News
Porsche Taycan gets three years free charging, 320 kW “Turbo Chargers” coming to dealer network
As Porsche prepares for the launch of its first all-electric car — the highly-anticipated Taycan — the carmaker has begun setting the stage for the vehicle’s rollout in the United States. On Monday, Porsche Cars North America, Inc. (PCNA) announced an agreement with Electrify America to provide the Taycan with three years of unlimited fast charging at public stations across the country. With this system in place, as well as Electrify America’s ongoing expansion, the Taycan would be capable of long-distance, coast-to-coast travel.
In a press release about the update, Porsche noted that the charging perk would be included in the Taycan’s selling price. Under the system, Taycan buyers would receive three years of unlimited 30-minute fast charging at Electrify America locations, which is comprised of over 300 highway stations in 42 states, on top of more than 180 sites in 17 select metro areas. The established carmaker stated that each Electrify America location would have an average of five charging stalls, while some sites would have enough support for up to 10 vehicles at once.
Apart from its deal with Electrify America, Porsche has also announced that its dealers would be installing their own fast-charge Turbo Charger kiosks for the company’s upcoming all-electric vehicle. Porsche would also be releasing products for home charging solutions. In a statement, Klaus Zellmer, President and CEO of PCNA, pointed out that this trifecta of charging systems — Electrify America’s infrastructure, Turbo Chargers in dealers, and home chargers — would ultimately free future Taycan owners from range anxiety.
“Every Porsche is a sports car with soul, and the Taycan is soul electrified. Together, Electrify America and our Porsche dealer network will provide a national infrastructure for DC fast charging that frees future Taycan owners from range anxiety. And Porsche home charging technology will turn the customer’s garage into the equivalent of a personal gas station,” the CEO said.
One thing that separates the Taycan from the conventional electric car is its capability to charge at an extremely rapid rate. Using 350 kW chargers, 800-volt technology, and the combined charging system (CCS) standard, the Taycan would be able to add more than 60 miles of range in just four minutes. That’s the fastest charging capabilities in the market today, roughly three times faster than Tesla’s expansive Supercharger Network.
To take advantage of the Taycan’s ultra-fast-charging capabilities, Electrify America’s highway stations would have a minimum of two 350 kW chargers per site, with additional stalls delivering up to 150 kW. Metro stations, on the other hand, would be capable of charging at speeds of up to 150 kW as well. Electrify America is expected to have 484 locations with 2,000 charging stalls completed or under construction by July 1, ahead of the Taycan’s release in late 2019.
While free 3-year unlimited access to Electrify America’s chargers would undoubtedly be a notable selling point for the Taycan, Porsche’s dealers across the country would also be offering their own charging perk. The automaker has noted that all 191 of its US dealers would be installing DC fast-charging stations for the upcoming vehicle, 120 of which would feature Porsche Turbo Charging — the company’s proprietary DC/CCS charging system that delivers up to 320 kW. Porsche dealers without Turbo Chargers would feature 50 kW fast chargers on site.
The Porsche Experience Center (PEC) in Atlanta, GA already hosts the company’s first Turbo Chargers. More of Porsche’s own charging stations are expected to be installed at the PEC in Los Angeles, CA in the near future.
The Porsche Taycan is the first all-electric vehicle from the automaker. In true Porsche spirit, the Taycan boasts impressive specs, from a 0-60 mph time of 3.5 seconds, a top speed of 155 mph, and a range of 310 miles per charge. The company has also noted that just like its iconic vehicles like the legendary Porsche 911, the Taycan would be at home at the racetrack being driven to its limits. As noted by a Porsche brand ambassador in an email to an auto journalist last month, the Taycan would be offered in three models — an entry-level variant, the mid-range Taycan 4S, and the range-topping Taycan Turbo, which would likely cost over $130,000 before options.
Note from Editor:
Last Friday, Electrify America partially shut down its charging infrastructure due to safety concerns from HUBER+SUHNER, the supplier for the network’s charging cables. A spokesperson from Porsche Cars North America tells Teslarati some details on Electrify America’s partial network shutdown:
“Electrify America notified us immediately about the partial shutdown of their charging network due to a concern with one of their liquid-cooling cable suppliers. We are confident that Electrify America and their supplier will move quickly to complete an investigation and resolve this issue well in advance of our public launch of the Porsche Taycan late this year.”
Tesla just upgraded its headlights through a software update, making them even better without any physical or hardware upgrade.
Tesla’s latest software update is quietly improving nighttime driving for a small number of owners. Version 2026.38 includes a new capability called Dynamic Headlight Leveling.
The feature automatically adjusts the aim of the low beams in response to driving conditions and nearby traffic, with the goal of giving the driver more usable light on the road while reducing glare for oncoming vehicles and traffic ahead.
2026.38 just dropped.
Model 3 gets Dynamic Headlight Leveling — low beams auto-aim around traffic for max visibility, less glare. Model 3 / Y (AMD HW3) also pick up sharper Tesla visuals + an enhanced park scene on the center display.
Legacy Intel cars get Supercharger Site… pic.twitter.com/45ac4AH6Vs
— Frunk To Trunk (@FrunkToTrunk) September 30, 2026
Unlike Tesla’s matrix high-beam system, which selectively dims individual LED segments to create shadows around other cars, Dynamic Headlight Leveling physically tilts the low-beam projectors. Internal motors respond to changes in vehicle pitch.
When the car accelerates hard, climbs a steep grade, or carries extra weight in the rear, the headlights can otherwise point higher than intended. The software counters that movement in real time so the beam stays aimed at the road surface rather than into the eyes of other drivers.
