeckis; without whom it would've been right up there with the Bricklin SV-1.
Setting aside JohnZ's personal failings, the car and its production was a catastrophe.
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Well this thread has taught me that “I don’t like Elon, but “ appears to be the new pronouns for people that find it important to signal their left wing bona fides.
Honestly thought we’re done with that …
Why isn't Tesla responding to queries as to whether production will cease completely? Are they ignoring bad news and bad rap? Childish of them.
Tesla could simply come up with a more conventional looking EV pick-up truck of course.
The Ford F150 lightning was killed because of low demand and loosing the company money. That looked just like all the other F150s and that didnt help it. I dont see you criticising them them.
I don't see a reason why there isn't a market for a EV pickup truck. Maybe the American public simply isn't ready for it. Or the Lighting may have been too expensive compared to its ICE counterpart.
But the CyberTruck is just one man's doodle-after-an-acid-trip kind of design.
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I recently had a Tesla service call at my house (routine maintenance for my Y). He showed up in a darkly wrapped Cybertruck. It didn’t occur to me that they’re just dogfooding their own vehicles to use them up.
Hilarious but a logical end state option for them.
Dang, I bet Elon fans did Not See this coming.
Ugly car, shoddy build quality and a price commensurate with much better vehicles. What’s not to love?
I already got the first knock-off.
https://x02.me/i/esVNQF.jpeg
Just kidding.
Maybe they will upgrade the polygon count, anti-alias some of the improperly cut borders and implement proper Béziers curves...
Couldn’t happen to a nicer company.
Money better spent on your roadster reservations.
Ugly, made by a Nazi and bad at truck stuff. This is amongst the least surprising news of 2026.
Like the ideology it represents, it's presence is impossible to ignore, but in the worst way possible. Plus it's a shitty truck.
It can never shake the "Ugh, get a load of this guy" factor, and it's a wonder it stayed in production this long.
Realism has a chance again, now can Americans also wind down the cult-like following of figures like Musk, Trump, actors, athletes, and the likes? It's Unamerican. European royalists never were this crazy about their objects of affection.
> European royalists never were this crazy about their objects of affection.
Michael Fagan (a British citizen who intruded into Queen Elizabeth II's bedroom in Buckingham Palace in 1982) was reportedly somewhat enamoured of the Queen.
The hardcore carriage way lining flag wavers of the UK queue for hours and often have homes that could feature on Desperate Hoarders for the sheer number of coronation themed teapots and tea cosies that line every sill and proto ledge.
Even the UK's most notorious anarchists and anti-christs sing God Save the Queen.
I can't help but laugh at the number of people on HN that kept trying to convince everyone this wasn't a terrible product.
The original promise wasnt terrible. The reality was!
I'm actually talking about the people defending the reality of what was released.
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Yeah the Roadster is never getting mass produced …
Also i wonder whether in 5-7 years Model 3 and Y will be around
Isn’t the Model Y consistently leading the sales charts? I don’t think it’s going away anytime soon. The Model 3 is also selling reasonably well.
It is now, but what if Cybercab demands eclipses it?
Also Model Y/3 battery/charging is ancient at this point. It hasn’t had any meaningful improvements for 8 years now.
Look up a Model Y’s charging curve it’s horrible. There are cars out there with much more consistent ones, 400 kW charging, much more range etc etc
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Car companies have long been on a cycle for their vehicles. It varies but generally we could say every seven years they're going to do a major redesign of a car. So I think it's safe to say the Model Y and Model 3 won't be sold in seven years. The question is, in seven years, will they have a different model, loosely based on the current Model Y and Model 3, that carry those same names? Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe Tesla goes bankrupt and the cars aren't for sale. Maybe Tesla continues and the names exist.
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The cybertruck is baffling to me because it has the political connotations of a Hummer, but the beauty and gadget-obsession of a Pontiac Aztek.
IMO the Aztek is a perfect comp to the Cybertruck, actually. Both were crammed with features intended to revolutionize their market segments. Like the Cybertruck, the added value from those features was... dubious, at best.
Both are hideous. Both had a longer production run than you'd expect given their lofty goals and poor sales.
The Aztek has taken on a sort of ironic-cool status among some car nerds. It wasn't a bad car per se, just ugly and weird. Nowadays it's just a funny curio of the early 2000s.
It'll be interesting to see how the Cybertruck ages in the public eye. With time, maybe it'll be easier to separate it from its context as a Hummer for tech douchebags, and it'll just be a funny ugly car with some goofy features.
