Lifestyle
Elon Musk and the electric (VTOL supersonic jet) plane that could
Elon Musk is a lot of things to a lot of people, but there’s something very interesting about him that drives most others: If he thinks something is worth improving, there’s more than a coin’s toss of a chance he’s going to make a go of it.
Now, Musk is a fantastically creative guy and all, but I’m not here to shower him with accolades (today anyhow). I’m setting the stage to discuss the next so-called improbable thing he might take on in the near future.
“I have an idea for a vertical takeoff and landing supersonic jet.”
— Elon Musk, every time the subject of electric planes comes up, to include almost never using the VTOL abbreviation for some reason that’s probably very unimportant. —
At this point, I’ve seen a few video montages of our serial entrepreneur saying this very thing word-for-word without fail to the point that it’s amusing. Wait, that’s not totally correct. In Musk’s Iron Man 2 cameo, he tells the (fake) Tony Stark that he (the real Tony Stark) has an idea for (just) an electric jet. I’m not sure if I cringe at the scene because it’s so awkward or because he went off-script on the plane’s usual description, but I digress.
Following Musk’s lead, the Tesla crowd has jumped on this electric plane idea a few times now, hashing out the particular advantages and hiccups that would be involved in battery-electric flight. It turns out that, along with reductions in carbon emissions (air travel is estimated to globally contribute 12% of the transportation-based carbon being pumped into the atmosphere), electric planes are fairly cost-effective even with the current state of battery technology.
Swapping Jet A (kerosine plane fuel) for a battery can bring a reduction of 60-80% in operating costs, 80% lower emissions and noise, and a 40% reduction in runway needs (not including VTOL), according to numbers crunched by one of the startups in the nascent electric aviation industry, Zunum Aero. Also, around 75% of all flights are domestic, and out of those, around half are under 700 miles and 20% are under 350 miles. Those mileage stats work out very well for current electric aircraft hopefuls as their planes have proposed travel distances of around 350-700 miles.
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A few companies have thrown their hats in the ring along with Zunum Aero such as Airbus/Siemens, Eviation, and BYE Aerospace, but one has specifically cited Tesla as an inspiration for its business model. Los Angeles-based Wright Electric announced plans last year to bring to market a 9-seat electrified aircraft with a range of at least 340 miles, covering a distance of nearly 44% of all flights. CEO Jeff Engler spoke with Teslarati about Wright’s development plans last July:
“Our plan is similar to the Tesla approach, in the sense that they started with the Roadster and then scaled up to larger more mass market vehicles. Our first plane to market will be a premium aircraft meant to travel short distances with a small number of passengers… perfect for intercity flights and recreational activities like skydiving. This initial program is the springboard for development of larger longer-range aircraft.”
With so many players already on board with electric flight, the next question then becomes whether Elon Musk is still interested in developing an electric vertical takeoff and landing supersonic jet. He’s led on so much technology already, perhaps word has finally gotten out on the (global) street that it’s okay to be stubborn about making big changes where they’re needed.
He’s certainly still thinking about it at least. Last week the CEO had a discussion about the concept on Twitter (Musk’s go-to idea playground), commenting that while yes, electric planes are possible, the range is still too limited. Battery density is the hangup, and they need about 400 Wh/kg energy density or better to really be viable.
Tesla’s current battery density is about 250 Wh/kg (300 Wh/kg on a high cycle), but their recent acquisition of Maxwell Technologies could indicate some serious progress in that direction is around the corner. The new Tesla addition is known to use dry electrodes to reach higher levels of energy density and has identified a “path” to reaching 500 Wh/kg. Or in other words, Maxwell and Tesla together could make electric planes a commercially viable idea.
On Musk’s infamous sit-down with Joe Rogan last September, however, he kind of dismissed the idea for the near future. “I have a lot on my plate,” he explained on the podcast. “The electric airplane isn’t necessary right now. Electric cars are important. Solar energy is important. Stationary storage of energy is important. These things are much more important than creating an electric supersonic VTOL.”
Let’s assume for a minute that he’s definitely going to go for it. Maybe Musk gets stuck at an airport one day because his plane can’t take off thanks to a late fuel tanker delivery or something. The tweet storm we’d see might go something like…
The question then becomes what, exactly, is Musk’s idea? This talk about the technology needing energy density is great and all, but as seen with Wright Electric and similar ventures, regional air travel is doable without Tesla’s shock-jock-of-sorts guiding the way.
Musk seems hung up on the “supersonic” aspect that no one’s really talking about, but supersonic passenger jets haven’t been around since Concord waved goodbye in 2003, and sonic boom complaints are an inescapable matter of physics (as are all complaints, really). Also, I highly doubt he’s thinking air taxis, although Uber has a foot in that door and he’s taking them on with the Tesla Network eventually.
What do you think Musk has in mind? And, whatever his idea…will he actually do it? Let me know in the comments below!
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Elon Musk escalated his monthslong feud with Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey this week, pledging that his own AI video tool will produce a competing version before the year is out. Responding to a fan-made, AI-generated clip of the ancient epic, Musk wrote on X, “Before this year ends, Grok Imagine will make a full-length movie of The Odyssey that is historically accurate and true to the art of Homer.”
In June, Musk quoted an xAI-shared trailer built entirely with Grok Imagine Video 1.5, a two-minute-plus reimagining of The Odyssey styled after a 1970s classical Hollywood epic, and predicted “full movies by the end of the year,” as Teslarati reported at the time. That trailer, built from 36 consistent shots by a single creator, was Musk’s proof of concept. This week’s pledge turns that prediction into a specific commitment, tied directly to Homer’s text rather than a generic demo.
