Update #2: SpaceX has successfully delivered Starlink 4-4 – batch of 52 new satellites – to low Earth orbit (LEO), completing the first of three back-to-back Falcon 9 launches scheduled less than three days apart.
Starlink 4-4 marks the 98th successful Falcon landing, the first time SpaceX has performed a non-polar Starlink launch from its West Coast pad, and the first time a Falcon 9 booster has completed 11 orbital-class launches and spaceflights. Up next, SpaceX is scheduled to launch Turkey’s Turksat 5B geostationary communications satellite out of its Cape Canaveral, Florida LC-40 pad. Falcon 9 could lift off as early as 10:58 pm EDT, Saturday, December 18th (03:58 UTC 19 Dec) – just 15 hours after Starlink 4-4. Set in September 2021, SpaceX’s current record is two launches in ~44 hours.
Update: SpaceX’s second dedicated West Coast Starlink launch has slipped to no earlier than (NET) 1:24 am PDT (09:24 UTC) on Saturday, December 18th. Headed to an orbit unusual for a Vandenberg Space Force Base launch, Starlink 4-4 could now lift off just 18 hours before a different SpaceX mission – Turksat 5B – lifts off from the opposite side of the country.
Barring delays to Cargo Dragon’s CRS-24 space station resupply mission, which remains scheduled for 5:06 am EDT on December 21st, that means that SpaceX is now on track to launch three Falcon 9 rockets in three days (less than 73 hours).
SpaceX appears to be on track to round out a record-breaking year with three Falcon 9 launches in four days.
With the diverse trio of missions, SpaceX will orbit another batch of laser-linked Starlink satellites, deliver a large communications satellite to geostationary transfer orbit (GTO), send a Dragon to space for sixth time this year, and break at least two company records. The first mission, known as Starlink 2-3, could occur as early as the morning of December 17th, kicking off an incredibly busy period of launches – and not just for SpaceX.

Starlink 2-3
Referring to the fact that the mission will be the third launch for the second distinct group or ‘shell’ of Starlink satellites, Starlink 2-3 will actually be the second dedicated launch to a semi-polar orbit, leapfrogging Starlink 2-2 for unknown reasons after Starlink 2-1’s successful September launch. Originally scheduled to launch in mid-October, SpaceX was forced to stand down just a few days before liftoff for unknown reasons and at least a week or two of delays soon put Starlink 2-3 at risk of clashing with the company’s upcoming NASA DART launch, which unsurprisingly took precedence. SpaceX successfully launched the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission on November 24th.
Late on December 13th, tugboat Scorpius likely departed Port of Long Beach with SpaceX drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) in tow – a fairly airtight confirmation that a SpaceX launch is just a handful of days away. Based on safety Notices to Airmen and Mariners (NOTAMs/NOTMARs), Starlink 2-3 is scheduled to launch sometime between 12am and 6am PDT (UTC-8) on Friday, December 17th. If accurate and SpaceX stays on schedule, Falcon 9 could lift off from the company’s Vandenberg SLC-4E launch pad with Starlink 2-3 in tow just 22 days after a different Falcon 9 rocket launched DART – smashing the pad’s current 36-day turnaround record by almost 40%.

Aside from drastically increasing the maximum theoretical launch cadence SpaceX’s West Coast pad is capable of supporting, Starlink 2-3 is also expected – as it was in October – to fly on Falcon 9 booster B1051, potentially making the mission the first time a liquid rocket booster has completed eleven orbital-class launches. B1051 debuted in March 2019, sending an uncrewed Crew Dragon on its way to orbit for the first time. Before SpaceX’s Starlink launch cadence fell off a cliff in the second half of 2021, B1051 completed its tenth launch on May 9th, 2021, averaging one launch every ~80 days over a two-year career. Starlink 2-3 will be B1051’s first launch in 7 months and eleventh launch in 33 months.
Turksat 5B
As early as 11:58 pm EDT (UTC-5) on Saturday, December 18th, another Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to launch Turkey’s Turksat 5B geostationary communications satellite from SpaceX’s Cape Canaveral LC-40 pad. There’s a good chance that former Falcon Heavy booster B1052 – recently converted into a Falcon 9 after more than two years in storage – will be assigned to the mission, which is set to be SpaceX’s 30th orbital launch in 2021.

CRS-24 and more!
Finally, a different Falcon 9 (possibly B1062 or even a new booster entirely) is scheduled to launch a new Cargo Dragon 2 spacecraft on CRS-24 – potentially the company’s 23rd operational International Space Station (ISS) resupply run since October 2012. It will be Falcon 9’s sixth Dragon launch of 2021 – another record for SpaceX and the spacecraft. If the schedule holds, CRS-24 could lift off as early as 5:06 am EDT (UTC-5) on Tuesday, December 21st and would be SpaceX’s third Falcon 9 launch in roughly 100 hours (a little over four days). CRS-24 is expected to be SpaceX’s 31st and final launch of 2021, beating out the 26-launch record it set just last year.
