News
The Lucid Air Dream Edition R’s first in-depth review reveals the car is a stunner
Lucid frontman Peter Rawlinson has spent plenty of years in the electric vehicle realm, so he definitely has an idea of what goes into creating a fast, luxurious, and effective electric car. Prior to his time at Lucid, Rawlinson was one of the key members of Tesla’s Model S development team back in the early 2010s, before leaving the company to pursue his own interests, eventually landing at Lucid Motors. As the electric vehicle sector continues to develop quite nicely in the grand scheme of things, with both exclusively electric companies and legacy automakers all contributing to the sustainable energy transition, Lucid is set to deliver its first vehicle, the Air Dream Edition sedan, later this year, and Motortrend got an in-depth and exclusive look at the car that could quite possibly be the king of the hill when it enters the market.
Design
One of the sharpest vehicles in the automotive sector, the Air Dream Edition was outfitted in Eureka Gold for this breakdown by Motortrend. Reminiscent of the Citroën DS redesigned for Blade Runner, the car is simple yet futuristic in its design. It’s a long sedan, and in photographs almost reminds me of an older Ford Taurus in its “boaty” nature. However, it is much more pleasing to the eye, in my opinion. (The Ford Taurus was my second car. I drove it to class in college, and Lord, I hated that thing.)
Credit: MotorTrend
Sleek and luxurious, the reviewers were more particular to this interior than that of the Tesla Model S, stating that “every Tesla since day one has seemingly shipped without a finished interior, Lucid not only crafted a perfectly wonderful luxury-car cabin, but it also smartly avoided the screens über alles aesthetic that plagues cars like the Mercedes EQS.” Truth is, the Air interior is still relatively simplistic, and while it does have a few more bells and whistles than the Tesla Model S, it is not all that different other than an extended instrument cluster, a repositioned center screen, and more material options.
Credit: MotorTrend
Performance
The Air Dream does not drive like a Lotus, which Rawlinson wanted when he designed the car: the look of a Mercedes with the ride of a Lotus. In fact, Jonny Lieberman, who wrote MotorTrend’s review, said it’s more like a Nissan GT-R. It has great handling, and with 933 horsepower, it’s extremely quick. Couple these performance tidbits based on Lieberman’s experience with the already stunning design and comfortable interior, and you have a car that is sure to appeal to many.
Carving turns in the Air was one of the highlights of the test drive. “I assumed the Air Dream Edition R would be decent enough to drive around big sweepers, but about 10 miles into our run up Angeles Crest Highway, I discovered the car enjoyed being manhandled through tight corners,” Lieberman wrote. The harder he drove the car, the better it performed, making it an ideal choice for a scenic joyride through winding and curvy rods, especially with the all-wheel-drive system to help navigate through those corners.
Not only is the car fun to drive, but it’s fast too, even if it’s over 5,000 pounds. Impressive with this pre-production Air model that was available for the test drive, the car will only improve as Lucid begins cranking out production models of the vehicle soon. This is where Lieberman expects Lucid to improve on an already great car. The front end seemed to be a little too free for his liking, while the back tires provided sufficient grip and maneuverability through tight corners. According to Lucid’s Director of Chassis and Vehicle Dynamics David Lickfold, the front spring rate will be reduced by 10% before production begins. The anti-roll bar will be stiffened for more support and stability, and active dampers will get an adjustment, too, providing an even smoother ride than already given.
Credit: Motortrend
Three Drive Modes
The Air will come with three available drive modes, as Lickfold was curious about the condition of the roads that the Air was being tested on by MotorTrend. He suggested Lieberman leave it in Swift Mode, the second option, between Smooth and Sprint.
- Smooth Mode: Motors limited to 670 horsepower, softens dampers and brake pedal feel, the steering wheel is “free” feeling
- Swift Mode: Motors limited to 670 horsepower, much firmer feel than smooth mode, suitable for quicker driving on winding roads, but still holding back some performance
- Sprint Mode: Motors can reach full 933 horsepower potential, dampers are very hard, extremely sporty driving feel with “Tesla Plaid-like battery conditioning” for battery performance
Swift Mode brings out about 75% of the total power output, according to Emad Dlala, Lucid’s Senior Director of Efficiency and Energy Technology.
