Larger 3-row Tesla Model Y with extra seats to be launched in May

At its ordering page, the new Model Y is currently listed with a sole "five seat interior" option, both in the US and in China, indicating that Tesla may be mulling other versions as well.

Last September, insiders claimed that the Juniper refresh will also have a seven-seat and even a six-seat variants, depending on the market.

A new Model Y seven-seater is not that hard to fathom, as its predecessor had an option with an extra row of two cramped seats hidden in the trunk floor, too. Its arrival "later this year" was even confirmed by none other than Tesla's lead engineer Lars Moravy in an interview with Jay Leno shortly after the 2026 Model Y facelift launch in the US.

At the time, however, the sources claimed that a six-seat Model Y version will launch earlier than the seven-seater, at least in China where that configuration is increasingly popular with families. The conflicting number of seats in the rumors about the new Model Y aren't mutually exclusive, though.

Instead of throwing an extra set of child seats in the boot like Tesla, Chinese six-seaters like the popular M4 Yacht Forthing hybrid often have an extended wheelbase with three rows of two full-size seats each, and one collapsible child seat connecting the last row.

Tesla may now be preparing something similar, at least for the Chinese market, where a source with credible leak history about the future plans of automakers there says that a 3-row Model Y is entering production at Giga Shanghai as soon as this week.

The new Model Y with a third row of seats will reportedly have an extended wheelbase, too, they claim, so Tesla might be mulling something more comfortable than its previous solution that had the same wheelbase regardless of its seat configuration.

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