However, the rest of the world isn’t quite finished. As early as the day after CRS-24, an Ariane 5 rocket is scheduled to launch the almost $10 billion, NASA-built James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Decades in the making, JWST will be the single most expensive payload and the largest space telescope ever launched and is functionally irreplaceable and hard (but not impossible, if the political will is there) to repair, making it perhaps the most universally nerve-wracking uncrewed launch in the history of spaceflight.
News
Tesla intertwines FSD with in-house Insurance for attractive incentive
Every mile logged under FSD now carries a documented financial value—lower risk, lower cost—based on Tesla’s internal driving data rather than external crash statistics alone.
Tesla intertwined its Full Self-Driving (Supervised) suite with its in-house Insurance initiative in an effort to offer an attractive incentive to drivers.
Tesla announced that its new Safety Score 3.0 will automatically have a perfect score of 100 with every mile driven with Full Self-Driving (Supervised) enabled.
The change is designed to boost customers’ average safety scores and deliver noticeably lower monthly premiums.
The move marks the clearest link yet between Tesla’s autonomous driving technology and its proprietary insurance product. Tesla Insurance already relies on real-time vehicle data—such as acceleration, braking, following distance, and speed—to calculate a Safety Score between 0 and 100. Higher scores have long translated into cheaper rates.
Under the previous system, however, even brief manual interventions could drag down the average, frustrating owners who rely heavily on FSD. Version 3.0 eliminates that penalty for supervised autonomous miles, effectively treating FSD-driven segments as the safest possible driving behavior.
The incentive is immediate and financial. Drivers who keep FSD engaged for the majority of their trips will see their overall score rise, potentially shaving hundreds of dollars off annual premiums.
Tesla framed the update as a direct response to customer feedback, many of whom had complained that the old scoring model punished the very behavior it was meant to encourage.
For now, the program applies only to new policies in six states: Indiana, Tennessee, Texas, Arizona, Virginia, and Illinois.
Existing policyholders are not yet included, a point that drew swift questions from the Tesla community. Many owners in other states, including California and Georgia, expressed hope that the benefit would expand nationwide soon.
The announcement arrives as Tesla continues to roll out FSD Supervised updates and push for regulatory approval of more advanced autonomy. By tying insurance savings directly to FSD usage, the company is putting its own actuarial weight behind the technology’s safety claims.
Every mile logged under FSD now carries a documented financial value—lower risk, lower cost—based on Tesla’s internal driving data rather than external crash statistics alone.
Tesla has not disclosed exact premium reductions or the full rollout timeline beyond the six launch states.
Still, the message is clear: the more drivers trust FSD Supervised, the more Tesla Insurance will reward them. In an era when legacy insurers remain cautious about autonomous tech, Tesla is betting that its own data will prove the safest miles are the ones driven hands-free.
Elon Musk
Tesla finalizes AI5 chip design, Elon Musk makes bold claim on capability
The Tesla CEO’s words mark a strategic shift. Tesla has long emphasized software-hardware co-design, squeezing maximum performance from every transistor. Musk previously described AI5 as optimized for edge inference in both Robotaxi and Optimus.
Tesla has finalized its chip design for AI5, as Elon Musk confirmed today that the new chip has reached the tape-out stage, the final step before mass production.
But in a brief reply on X, Musk clarified Tesla’s AI hardware roadmap, essentially confirming that the new chip will not be utilized for being “enough to achieve much better than human safety for FSD.”
He said that AI4 is enough to do that.
Instead, the AI5 chip will be focused on Tesla’s big-time projects for the future: Optimus and supercomputer clusters.
Musk thanked TSMC and Samsung for production support, noting that AI5 could become “one of the most produced AI chips ever.” Yet, the key pivot came in his direct answer: vehicles no longer need the bleeding-edge silicon.
And thank you to @TaiwanSemi_TSC and @Samsung for your support in bringing this chip to production! It will be one of most produced AI chips ever.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 15, 2026
Existing AI4 hardware, which is already deployed in hundreds of thousands of HW4-equipped Teslas, delivers safety metrics superior to human drivers for Full Self-Driving. AI5 will instead accelerate Optimus robot development and massive Dojo-style training clusters.
The Tesla CEO’s words mark a strategic shift. Tesla has long emphasized software-hardware co-design, squeezing maximum performance from every transistor. Musk previously described AI5 as optimized for edge inference in both Robotaxi and Optimus.
Now, with AI4 proving sufficient, the company avoids costly retrofits across its fleet while redirecting next-generation compute toward higher-value applications: dexterous robots and exponential training scale.
But is it reasonable to assume AI4 enables unsupervised self-driving? Yes, but with important caveats.