Credit: MotorTrend
Efficiency, Range, Battery Pack
The Air Dream Edition R is supposed to have 500 miles of range at a minimum, and the EPA will either confirm or deny this when it certifies the car in the coming months. MotorTrend decided to test the range on its own terms with a drive from Los Angeles to San Francisco, close to 350 miles. Not only did this drive provide some insight on how the range of the vehicle would be, but it would also give the reviewers an opportunity to get a look at what the vehicle would be like in its most frequent way of travel: abiding by speed limits and traffic rules during highways, while having to navigate through traffic and provide the driver and passengers with safety, but also entertainment and comfortability through the lengthy quest up the California coast.
It’s a smooth ride, there was wind noise, a common complaint among EVs due to their lack of an engine to drown out road sounds, but tire noise was minimal, Lieberman said. The car sat on Pirelli P Zeros, specifically designed for Lucid. After 205 miles of driving, the range of the vehicle had gone from 503 miles to 286, so there was slightly more energy usage through the 205 miles of driving as 217 miles had been subtracted from the range since the start of the trip. The additional range usage was due to air conditioning, so Lieberman adjusted the temperature from 69 to 71 to see if there was any impact.
The team arrived in San Francisco with 69 miles of range remaining, not needing to charge up at any point during the drive.
Credit: Motortrend
While Lucid still remains very vague in terms of when the Air Dream Edition will begin deliveries, the company still expects them to occur this year. With its unique design, different drive modes, impressive range, fast performance, and sporty but luxury interior, the car is certainly one of the most-anticipated EVs in the last several years. The car, along with Tesla’s vehicles, continues to chip away at the idea that range anxiety is an issue and EVs are not fast and fun. The Air is its own vehicle, and it’s important to not count it out before it hits the road, especially as Lieberman, who has reviewed hundreds of vehicles, was quite impressed by the Air Dream Edition.
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Investor's Corner
Tesla’s flying Roadster just revealed something bigger than the car
Analysts say the Roadster demo puts a Tesla and SpaceX merger back on the table.
The Roadster unveiling near Waco ended Thursday night, and by Friday morning much of the investor reaction had less to do with the car than with who owns the rocket technology inside it.
Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said the event “puts the Tesla/SpaceX relationship on the table in a tangible way,” pointing to the propulsion, pressure vessel and control hardware sitting on a Tesla product. Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management called the demo “a ridiculous display of engineering” with “no commercial value” beyond embarrassing traditional automakers, though he said it showed Musk wants the two companies together.
The more specific forecast came a day earlier from Barclays. Analyst Dan Levy told clients a deal could be announced before Tesla’s annual meeting, which must happen by December 6, and that an announcement in late October or early November could make shareholder approval harder. Barclays expects SpaceX to be the buyer in an all stock deal, with Tesla holders receiving SpaceX shares at a premium, based on market values of roughly $2.1 trillion for SpaceX and $1.5 trillion for Tesla. If nothing lands around the meeting, the bank still sees an announcement within 6 to 12 months.
The Roadster demo just added more weight to merger speculations. Tesla’s demo used cold gas thrusters and pressure tanks of the kind SpaceX uses on Falcon 9, and Musk described the car as a collaboration between Tesla and SpaceX engineers, as we mentioned in our breakdown of the three Roadster configurations.
Musk has not publicly addressed a deal since the event, as far as we have seen. His most direct answer remains the one he gave at the All In Summit, when he said that with so much collaboration, “who can imagine what action one might take” without ruling anything out. Ives has held to a 2027 timeline since his March note, and Musk pushed back on the China piece of the speculation when ARK floated a year end announcement in August.
The next test is Tesla’s third quarter earnings call on October 21. However, we recall in July that Musk told analysts, “we can’t talk about combining companies and that kind of thing on an earnings call,” so a clear answer wouldn’t be expected.
News
How Tesla’s Roadster fan system and thrusters are built to dominate the corners
Tesla’s Roadster uses fans, active wings and cold gas thrusters to create grip at any speed.