Early indications reveal the update is reaching a limited set of vehicles, including certain Model 3 and Cybertruck examples in the United States and the United Arab Emirates. The rollout does not appear tied to a single hardware revision, and Tesla has not published a broader schedule. It is simply a common waiting game until your car receives it.
The change arrives against a backdrop of wider complaints about headlight glare. Some earlier Model 3 and Model Y vehicles were the subject of an NHTSA recall related to excessive low-beam glare; the software adjustment offers a potential mitigation for cars equipped with the necessary leveling hardware. It does not replace adaptive high beams where those are already available, nor does it alter the basic low-beam pattern itself.
Instead, it keeps an existing beam pointed where it is most useful.
For drivers who have received the update, the system requires no new settings or user input. The headlights simply respond as road conditions and traffic change. As the feature reaches more vehicles, it adds another example of Tesla using over-the-air software to refine existing hardware rather than waiting for a new model year. Nighttime visibility and reduced glare for others are the practical results owners are expected to notice first.
Lifestyle
Tesla teases “Halloween Mode” update with Optimus rising from a graveyard
Tesla’s Halloween teaser hides a covered vehicle and an Optimus hand rising from the ground.
Tesla has started teasing a Halloween software update for its vehicles, with a short clip on X that reads, “Halloween is coming.” The clip opens on a glowing pumpkin before pulling back to the car’s center touchscreen, where the usual parked visualization has been replaced by a graveyard scene, and the vehicle draped with a white sheet so it reads as a cartoon ghost.
Halloween is coming pic.twitter.com/lM3ASUeOqX
— Tesla (@Tesla) October 1, 2026
The second detail is a robotic hand clawing its way out of the dirt like a zombie, which looks to be the hand of Tesla’s latest Optimus V3 humanoid robot. While Tesla still has not formally shown Optimus Gen 3 walking around in service, renders pulled from Tesla’s Android app last month gave the clearest look yet, including far more refined hands that Tesla has said carry 22 degrees of freedom. The hand has been the hardest part of the program. Musk has called it the majority of the robot’s engineering difficulty, and Tesla’s patents describe a design driven by tendons with the actuators moved into the forearm.
Tesla Optimus V3 hand and arm details revealed in new patents
Optimus also has a Halloween track record. Last October the robot handed out candy in Times Square, and a costumed “zombie” Optimus shuffled around the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles on Halloween night.
On the software side, Tesla’s 2025 Holiday Update expanded Santa Mode with a Santa sleigh, snowmen, snow effects, and a festive lock chime, so it wouldn’t be too far fetched if we saw something similar but themed for a Halloween Mode.
Tesla Full Self-Driving is set to receive improvements to address its two biggest issues, according to a company engineer.
Director of Engineering at Tesla AI, Phil Duan, revealed in a post on X that improvements to both pothole avoidance and navigation “are coming,’ something we have heard many times in the past. However, there are a few things that seem to hint that things might be different this time around.
Improvements on both are coming.
— Phil Duan (@pduan) October 1, 2026
Pothole avoidance, navigation, speed control, and left lane camping are some of the most prevalent and frequently mentioned shortcomings of the Full Self-Driving suite. These are a few of the biggest issues that have kept Tesla Full Self-Driving as a Supervised suite, meaning drivers must remain attentive during operation.
Pothole Avoidance
Pothole avoidance was first mentioned as an “Upcoming Improvement” with the Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.3 update back in early April of this year. It was listed alongside “Expand reasoning to all behaviors beyond destination handling.”
It’s been six months since we first saw pothole avoidance explicitly mentioned, and it has not moved beyond that and joined the main release notes yet.
Tesla has not shed any light on why pothole avoidance has been such an issue for it to solve, but it also has issues identifying large bumps much of the time, so its modeling of sudden changes in road conditions is likely pretty weak at this particular point. I’ve had more issues with large bumps than potholes, personally, but both are issues that need to be resolved.
This is that big bounce that I mentioned in the quoted post.
It’s just a tad too drastic to take at the speed FSD wants to go over it. You can see me quickly swipe down into Sloth, but I intervened. https://t.co/K20PK9ysBg pic.twitter.com/81Oc82ZJcZ
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) August 2, 2026
It makes sense that things might be pretty close to being released to the public, as we are going on such an extensive period of time between it being mentioned and it actually being deployed.
Navigation
Navigation is likely the most painful part of using Full Self-Driving, as it routinely takes strange routes, has trouble with local rules (like Except Right Turn Stop Signs in Pennsylvania), and sometimes does not realize that maneuvers it is suggesting are against the law. Turning out of my neighborhood, you cannot turn left, yet my Model Y still suggests it roughly 70 percent of the time when I’m leaving.
However, Tesla might be close to a breakthrough on this. With the Summer Update, Tesla added “Preferred Routes” alongside “Automatic Navigation.”
Preferred Routes prioritized roads that the driver had actually taken before, instead of always defaulting to what the vehicle believes is the most efficient path. This has already solved many of my issues. Formerly, I would turn off the Online Routing setting, and that would eliminate most of my complaints with routing, but then you lose out later on the Live Traffic Visualization.
Tesla’s Navigation has improved tremendously thanks to the Preferred Routes release with the Summer Update, but it still could use some polishing, as it still suggests strange routes from time to time, and it also has a lot of issues getting out of a parking lot. I find that those truly confuse FSD sometimes.
Tesla just made its headlights even better through a software update
Tesla teases “Halloween Mode” update with Optimus rising from a graveyard