It lasted longer than I expected
RIP Cybertruck
It brought joy and anger to many people.
nobody in the top level comments can just say "it sucked and I hated it"
Following the DeLorean example in more than just body surfaces.
And nothing of value was lost.
Tired: all terrain vehicles
Wired: special purpose vehicles
It did sort of identify/lean into something that I think many people don't really want to acknowledge, which is, yes the "truck" has become a status symbol rather than a work vehicle.
Had Musk leaned into it as the "luxury"/GT of trucks (like the H2), there probably would've been less pushback. Granted he's functionally incapable of not just lying about things being the best every and setting stupid impossible goals, but I do think there's outcomes where we see more things "akin" to the cybertruck, leaning into the Pavement Princess market.
They ran out of polygons
I can only imagine how many people told Musk that the Cybertruck was a horrible idea and he completely ignored them and probably fired a lot of them. Musk basically re-enacted the Simpsons episode where Homer's brother lets him design a car and it is so bad it bankrupts the company.
... in order to free up production capacity for the Cybercab.
Hah, feels like when someone says they're going to stop dating the unemployed slob to focus on dating the alcoholic.
A taxi with only 2 doors, what an improvement!
The Zeekr with sliding doors that Waymo is using seems like a way better concept for a robotaxi. Still fits in a standard parking space but can carry a group at need without being terribly inefficient for a single person.
how come waymo can buy Chinese cars but i cant?
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Without a steering wheel which guarantees it won't be road legal in most countries anytime soon.
A people mover that moves the minimum of people (2)
> A people mover that moves the minimum of people (2)
You meant maximum? Though minimum would be fun, too: taxi won’t start unless you agree to socialize and chat with a random stranger. As soon as silence is detected it pulls over and the ride ends.
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90% of taxi rides are 1 person 95% 2 so its based on, you know, business intelligence rather than your hot take which is anti Elon rhetoric like most of this thread or any for that matter here (keep thinking this is reddit)
The Delorean of our times…
Where I live people make fun of this car. Not too unsimilar to "incel goggles".
The Cyberduck has always been DOA ... it just took Tesla/Elon 3 years to admit it.
Tesla is now two cars away from offering no cars? There's just model x and y which was built off of x. It does seem like they'd do fine as a meme-stock company though.
It was absolutely shocking that this thing launched at all.
It was so bad, yet, Musk managed to make buying one became an identity thing, selling far more than the product warranted.
I taught my now 4 year old that those are called dumpsters, so he very reliably says, "Hey Dad! A dumpster" whenever he sees one. The number of people he has loudly roasted while getting out of their dumpster is too high to count. Perhaps my proudest parenting achievement so far.
We went with "dumpster on wheels".
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I just imagine what an incredible success Tesla would have had just making a "boring" Tesla branded competition to the F150. "Just" a model 3 with a standard pickup body.
Americans, for whatever reason, only buy SUVs and trucks. They've left the whole truck market untapped by creating a vehicle only a very small niche could/would want.
I don't understand what product marketing was up to, or if they just completely lacked the spine to stand up to Elon.
Surprise: a car that can only be legally sold and used on mainstream roads in the US makes poor sales, even in the US, after its design was widely ridiculed.
The Model 3 was a masterpiece of design, the Cybertruck is more like Cybercuck.
Thank goodness. What an eyesore. Of course, it does have the instrumental benefit of acting as a shibboleth.
As a small-business utility vehicle designed specifically to be wrapped in advertising, I thought it was brilliant. For other uses, eh.
Outside of certain kinds of construction contractors, I rarely if ever see pickup trucks used for this purpose.
This anecdote might indicate why: We recently had a bunch of work done on our house. The siding crew had a pickup truck, and every morning the very first thing they did was unload the entire contents of the truck into our back yard. The plumbers and electricians would just get the stuff they were actually using and then lock the van.
A ford Transit van fits that requirement much better - much more useful as a utility vehicle, much more space for advertising, much cheaper...
Reminder that the INFINITELY MORE PRACTICAL Model S and X lines died for this boondoggle. Still upset over that one.
"You never see a whole family in a cybertruck, its always just one man"
I struggle with why I should care. A low selling, controversial truck that is the brainchild of an eccentric billionaire is being discontinued. It's a triumph of Tesla marketing that anyone should care.