Tesla’s new Roadster is best known for flipping through the air in Texas, but the technology that matters most for a race track is the stuff that keeps it on the ground. Tesla’s Roadster page describes a multi-mode fan and ground sealing system that acts as a downforce generator, pulling air out from beneath the car. Tesla says it provides enough suction to hold the vehicle upside down, even when stationary.
That is the key difference from the wings and diffusers on a normal supercar. Conventional aero only makes downforce when the car is moving, and it grows with speed, so a car has the least grip in the slow corners and under hard braking. A fan system makes downforce at any speed. Tesla’s patent, which we covered last year, describes fans and deployable skirts that create sealed or partially sealed regions under the car, with the fans extracting air to lower the pressure and increase grip and stability.
Still processing this … the most unreal thing I’ve seen. https://t.co/HtEuvnkZjY
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) October 16, 2026
Tesla pairs that with active wings, a next generation steer by wire system and a Track Mode that lowers the car and changes the suspension, with high downforce and low drag settings for the circuit. To keep weight down, Tesla points to magnesium, titanium and carbon fiber, manual controls and a fixed seat position, which it says lets the car respond to driver inputs almost instantly.
Tesla Roadster: Three configs, one can fly, 0-60 in 0.8 seconds
The cold gas thrusters are the other half. On the Thrust version they sit at the rear and Tesla says they take the car from 0 to 60 mph in under 0.9 seconds, while the Rocket version adds perimeter thrusters for forward, upward and lateral rotational movement. Tesla says the all electric actuators make micro adjustments within a fraction of a second.
Roadster transforms in Track Mode
These aero features aren’t just for looks: they provide the best passive downforce package of any road car (approaching F1 levels!) with wing actuation driven by the @Tesla_Optimus actuator system https://t.co/AqrC4qUga9
— Tesla (@Tesla) October 16, 2026
Musk has been talking about records for years. In June 2019 he said, “We’re going to do things with the new Roadster that are kind of unfair to other cars.” That September, when a follower asked whether the Roadster would beat the Nürburgring production car record, he replied with one word, “Absolutely,” as we reported at the time. In February 2024 he said Tesla had “radically increased the design goals” for the car and that its sub one second 0 to 60 time would be “the least interesting part.”
There are caveats. Tesla has not published a lap time or a verified cornering figure, so the record talk is still a promise rather than a result. Tesla also says the car is not approved for public road use, and the thruster features are limited to the Rocket trim, which is invite only. Fan cars have also been banned or withdrawn before, and getting a sealed underbody to work on a rough public road is a harder problem than on a smooth track. The first real test will be an official lap at a circuit.
Featured
Tesla Roadster: Three configs, one can fly, 0-60 in 0.8 seconds
Tesla’s Roadster comes in Performance, Thrust and Rocket versions, with a claimed 0-60 under 0.59 seconds.
Tesla finally showed the next generation Roadster on Thursday night, and the demo had more in common with a SpaceX test than a track lap. At an event outside Waco, Texas, near SpaceX’s McGregor site, the car used a mix of fans and cold gas thrusters to drive up a curved ramp until it was upside down, then flew off, flipped and landed on the pavement. “Well, it worked,” Elon Musk said. “Flying cars are real.”
The Roadster also hovered itself over a Cybercab, Cybertruck, Tesla Semi, Model Y and Model 3 while moving, and that Tesla showed it going 0 to 60 mph in one second. Musk said “this will be the actual car that’s on the roads” and that it “literally is just going to puff itself up” to perform the maneuvers whenever an owner wants. He called the result a collaboration between Tesla and SpaceX engineers that is “better than any James Bond car,” with Franz von Holzhausen and Lars Moravy on site.
