1) Wasn't it always inevitable that, once tha large established car manufacturers really started to knuckle down to creating EVs, that Tesla's lead and 'moat' would mostly vanish? They still have some of the most efficient EVs available, and their UI/UX is still one of the best, but of course they'll face compeition, and of course their competitors will try to differentiate in all directions, and especially those that are superficially attractive (and less expensive to deliver) like interior design.
2) Back in his earlier, pre-crazy days, Musk suggested (something along the lines of) that Tesla's goal wasn't to be a huge successful car company, so much as to prove that EVs were viable as everyday cars, and drive a revolution in the car industry. By this measure, they've mostly succeeded.
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Big picture, totally agree that Tesla seems to have lost its way over the past few years, which unsurprisingly correlates (to an outside observer) with Musk's apparent changes in judgement and behaviour, with its consequent impact on Tesla's image and desirability amongst consumers. The Cybertruck turns out to have been a huge misstep, and not having delivered a 'model 2' - i.e. a small mid-sized option - (maybe instead?) is a huge miss.
2025 model year, less than 20k miles.
I can get an iPad myself and a GPS myself that don’t have these problems.
They started without all the legacy and worries. Like existing suppliers, existing things, existing image. Fresh market, modern software development etc. brought them a proper market share.
Now the olds had to update themselves, which they did and now they are stuck with tesla.
But thats it. Tesla doesn't has that much innovation. Plenty of things did not materialize at all.
You are not wrong about Tesla's base models like the 3 and Y being light on traditional 60k car features, but the second part is much more debatable. With the exception of some Chinese car manufacturers, almost no Western car makers have managed to match Tesla's software stack.
I can't think of another car brand that makes its own silicon, ships OTA updates weekly, runs an in-house OS that isn't an outdated Android skin, and tightly integrates media, navigation, charging, and energy management all in the same platform. Most legacy automakers still rely on their old infotainment vendors, release update slowly (if at all!), and struggle with fragmented software architectures. Their driver assistance systems are improving very slowly, and they are behind Tesla even for basic features like lane-keep assist. And that's even before getting into self-driving ambitions, where no brand has been able to ship anything similar AFAIK.
Rivian and Lucid are closer philosophically and technically, but they're still quite tiny players compared to Tesla, and haven't proven they can execute at Tesla's volume and pricing.
There's currently no other DA other than Tesla's FSD available in the US that will work on city streets and highways.
Or, if you want to loosely define "work", Ernst Dickmanns had self driving in the 80s, and put in on the autobahn in the 90s. I'd rather define it more tightly as "statistically at least as safe to be in _and_ to be near, as a human driver".
Tesla claims to have achieved that, but I don't believe them. That's because the data they report 1) omits a fair bit of critical info, and 2) frequently changes definitions. Both serve to make comparisons difficult. If it was clearly safe, I think they'd put effort into making the comparison transparent.
Bear in mind that Musk has been claiming "Full Self-Driving" since at least 2016, and people involved have asserted that he wasn't wrong, he was lying.
* The ability to specify individual drop-off locations for FSD arrivals (curbside, parking lot, driveway, etc)
* Grok as a voice assistant for the infotainment system
* iOS live activity viewer for the Dog Mode camera feed
* Speed/steering/control statuses being overlaid on dashcam footage
* “Santa Mode” which revamps the UI with Christmas theming for the holiday season
* Automatic HOV lane routing based on vehicle occupancy status
* Vehicle alerts/chimes when exiting, if leaving your phone within the vehicle
* Location-based individual charge limits
* 3D visualizations of supercharger locations, synced with active availability/occupancy per stall
* The SpaceX docking simulator ported as an in-vehicle game, playable on the infotainment screen
These are all additions from just the most recent update, and I can confidently say this is the only vehicle I’ve had that consistently gets better and better in terms of its software features over the course of ownership. Each update takes anywhere from 20-45 minutes during which, unfortunately, you’re not able to utilize the vehicle at all.
And you wonder why Tesla is heading the way of the dodo? Wasting the SW talent to deliver drek.
If you look at your updates, the FSD one is clearly a beta thing now for so long, of course you need to update regularly if you still change that much. Btw. Musk said 2014 that FSD will allow you to sleep in your Car while driving in 2023. Soooo?
Something like Grok was also added OTA in my Ford car. So yes they can do it apparently too.
Everything else just feels like gimicks I wouldn't want to have. I drive my car i do not play with my car. My car is not a gimmick.
> The SpaceX docking simulator ported as an in-vehicle game, playable on the infotainment screen
Really? People want that? I know that Elon Musk would think that it would be great to play a video game about Elon Musk's companies, but are Tesla owners similarly afflicted?
