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SpaceX could land Starship on Mars in 2024, says Elon Musk
Four years after Elon Musk revealed “aspirational” plans to launch Starships to Mars in 2022, the SpaceX CEO now believes that 2024 is a more accurate target.
For SpaceX, that two-year ‘delay’ is more impressive than anything given that the company practically restarted Starship development from scratch a year after Musk set the 2022 target. In late 2018, after more than two years of work developing a Starship (then BFR) built out of carbon fiber composites, the CEO revealed that the company was going to completely redesign the rocket to use steel for all major structures.
Two and a half years after that decision, SpaceX has built a vast Starship factory capable of building at least one ship per month, cumulatively fired dozens of full-scale Raptor engines for more than 30,000+ seconds, flown eight full-scale prototypes, and recovered the first full-size Starship in one piece after a high-altitude launch and bellyflop-style descent and landing.
It doesn’t come as a huge surprise that Starship probably wont be attempting any Mars launches in 2022. Had SpaceX not had to return to the drawing board in 2018, Musk may well have been able to achieve that 2022 goal, but wholly redesigning Starship with steel almost certainly delayed development by at least a year. For interplanetary launches, the most efficient trajectories – those that allow a rocket to maximize payload capacity – are only open for several weeks every ~25 months. That means that a rocket that’s one year behind a Mars launch window will still have to wait more than two years for the next launch opportunity.
In Starship’s case, even if SpaceX were ready for its first Mars cargo missions in 2023, it would need to wait until September or October 2024. That’s far from out of the question but three full years will arguably give SpaceX a good amount of time to both ensure that Starship is technically ready and reliable enough to land on Mars while also determining – and likely designing and building – the cargo those first Starships will carry.
SpaceX could also launch the first one or several Mars-bound Starships with an absolute minimum payload under the assumption that success will require several failures, in which case the company would have until 2026 to develop a system capable of finding and gathering Martian ice, processing it into cryogenic liquid oxygen and methane, and storing that propellant for months or even years. Without that complex system of in-situ resource utilization (ISRU), Starship will never be able to leave Mars, turning initial crewed missions into one-way trips.
In the meantime, while SpaceX has successfully proven that Starship’s exotic skydiver-style landing is viable on planets with atmospheres, orbital Starship flight tests will likely pose just as many challenges. Starship will have the largest heat shield of any spacecraft ever built, while that heat shield will also be the first non-ablative shield ever developed by SpaceX. Even if Starship aces reentries from low Earth orbit (LEO), reentries from geostationary, lunar, or Mars transfer orbits are all multiple times more stressful, requiring still more testing to ensure that its ceramic heat shield and steel hull can withstand interplanetary velocity reentries.
SpaceX will also have to develop unprecedented thermal management solutions to keep hundreds of tons of cryogenic liquid propellant at the right temperatures for weeks, months, or even years in orbit, deep space, and on the surfaces of other moons and planets. This is all to say that SpaceX has its work cut out for it as it approaches the dawn of orbital Starship flight tests and has to tackle a number of daunting technical challenges it might end up being the first to solve. But, as SpaceX always has, it will devour each problem piece by piece until Starship is exactly as capable and revolutionary as the company and its CEO have long promised – if a bit behind schedule.
Turn-by-turn navigation is not new technology.
For over two decades, drivers have relied on Garmin, TomTom, and later smartphone apps like Google Maps and Waze to receive precise, reliable directions. These systems have guided millions safely through unfamiliar cities, highways, and backroads with remarkable effectiveness. They handle real-time traffic, construction detours, and complex intersections with minimal fuss.
Yet Tesla, the company that promised revolutionary Full Self-Driving (FSD), continues to struggle with this foundational capability. As FSD (Supervised) v14.3.4 has started rolling out to cars this week, navigation remains its glaring Achilles’ heel, undermining the entire autonomous vision.