On the hardware side, the claim is credible. Tesla’s FSD stack runs end-to-end neural networks trained on billions of miles of real-world data. Internal safety data reportedly shows AI4-equipped vehicles already outperforming average human drivers by a significant margin in controlled metrics (collision avoidance, reaction time, edge-case handling).
Dual-redundant AI4 chips provide ample headroom for the driving task, leaving bandwidth for future model improvements without new silicon. Musk’s assertion aligns with Tesla’s pattern of over-provisioning compute early, then optimizing ruthlessly, exactly as HW3 once sufficed before HW4 scaled further.
Optimus and our supercomputer clusters.
AI4 is enough to achieve much better than human safety for FSD.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 15, 2026
Unsupervised autonomy, meaning Level 4 or higher, is not solely a compute problem. Regulatory approval remains the primary gate.
Even if AI4 achieves “much better than human” safety statistically, agencies like the NHTSA demand exhaustive validation, liability frameworks, and public trust.
Tesla’s supervised FSD has shown rapid gains in recent versions, yet real-world edge cases, like construction zones, emergency vehicles, and adverse weather, still require driver intervention in many jurisdictions. Competitors like Waymo operate limited unsupervised fleets, but only in geofenced areas with extensive mapping. Tesla’s vision-only, fleet-scale approach is more ambitious—and harder to certify globally.
In short, Musk’s post is both pragmatic and bullish. AI4 is likely capable of unsupervised FSD from a technical standpoint. Whether regulators and consumers agree, and how quickly, will determine if Tesla’s bet pays off.
The company’s capital-efficient path keeps existing cars relevant while pouring future compute into robots. If the safety data holds, unsupervised autonomy could arrive sooner than many expect.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk signals expansion of Tesla’s unique side business
Long envisioning the Tesla Diner as more than a charging stop, Musk has clearly adopted the idea that the Supercharger and Restaurant combo is a good thing for the company to have. It’s a blend of classic American drive-in culture with futuristic Tesla flair, complete with a 1950s-inspired design, movie screens, and on-site dining.
Elon Musk has signaled an expansion of Tesla’s unique side business, something that really has nothing to do with cars or spaceships, but fans of the company have truly adopted it as just another one of its awesome ventures.
Musk confirmed on Wednesday that Tesla would build a new Diner location in Palo Alto, Northern California. After hinting last October that it “probably makes sense to open one near our Giga Texas HQ in Austin and engineering HQ in Palo Alto,” it seems one of those locations is being set into motion.
Sure
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 15, 2026
Long envisioning the Tesla Diner as more than a charging stop, Musk has clearly adopted the idea that the Supercharger and Restaurant combo is a good thing for the company to have. It’s a blend of classic American drive-in culture with futuristic Tesla flair, complete with a 1950s-inspired design, movie screens, and on-site dining.
He first floated broader expansion plans shortly after the LA opening in July 2025, noting that if the prototype succeeded, Tesla would roll out similar venues in major cities worldwide and along long-distance Supercharger routes.
Earlier hints included a confirmed second site at Starbase in Texas, tied to SpaceX operations, underscoring the Diner’s role in enhancing Tesla’s ecosystem behind vehicles.
The Los Angeles location on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood has served as a high-profile test case. Opened in July 2025 at 7001 Santa Monica Blvd., it features the world’s largest urban Supercharging station with 80 V4 stalls open to all NACS-compatible EVs, over 250 dining seats, rooftop views, and 24/7 service.
The retro-futuristic building replaced a former Shakey’s and quickly became a destination. Tesla reported selling 50,000 burgers in the first 72 days—an average of over 700 daily—drawing crowds with Cybertruck-shaped packaging, breakfast extensions until 2 p.m., and movie screenings.
Palo Alto stands out as a logical next step for several reasons. As Tesla’s longstanding engineering headquarters in the heart of Silicon Valley, the city is home to thousands of Tesla employees, engineers, and executives who could benefit from a convenient, branded gathering spot.
The area boasts high EV adoption rates, dense tech talent, and heavy traffic along key corridors, making a large Supercharger-diner an ideal fit for both daily commuters and long-haul travelers.
Proximity to Stanford University and the innovation ecosystem would amplify its appeal, potentially serving as a showcase for Tesla’s vision of integrated mobility and lifestyle experiences. It could be a great way for Tesla to recruit new talent from one of the country’s best universities.
If Tesla and Musk decide to move forward with a Palo Alto diner, it would build directly on the LA prototype’s momentum while addressing Musk’s earlier calls for expansion near core Tesla hubs.
Whether it materializes as a full confirmation or evolves from these hints remains to be seen, but the pattern is clear: Tesla is testing ways to make charging stops memorable. For EV drivers and enthusiasts alike, a Silicon Valley outpost could blend cutting-edge tech with nostalgic comfort, further embedding Tesla into everyday culture. As Musk’s comments suggest, the future of the Diner looks promising.