It doesn’t literally drive itself — but it’s going to cost more.
Elon Musk announced in a Tweet Sunday that Tesla’s “full self-driving” technology or FSD, is going to cost more than originally expected.
After wide release of FSD Beta 10.69.2, price of FSD will rise to $15k in North America on September 5th.
Current price will be honored for orders made before Sept 5th, but delivered later.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 21, 2022
“After wide release of FSD Beta 10.69.2, price of FSD will rise to $15k in North America on September 5th,” Musk wrote.
It will cost $15,000, up from $12,000. According to the company’s website, Tesla customers can make appointments to get the technology installed.
The move is somewhat unsurprising in an inflationary environment. Though inflation did cool off in July, per the Consumer Price Index, businesses have leaned in on upping prices, including Tesla and Amazon.
The new FSD price will go into effect for orders made after September 5, Musk added in his Tweet. If you order before then, he also said you’ll get the same price but a later delivery.
Tesla raised its prices for its electric cars in March, April, and June this year, per Electrek, sometimes substantially.
Elon Musk also mentioned a probable price increase for Tesla’s not-yet-released electric pickup truck at a shareholder meeting in early August, citing inflation and other problems.
“There’s no way to sort of have anticipated quite the inflation that we’ve seen and the various issues,” he said at the meeting, according to IFL Science.
The phrase “full self-driving” technology is a bit of a misnomer for the uninitiated.
FSD combines Tesla’s “Autopilot” and “Enhanced Autopilot” packages, and allows a car to help change lanes, steer, and park, as well as imitate the speeds of cars and move in the direction of an app, for example.
About 100,0000 drivers are testing the technology in beta mode to help build out the AI so the system can learn how to drive, per Benzinga.
And those testers “have become an entire genre on YouTube,” Insider reported. Elon Musk replied to a Tweet that claimed an FSD Tesla slammed into a decoy of a child and called it a “scam.”
From Real Scam O’Dowd
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 11, 2022
Tesla’s later added that its Automatic Emergency Braking system (AEB) is meant to lower the possibility of a collision, not totally prevent one, Insider also reported.
The name of the program — full self-driving, when in fact the car does not do that — has faced some controversy.
A private German regulatory body sued Tesla for misleading marketing as far as FSD and its autopilot packages go, but Tesla won on appeal in October 2021 in a decision that was only recently made public by German outlet TeslaMag.de, according to Teslarati.
There are, however, standard definitions for what makes a self-driving car. The levels go from one to five. Five means “a vehicle can drive itself everywhere in all conditions without any human interaction,” according to JD Power.
Tesla’s FSD is currently classified as a level two, the blog added.
