Access to the supercharging network.

My perception of Tesla’s supercharging network is that it was a huge edge 5 years ago, or even 2, but not so much anymore.

Yeah, it may still be the densest, but generic chargers are popping up everywhere. If I’m deciding on which brand to go with today, the charging network doesn’t even make the list of considerations. In 2017 it may have been near the top of that list.

Couple that with Tesla’s stale designs and continuous decontenting and I don’t see a Model 3 as all that compelling.

Not correct it’s still a huge advantage

Anecdata: I regularly stop at a UK motorway services (Hopwood Park, M42) where there are 16 superchargers (and have been for several years) and even on the busiest days there’s always been a couple free.

Meanwhile over at the “public” “fast” chargers (4 of them) there’s regular contention, to the point of heated verbal disagreements between drivers one busy day this summer.

(I thankfully drive a Prius which can make the entire 250 mile trip on half a tank of petrol.)

Tesla have their own contention problems here and there, but I consider the supercharger network a definite competitive advantage over other EVs.

isn't there any adapters for other manufacturers?

No but the new super chargers going in next year will have a built in ccs adapter in the US. In Europe they all currently use the European version of ccs

My wife and I did a trip from Houston to San Diego in a non-Tesla EV, and from what I could tell, along the freeways (I-10 and I-8) there were roughly as many Superchargers as the high speed Electrify America chargers we used. Superchargers do seem to outnumber EA in major cities, however.

It's also important to consider number of stalls v.s. number of locations. The biggest Electrify America location on I-5 between SF and LA has 10 stalls. The biggest Tesla supercharger location has over 100.

As far as I know, the largest Supercharger in California only has 98 stalls (Harris Ranch + Coalinga, which are technically two stations but collocated in the same parking lot).

The next largest are:

* Kettleman City (again technically two stations, this time across the street) with 95

* Tejon Ranch (again two stations about 1000 ft distant) with 80.

Quartzsite (sic) AZ with 36 is scheduled to have, in the future, 124 stalls when expansion is complete

True. The largest I saw was in Tempe, in an outlet mall (16 stalls I think). That said, the locations along the freeway (often tiny towns) in such a trip are more relevant. Typically these were 4-6 stall locations in places like gas stations and WalMarts.

Interestingly enough, the largest Supercharger in the Houston area only has 16 stalls.

I've seen exactly one supercharger station in the last three years, and it's attached to the tesla dealer a good 30 miles away. There's a generic charger on my office building, a different generic charger a mile from my house, then a couple more in between.

Unless they've changed things, you need an adapter to use the generic chargers with a tesla. I'd rather just buy a car meant to work with the infrastructure available to me

The "generic" charger at your work is probably J1772? Teslas come with an adapter for that plug. The benefit of the supercharger network is mainly for DC fast charging (which J1772 can't provide) on road trips. You aren't getting 250Kw from your office building.

Same reason you buy any car from any brand, you like the product they have better than the alternatives.

I had the same experience as you four years ago. I have owned Tesla from 3 years. It is a great commuter car, and I am hardly tired at the end of 70 min one way commute every day. This is because of AutoPilot, acceleration and the ease with which it handles curves in AP. And I bought an electric tire inflator the other day, because I never had to visit the dealer in 3 years. It offers comfort in a different way - for busy people in cities.

Drive a model S plaid and get back to me on that.

It's not a luxury car, never has been. I'm not sure it's even portrayed as a luxury car, perhaps it was perceived as a bit of a luxury car before it came out with the Model 3 (buying a Model S was the first thing someone coming into money from a startup exit would commonly do in the early-mid 2010's).

Base Model Tesla 3: 49K Long Range: 56K Performance: 62K

Fully Self-Driving is another 15K add on and there are other add ons as well. So let's say 49-80K depending on trim and options.

A 2022 BMW 3 Series goes from 42K to 57K. A 5-Series goes from 60K-74K (we'll ignore the 2 and 4 series) depending on trim and all wheel drive.

So Tesla is priced as a luxury car, and therefore is in that market -- or it better be, otherwise they need to start cutting prices.

If you look at the demographics of Tesla buyers, it's a median age of 54 and median household income of 128K[1]. So yes -- luxury market. Not Rolls Royce luxury, but Lexus/Audi/BMW/Mercedes luxury.

[1]https://www.start.io/blog/tesla-target-market-analysis-and-s...

Depending where you live, all cars could be considered luxury cars but in reality they are just expensive. For example in Ireland a new scoda Octavia starts from 34k-54k euros. There is not big difference in price, but it's not considered luxury car for sure. I remember back in 2002 a good version of this car would cost between 16k-24k.

Let's not pretend that we are babes in the woods, with glistening eyes just opened to the world, trying to decide for ourselves what a "luxury car" really is.

This is a well defined market segment for suppliers and consumers alike. It is a term of art used by industry analysts, investors, producers, and car buyers. Don't create your own definitions or philosophical musings about "what is, luxury, really?". If I say I am going to buy a junk bond, you don't need to start questioning "what is junk? All things are needed in life. One man's junk is another man's treasure", etc.

You are living in a wealthy bubble if you don’t think a Tesla is a luxury car.

You can play steam games on it.

Tesla cars are just overpriced and poorly manufactured, and definitely not luxury. Their FSD software does not work as advertised. There are much better EVs out there from other manufacturers at a fraction of the price.