Tesla Summon got insanely good in FSD v14.3.2 — Navigation? Not so much
Tesla’s FSD excels in many driving behaviors—smooth acceleration, confident lane changes in ideal conditions, and responsive handling of visible obstacles. However, when it comes to following a route accurately, the system falters repeatedly.
Owners report wrong turns, missed exits, inefficient routing through local roads instead of highways, phantom speed limit errors, and even directing vehicles to building rear entrances. Interventions for navigation issues often outnumber those for core driving maneuvers. Tesla has begun surveying owners specifically about these errors, acknowledging the problem after years of complaints.
Navigation is perhaps my biggest complaint when it comes to FSD, because sometimes, we do know better. Some of us have been living in our areas for our entire lives, but even those who have not have years or even decades of experience driving on local roads. We might know a little better about routing.
But the navigation mistakes are more than just FSD potentially taking a slightly different route that may or may not save you a few minutes. Sometimes, they’re genuinely mind-boggling.
This isn’t just annoying; it cascades into broader failures. A flawed route plan confuses the AI’s decision-making, leading to hesitant behavior, unnecessary disengagements, or dangerous maneuvers like attempting impossible U-turns or ignoring clear ramps. In a system meant to operate with minimal supervision, unreliable navigation erodes trust.
More often than not, false or plain incorrect navigation is what causes me to interrupt FSD operation. Unfortunately, I believe the latest FSD version is the worst example of it, and it leads me to believe that Tesla might be making some changes; they’ve just made them in the wrong direction.
It makes you wonder: Why is a company that has done so much with the progress of FSD and autonomy struggling so much with navigation, something that is not new and has been around a long time?
Multiple Data Sources
First, Tesla’s navigation relies on a fragile patchwork of multiple data sources—Google Maps, TomTom, OpenStreetMap, Valhalla, and its own fleet-derived data—stitched together rather than a single authoritative map. When these conflict on lane geometry, road status, or turn details, the system hesitates or chooses incorrectly.
Traditional GPS providers maintain centralized, regularly validated databases with professional curation and rapid updates. Tesla’s hybrid approach, while innovative in crowdsourcing, introduces inconsistencies that a purely vision-based or end-to-end AI approach may not easily reconcile in real time.
Persistent Learning
FSD seems to struggle with persistent learning from driver interventions.
Unlike consumer apps that quickly adapt to repeated corrections or user preferences (e.g., avoiding certain routes or remembering habitual detours), Tesla’s FSD often fails to internalize fixes on the same trip or across similar scenarios. Owners note making the same manual override multiple times without the routing engine updating its behavior meaningfully.
This stems from the neural architecture prioritizing real-time perception and control over long-term route memory and personalization, making navigation feel rigid and “opinionated” compared to the adaptive logic in Waze or Google Maps.
I noticed that when I asked Grok to try and get me home a certain way (a way that FSD routinely took in the past because it was the most efficient), it had to place a waypoint between my location at the time and my house. When I went to edit the waypoint out, as Grok had placed it for a way to get FSD to get off the highway at the right exit, it was stumped again, rerouted, and took a longer way home.
The next thing I’ve noticed, and this might be controversial, is that Nav has gotten even worse.
I think that might actually be a good thing; Tesla seems to be adjusting it. They just need to adjust it the opposite way.
The car is taking extremely strange routes to very… https://t.co/UHg3tVfNA2
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) June 16, 2026
Reasoning, Scaling, and Intuition
Third, scaling navigation for unsupervised or robotaxi ambitions requires not just accuracy but adaptability and user-like reasoning. Current FSD often defaults to single routes that ignore driver preferences or real-world nuances like time-of-day traffic patterns. It fails to match the intuitive, context-aware planning that traditional systems have refined over the years.
Resolving navigation is critical for several reasons. Practically, it is the backbone of any autonomous journey: without trustworthy routing, the car cannot reliably reach destinations, rendering FSD useless for robotaxis or hands-free commutes. Safety depends on it—mismatched plans create hesitation in merges or intersections, increasing accident risk.