Driving to tesla meetups, adding certain accessories for led light stuff, its (sry to say) just weird.
I get the basic idea of telling the internet about some issue and getting faster feedback than from the manufacturer, but I never had the feeling i needed any of this for my non Tesla EV.
And as i mentioned in my comment: I would hate all the regular updates. As long as everything works as expected, pls do not change anything.
To me it is like someone saying, "Honey, I'll be on the garage watching Football in my Tesla all afternoon." Yeah, you can do it, but is a car really where you want to do that? The second aspect is it is a game glorifying Elon's "genius". What is next, a FPS for your Tesla where you have a chainsaw and you run through federal buildings trying to get the highest body count?
Because musk has been over promising and under delivering for years. What do you want to bet those updates still haven't put the "self driving" in FSD? Classic bait and switch. They give you a little thread of hope that one day your car will be better, and give you goofy infotainment features instead of autonomous driving.
VW (ID software 3/4/5), Mercedes (MBUX).
They don't update weekly (I don't think so, anyway), but I don't see how that would be inherently positive. They should be able to update weekly (e.g. security patches), sure, but car software should probably not be changing week-to-week for years on end.
That being said, since the US is basically a captive and stagnating market for EVs now, it seems most models from European makers are not available in the US anyway.
They are also forefront of ml simulation. 3D, weather pattern etc.
Tesla also had plenty of missshapes like Dojo or cybertruck and the sitll not finished FSD.
My Car OS from Ford Mustang Mach-e works completly fine. No clue why this is some advantage Tesla should have? BMW just launched their new Gen 6 incl. their new os.
All the advantages of that fully integrated 'platform' also just works in my car?
BMW is very good in lane keeping, Mercedes can drive more km in germany autonomes than BMW and BMW can drive more km than Tesla.
I of course focus on german brands because i'm from germany. But XPeng and others working on all of that too.
GP was talking about HUD and "new features" in the context of a $60k car. Presumably your desired "basic car" would cost considerably less.
* Wait 60 seconds to start using the GPS / nav to become responsive
* Unreliable backup camera (even after several software "fixes")
* No buttons or knobs for climate control
* No way to disable intrusive line detection that makes car vibrate when you get close to yellow and white lines
* Overzealous auto-dim of high beams (our 2023 Mazda CX-5 is significantly better with almost no false positives)
It's not all bad, and once the infotainment warms up, it's plenty responsive. It's certainly a luxury car though (as an admitted Mazda fan) you can get a lot of nice from a $30k Mazda.
To me, it looks desperate, and poorly executed. I was even waiting outside shake shack for my order, and the sales person approached me to offer me a test drive unsolicited. While I was waiting, I saw groups of people flicking them off and trolling them.
The irony to me - they have paid me $250,000 back for vehicles under lemon law instead of acknowledging and fixing a safety issue in the software, instead labeling it from “bug” to “characteristic”.
Now, they’re approaching me outside a shake shack begging me to accept a test drive, and i bet the issue is still not fixed. BMW driver assistance pro may be more limited but it is boring in the ways you want.
I was really intent on supporting Tesla, but they refused to work with me when I repeatedly raised the safety issue. They just repeatedly returned the car and said it was an expected characteristic for the car to turn left when I’m turning the wheel right.
I suspect they don’t wanna fix the false positive lane departure avoidance because they probably know they would be even more cases of accidental FSD engagement that do result in a collision where it needs to kick in. At the time I was reporting the issue they did not disclose the hidden disabled lane departure state, either.
It becomes more and more clear that traditional automakers see software as just another lowest-cost component of the car. I understand VW actually started putting effort into their software, but I haven't heard good things about it. Maybe it'll get better.
Also bizarre to me that only Tesla/Rivian offer dash cam recordings as a standard feature. All the other cars seem to come with cameras, they just choose not to allow the video to be saved?
My Ford Mustang Mach-e has great software. It works, is reliable, supports apple and android car.
BMW software stack does even more.
Where is this coming from? What are the features you are missing?
BMW can be remote controled also Mercedes and VW btw.
That’s precisely what I don’t want my car to support. Every other car’s software is essentially a CarPlay integration.
There are no other vehicles that can take you as easily to the grocery store as they can across the country.
Buying another brand for me at this point would be like picking up a part time job as a driver. No thank you lol. FSD is all the mote that they need.
I assume this post is a troll, 'no one is within a decade of Tesla' -- are you serious ? Have a look at Rivian, which is preparing to make the Cybertruck even more of a laughing stock.
No new features, no HUD, no dashboard. They want 60k for cars which have nothing in them. Other companies have now ripped the software and the iPad, so they have nothing unique.
All they had to do was continue to improve the product. They didn’t even try.