Tesla published new mind-blowing stats for the car that replace the previous targets. The Performance version is road ready and seats two, with active aerodynamics and a multi-mode suction system, and Tesla lists 0 to 60 mph in under 1.6 seconds. The Thrust version is race ready, also seats two, and adds rear-mounted cold gas thrusters for a 0 to 60 time of under 0.9 seconds. The Rocket version is described as air ready, seats one, and uses perimeter-mounted thrusters for forward and upward acceleration plus lateral rotational movement.
| Configuration | Seats | 0 to 60 mph |
|---|---|---|
| Performance | 2 | under 1.6 s |
| Thrust | 2 | under 0.9 s |
| Rocket | 1 | under 0.59 s |
Tesla’s own description: “So…yes, it can fly.” It lists a 0 to 60 time of under 0.59 seconds for Rocket, a top speed of up to more than 230 mph, and range of more than 300 miles. Tesla has not yet given pricing in the information we have seen, but has reopened $50,000 reservations in the newly updated Tesla Roadster configurator. Production is planned for Giga Texas in 2027 or 2028, and Musk has said it would follow the demo by 12 to 18 months.
Every car on the road today is limited by one thing: tire grip
Roadster’s thruster system generates 4–5x the force the tires can.
More force on the same mass means significantly better acceleration – physics does the rest https://t.co/zdPRT2aKwZ
— Tesla (@Tesla) October 16, 2026
Tesla’s Roadster page adds more on how the car works. A multi-mode fan and ground sealing system pulls air from under the car, producing enough suction to hold it upside down even when stationary. Active wings, steer-by-wire with a yoke, and a Track Mode that lowers the car round out the driving setup. The cold gas thrusters use all-electric actuators for micro adjustments to stabilize the car in flight. Tesla says it cut weight with magnesium, titanium and carbon fiber, manual controls and a fixed seat position, and the exterior has hidden headlights, a full-length taillight and Ano White paint inspired by aerospace coatings. Inside are an Ultrawhite interior with gray microsuede, a center touchscreen and two smaller forward displays, and gold tinted glass modeled on spacesuit visors. Availability is tiered: Performance is by reservation, Thrust is a limited release, and Rocket is invite only. Tesla notes the car is not approved for public road use, and that Rocket is not available in all regions.
Tesla Roadster Highlights
- Aero and suction: a multi-mode fan and ground sealing system pulls air from under the car and can hold it upside down even when stationary. There are also active wings and a Track Mode that lowers the car.
- Controls and thrusters: steer-by-wire with a yoke. The cold gas thrusters use all-electric actuators for micro adjustments that stabilize the car in flight.
- Weight: magnesium, titanium and carbon fiber, manual controls and a fixed seat position.
- Design: hidden headlights, a full-length taillight, Ano White paint inspired by aerospace coatings, and gold tinted glass modeled on spacesuit visors.
- Interior: an Ultrawhite interior with gray microsuede, a center touchscreen and two smaller forward displays.
- Availability: Performance is by reservation, Thrust is a limited release, and Rocket is invite only.
- Road use: Tesla notes the car is not approved for public road use, and that Rocket isn’t available in all regions.
Musk has described the Roadster as “the best of the last of the human-driven cars,” and he has been open that it is a halo product. He said he is “not sure it moves the needle massively from a revenue standpoint,” and has warned that anyone whose top priority is safety should not buy it. Tesla reports third quarter earnings on October 21.
Roadster is a true pilot’s car: active aerodynamics, a multi-mode suction system & cold-gas thrusters
Exterior
– Concealed headlights, full-length taillight & flush-mounted surfaces for a minimalist, highly technical form– Super light wheels w/ thin spokes that reinforce structural strength when earthbound
– Ano White paint brings an aerospace-derived finish w/ UV & cryogenic protection, electrostatic dissipation & corrosion resistance
– Gold Glazed tinted glass mimicking the copper coating of spacesuit visors, w/ subtle titanium accents
— Tesla (@Tesla) October 16, 2026
Tesla’s flying Roadster just revealed something bigger than the car
How Tesla’s Roadster fan system and thrusters are built to dominate the corners
Tesla Roadster: Three configs, one can fly, 0-60 in 0.8 seconds
SpaceX reveals how its 1 Million AI satellite network will work and prevent space collisions
Elon Musk’s Boring Company lands a new Middle East deal, and Nashville is about to get faster