Economically, Tesla’s valuation and future hinge on FSD delivering unsupervised driving; persistent navigation flaws delay regulatory approval and erode consumer confidence. For owners who paid premiums for FSD, these issues represent unfulfilled promises. While it is unlikely Tesla will lose too many customers due to bad navigation, some will be frustrated with the constant need for human input.
Tesla has achieved miracles in electric vehicles and battery tech. Mastering turn-by-turn—technology Garmin nailed in the early 2000s—should not be this hard. By investing in tighter data integration, faster learning loops from interventions, and more intuitive routing algorithms, Tesla could close this gap.
Until then, FSD’s navigation struggles highlight a humbling truth: even the most ambitious innovator must sometimes master the basics before conquering the future.
A Tesla Cybertruck driver in the United Kingdom had their all-electric pickup seized by local police in the Greater Manchester area after the department cited “legitimate concerns.”
Last Thursday, police saw the pickup on the roads and decided to pull the driver over. Greater Manchester Police said:
“Whilst this may seem trivial to some, legitimate concerns exist around the safety of other road users or pedestrians if they were involved in a collision with the Cybertruck.”
🚨 A Tesla Cybertruck, which is illegal to drive in the UK due to safety concerns, has been seized by police in Greater Manchester
“Whilst this may seem trivial to some, legitimate concerns exist around the safety of other road users or pedestrians if they were involved in a… pic.twitter.com/cqhdPok3DM
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) June 16, 2026
The Cybertruck in question was, according to the BBC, registered and insured abroad and was confiscated. The driver, who is a UK resident, was reported.
The Greater Manchester Police Department then added:
“The Tesla Cybertruck is not road-legal in the UK and does not hold a certificate of conformity.”
The Cybertruck cannot be legally driven in the UK because it has no UK Type Approval for operation in the country. This is due to some safety concerns, which are related to its angular shape and design. The stainless steel exoskeleton has sharp edges and projections that violate UK/EU rules on pedestrian protection.
Tesla has considered creating what it referred to as an “international version” that would be approved for operation in Europe. However, there has been no real movement on that front by the company, as it has been focused on the Robotaxi rollout primarily.
A new report claims that Apple is in the process of developing what would be the missing link for Tesla to get CarPlay.
Apple and Tesla have been reportedly working together for some time to give Tesla owners the opportunity to utilize CarPlay within their vehicles. While many owners are more than happy with Tesla’s in-house UI, which is seamless, effective, and smooth, some still want CarPlay, which does have its advantages.
A report from 9to5Mac now states that a new CarPlay technology that was highlighted during the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) would potentially be the bridge between Tesla and Apple. With the addition of a feature known as “Route Sharing,” which gives a navigation app the ability to share routing data with the vehicle, Tesla would be able to launch CarPlay in its vehicles, the report states.
CarPlay has not been a priority for Tesla because it has done extremely well with its in-house UI, but some drivers are just used to it. Additionally, it could improve Tesla’s subpar Navigation or offer improved app capabilities, especially with iMessage.
Route Sharing is an intended addition to CarPlay’s iteration in iOS 26.4, which was released in March:
The addition of CarPlay would undoubtedly be welcome, but at the same time, it seems like Tesla realizes it is not of the utmost priority. There are so many things that Tesla is working on currently within its own vehicles, especially attempting to solve self-driving.
Back in February, Bloomberg had reported that Tesla was still working on bringing CarPlay to its vehicles, but it had not due to app compatibility issues and incredibly low adoption rates of iOS 26.
This bottleneck could buy Tesla the proper amount of time to develop CarPlay for its vehicles. It would be a welcome addition, and could be brought on with either the Summer or Fall 2026 Software Updates.
Tesla’s Navigation Nightmare: Why the easiest part of FSD might be the hardest
Tesla Cybertruck driver gets pickup seized for ‘legitimate concerns’ in UK
