After pairing free trials of its Full Self-Driving (Supervised) service with inventory vehicles only, then expanding the offer to add gratis Supercharging to the whole of its fleet for new purchases, Tesla is now straight out gifting FSD tryouts.
Some Model Y owners have started receiving a free FSD subscription month to test the autonomous driving option that recently entered into its 13th update iteration that brought a good deal of new parking and traffic awareness features.
"You have been granted a complimentary trial of Full Self-Driving (Supervised) for your Model Y," reads Tesla's Christmas message, continuing to explain what FSD does and how to use it during the extra trial months.
Interestingly enough, the offer is valid for current FSD subscription holders, too, who simply get to use it without paying the $99 monthly fee for the period. Unfortunately, the invitations go out to people with comparatively new Model Y batches that carry Tesla's newest AI4 hardware, rather than the majority of Model Y owners in the US that are still on a HW3 kit that can't yet run FSD 13.
Tesla is promising free HW4 upgrade retrofits if it can't make its latest FSD versions run on the older Hardware 3.0 platform, but in the meantime, most Model Y or Model 3 owners will be missing on the latest and greatest that its self-driving software can offer.
The move is undoubtedly aimed at popularizing the freshest FSD 13 version that Tesla needs intervention data on to present to regulators in the quest to drop the "supervised" part of its paid Full Self-Driving option.
Elon Musk said that unsupervised FSD is happening in 2025, with Texas and California being the states where it will roll out for its current models first, before Tesla introduces the driverless Robotaxi on public roads.
Tesla's Cybercab ride-share platform will reportedly start with company owned and operated vehicles, including Robotaxis, while current Tesla owners will be able to loan their cars to the service for some extra cash at a later date.
Elon Musk also hinted that Tesla may use his status as the lead of the upcoming Trump administration's newly minted Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to spearhead autonomous vehicle regulation at the federal level.
This will make self-driving car approvals for use on public roads faster and easier for everyone, says Musk, but Tesla is also working at the state and even city levels, including with first responders that it now trains in addressing situations that may arise from the use of its driverless cars like the Robotaxi when they hit the streets en masse.
Get the 80A Tesla Gen 2 Wall Connector with 24' cable on Amazon
Are you a techie who knows how to write? Then join our Team! Wanted:
- News Writer (Romania based)
Details here
Source(s)
Tesla via SawyerMerritt (X)