They have sold 70k Cybertrucks since 2023. Ford has sold more than 10 times that alone of F-series. Toyota sells that many RAV4s every two months.
For anyone that bought one and loves it - I'm not questioning your choice and I hope the vehicle will be well supported. Many popular vehicles that sell better have been discontinued like the entire companies of Geo, Saturn, and AMC. The Chevy Malibu sold twice as many cars per year pre-Covid than total Cybertrucks have been sold, and they were discontinued in 2024.
It's relatively neat that Tesla tried something new but they should consider focusing on operations and not losing further ground to BYD globally.
I wonder if we will see less aggressive and generally hostile car designs in the future, now that public sentiment towards the tech oligarchs seems to have shifted.
Renault is designing cute things again, so that's a good development. So is Citroen, apparently?
So that's a good development
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The overall positive responses here are kinda...concerning.
This sharp edged, fire hazard which was aimed at a certain group of people who seem to be dangerous themselves is not really something that should be cheered.
And yes, it looked different but there are different looking cars all over the world. They usually serve a purpose though like kei cars in Japan.
Does anyone want this ugly spy device anymore?
Darn, elon must be on downers since his attempt to buy elections for half a billion dollars failed utterly
My five year old nephew will be devastated.
My kid loves these things too and I have to keep the eye-rolling to myself.
Future collectible market will be willing to pay good money for these! Big future nostalgia factor amongst 3-9 yos.
Of course if there was an actual board of this public company with actual power the useless CEO would have been fire ten times over. But like in Meta and other Tech companies this will never be able to happen due to 10x voting Class B shares bullshit.
Why shareholders put up with that I will never know
All the clown show at Tesla had to do is clone the F-150. This was one of the easiest product failures to predict in recent memory. Musk can't help himself. Tesla continues to desperately need a Shotwell at the helm.
At present all Tesla has propping it up is bubble dust and one car model (one increasingly dated car model). Somehow after 14-15 years (Model S released in Summer 2012) these people still can't release a real SUV of any sort. The model Y is a grotesque joke of a fake SUV, a mutilated model 3 that doesn't really look like an SUV in any regard. The model Y is an SUV like the Cybertruck is a truck. They might as well have unlimited money to do it, and they can't do it. Same reason they couldn't release the roadster even after all this time. It's a fundamentally broken company because Musk won't get out of the way. Whatever Musk is good at it, it's not running a large scale automotive company.
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Ok, I know I will take a lot of flack for this here with all the Enron fanboys but..
On one hand: "Ha ha!"
On the other, oh no, all these yahoos that bought this trash may make their money back if they hold on to this garbage long enough for the rarity to drive up the value as a collectors item.
Very happy to see this incel dumpster disappear. It's a great example of how aesthetics can be so horrible that they become a kind of moral contagion. The cybertruck's metallic exterior is the g4m3r equivalent of Trump's gold foil. Do love that Elon spent half a billion to get BTFO in Texas though. Good riddance. And lol at all the HN Elon fanboys. Guess I shouldn't expect more from this crowd. If there's one thing that MAGA slackjaws and SF tech nerds have in common it's zero taste.
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I always feel sorry for people who own cybertrucks. Or Teslas in general.
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They are not selling in USA. Chinese are buying the Chinese made ones..
https://evwire.com/etrucks/market-share
This seems to be about a totally different class of trucks.
> Zero-emission trucks over 12 t ·
(Cybertruck is still in the <3.5t class afaik)
> Zero-emission Class 7–8 trucks
These seem to be the classical cargo carrying trucks, not the pickup trucks.
You are right. I hadn't notice that.. Pick up truck category is different.
These aren't pickup trucks.
No mention of Tesla on that page?
Even if one assumes all tesla trucks.. share of electric trucks in USA is 0.3%.
Tesla cyber truck sales are going down from 38k a year to 20k a year. The Chinese net sales of electric trucks is massively more than Tesla's production if you look at the data that I posted.
https://www.centraloregondaily.com/news/consumer/tesla-to-pu...
Yusssss!
"Oh, no! Anyway..."
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Just because someone likes a given piece of trash doesn't make it not a piece of trash
That's not how the ancient idiom goes..
But it does mean that the thing isn't "unloved and unwanted".
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We need this person to tell us all what we should like!
I notice this internet world we live in, networked behind screens, really demonstrates the average person's drift to totalitarianism. It's frightening to me.
Just cause an internet blogger thinks something is trash doesn't make it trash.