Before this year ends, Grok Imagine will make a full-length movie of The Odyssey that is historically accurate and true to the art of Homer https://t.co/bVHzUmY9WN
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 22, 2026
When a fan separately proposed that Musk fund a live-action alternative, to “give Mel Gibson $100 million to film an Odyssey adaptation with painstakingly historically accurate ships, armour, weapons, and casting, with all dialogue taken straight from the original poem and delivered in Homeric Greek,” Musk replied with two words: “I’m down.”
The Grok Imagine pledge lands as the tool’s underlying infrastructure has changed hands. Grok is no longer a standalone product, it folded into SpaceXAI after SpaceX’s acquisition of xAI closed in February, meaning the compute behind any Odyssey production traces back to the same Colossus supercomputers now bundled into SpaceX’s pitch to investors. Musk has separately said SpaceX’s own engineering data is being fed into the next major Grok training run, a two trillion parameter model he’s called the “2T run.”
Whether Grok Imagine can sustain a feature length narrative, rather than a series of impressive individual shots, remains the open question.
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Cybertruck
Tesla Mobile App gets a new feature that wrap fans are going to love
Tesla’s Summer Update removes the USB drive step from customizing your car’s digital wrap design.
Tesla’s latest 2026 Summer Update quietly closes out one of the more tedious steps in personalizing a Tesla’s digital appearance. Uploading a custom wrap design used to require a USB drive. Now it doesn’t.
The feature is listed in Tesla’s release notes as “Send Custom Wraps from Mobile App.” The company described it plainly: “Skip the USB drive and upload a custom wrap of your car from the mobile app. Instructions for creating a custom wrap here: github.com/teslamotors/custom-wraps.”
The digital wrap tool has been around since Tesla’s 2024 Holiday Update, when it launched for Cybertruck owners first, as Teslarati reported at the time. Getting a design onto the car meant formatting a USB drive, creating a folder named exactly “Wraps,” dropping in PNG files sized between 512×512 and 1024×1024 pixels and under 1 MB each, then plugging the drive in and applying the wrap through Toybox. Tesla expanded the tool to other models and renamed it from “Colorizer” to “Paint Shop” with the 2025 Holiday Update, while also adding license plate and window tint customization alongside the wraps.
Custom wraps via mobile app https://t.co/5OydZ26g9p pic.twitter.com/uexU0ZePxu
— Tesla (@Tesla) July 22, 2026
The latest Summer Update removes the USB step from that process. Owners will be able to pull a design from wherever they saved it, whether that’s a download from social media or something built from Tesla’s own GitHub templates, and push it to the car directly through the app.
Tesla reveals 2026 Summer Update with crazy fixes to Nav and more
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It’s a small fix relative to the rest of this latest release, which also included expanded Grok voice commands, automatic navigation that learns regular routes, and self-driving stats inside the mobile app, all detailed in our rundown of the full Summer Update. The USB requirement was one of the more common complaints about Paint Shop since it launched. Tesla did not say when the wrap upload change would reach individual vehicles, only that the broader update is rolling out now in waves.
Elon Musk
Tesla Diner is throwing a birthday party with a Franz-signed special treat
Tesla Diner turns one on July 21 with Optimus, roller skates, and a Franz-signed hat.
Tesla is throwing its Hollywood Diner a first birthday party on July 21 and the celebration comes with a guest list of unique items, including a limited run of Tesla Diner birthday hats personally signed by Tesla Chief Designer Franz von Holzhausen for the first 50 customers who place an in-car order at midnight.
One year after lines wrapped around the block on Santa Monica Boulevard for a diner that most of the restaurant industry did not take seriously, Tesla is making the case that the concept was worth the years it took to build. The concept had been in Musk’s head since at least 2018, when he floated the idea of “an old school drive-in, roller skates and rock restaurant” on X, describing it years later as “‘Grease’ meets ‘The Jetsons’ with Supercharging.”
Tesla Optimus Gen 3 is coming to the Tesla Diner with new ambitions
What made the diner genuinely different from any restaurant that came before it was not the menu or the nostalgia. It was the ordering model. Tesla owners could place food orders directly from their vehicle’s touchscreen before arriving, a small feature that hints at something much larger on the horizon. As the Cybercab and unsupervised FSD expand across major cities, the diner model becomes a template for an entirely new kind of commerce. A robotaxi pulling in to charge does not need a human to walk up to a counter. The vehicle places the order, the food is ready on arrival, and the passenger never interrupts the experience of being driven somewhere else. It is the first glimpse of what drive-through commerce looks like when the car is doing the driving.
As Teslarati has reported, Musk signaled immediately after opening that the Hollywood location was only the beginning, posting that Tesla would expand the concept to major cities worldwide and along Supercharger corridors on long-distance routes if the first location proved successful. One year in, the birthday celebration on July 21 makes a strong case that it has. Tesla announced a full day of events including a Cybercab on display, a birthday menu, Optimus in attendance, face painting, a photo booth, roller skating servers, a light show, a Skypad DJ, and complimentary collectibles.
If Musk’s ambition holds, the Hollywood diner is year one of something much bigger. The birthday party is the proof of concept. The robotaxi fleet is the business model waiting behind it.
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Tesla Diner is turning 1 on July 21st, so we’re throwing a party
Come swing by for a day full of fun:
– Cybercab on display
– Birthday menu
– @Tesla_Optimus
– Face painting for kids & adults
– Photo booth
– Servers on roller skates delivering your order
– Light show
– Skypad DJ… pic.twitter.com/TD8pOjihYs— Tesla North America (@tesla_na) July 18, 2026
Tesla Summer Update begins rolling out: a look at the new features
Tesla briefly offered this Robotaxi part for your personal car