I test drove one, liked it, had no intention to buy but asked what it would take to get one.
The answer was wait a long time since they’re sold out. Obviously someone wants them.
But they didn't sell out. There were storage lots in Florida full of them. Were they falsely claiming demand and hiding away their stock?
The article says they sold about 12,000 in the first 3 quarters of this years. That’s about 1 per 30,000 Americans.
With numbers that small, any vagary of demand can lead to lots full of unsold vehicles or waiting lists.
Was that RIGHT after they got released? Or later on?
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. For better or worse, it looks unique, and while a truck probably should be functional rather than flashy, I appreciate the swing they took with the design.
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I mean owners are often quite regretful?
It's certainly more balanced than a forum of non-owners who's only knowledge about the issue is that they hate Elon with an undying passion.
...yeah? You should get an opinion from people who use the product, not people who dislike the company's CEO for political reasons and their dislike of it was a foregone conclusion.
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"There are dozens of us...DOZENS!"
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found the cybertruck buyer lmao.
There was nothing "new" in cybertruck. Delorean had bare metal panels! It wasn't a good truck, vehicle, EV, anything. It was Elon's crayon drawing turned car. That's not "innovation" we should applaud
the cybertruck in its whole was new in that there is nothing else like it. even the ss panels are different alloy and rear steering is differently implemented. The polarization is probably its only real downfall- essentially suffering from ridicule and too often actual harassment. your argument against it is that you think it was drawn with a crayon(subjective and childish)when the motivation was to simplify the manufacturing>cost thru folding. and last, “It wasn't a good truck, vehicle, EV, anything”- what does that add to the conversation?
It was the first fully drive-by-wire production car, and it was the first car with steerable rear wheels. That's an innovation, on one of the worst vehicle of all time.
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This is the world that the Supreme Court dreamed up for us in their Citizen's United ruling. Now that money is equivalent to speech, we all have to carefully weigh if our purchases will be used against us in our political system.
To anyone who is/was a crusader against cancel culture, recognize the source of it. Become a crusader against Citizen's United instead. It would be a much more productive coalition.
It was absolutely the nail on the coffin for democracy, right after Mitch blocking Obama's SC nominee.
Yeah I find myself in the same boat. I don't know if it's a thing with just Bay area tech folks or what.
(btw dope earthbound reference in your username if that's what it is)
Yes it is an Earthbound reference!
100% agreed. Puts into perspective who you're talking to on this website.
Hear fucking hear. Every time there's a Musk-related product release posted here, and people excitedly chatter about it without even mentioning the massive elephant in the room, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.
To be frank, I think this community's time has come and gone. It seems like most of the remaining members are just corporate mercs who don't care one whit about the trail of blood and misery this man leaves behind him. Certainly nothing to do with "hackers" of yore.
(Of course, these comments will be flagged into oblivion. But thank you for putting this feeling into words.)
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it sounds like the bubble is in Orange County. Not everyone is able to ignore the side effects of "political noise"
Ah yes when I want to escape my insular, ivory tower life, when I want to connect to common, everyday Americans, the first place that comes to mind is Orange County, CA. These salt of the earth people don’t worry about frivolous little concerns such as the cost of living. Unaffected by petty concerns, Joe Mainstreet of Orange County, CA looks at a line up of electric car options for him and his family, and every the pragmatist says “give me the $80k giant toe nail clipper”.
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You yourself might want to do a quick Google search or AI chat and note:
Musk says SpaceX did restrict Starlink, as Ukraine says the tech has been restored
https://www.npr.org/2026/10/24/nx-s1-6015482/ukraine-starlin...
> In a post on social media site X, Musk said that Ukraine had been violating Starlink's terms of service by using it for offensive military activity.
> On Saturday, Ukraine said that Starlink and the military's use of the related Starshield technology were back to high operating speeds after more than a week of disruptions.
> Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on X that the restoration began overnight.
> "The most important thing today is that Starlink and Starshield operations have been restored to the speeds we had before the restrictions," Zelenskyy said. "The speeds are now where they need to be."
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Democrats will not take him back, but he will try.
not if they have any sort of spine left... an open question
A Cybertruck for a redneck sounds like barbecue barrel in the middle of the Trump penthouse in New York. Out of place.
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Ok, but please don't post like this to Hacker News.
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Please don't do this here. You may not owe $whoever better, but you owe this community better if you're participating in it.