Tesla rival Xiaomi is experiencing demand that is off-the-charts with its new YU7 crossover, which competes with the Model Y. The company’s CEO has stated that demand is truly outpacing what it can build, and that customers in limbo should consider the Model Y because “it’s a great car.”

The Xiaomi YU7 has already gained an incredible number of orders so far. Its launch a few months ago had consumers busting down doors to place an order before others, and demand has been so high that customers will wait, on average, between 56 and 59 weeks for delivery.

Tesla Model Y meets new competition from Xiaomi 

Within 18 hours, Xiaomi received about 240,000 orders, CarScoops reported. Some customers are truly interested in the vehicle, but cannot wait the extended period to take delivery as they might need a car now.

Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun said on social meida that there are other cars out there that would be suitable as a replacement to the YU7:

“If you need to buy a car quickly, other China-produced new energy vehicles are pretty good.”

He explicitly mentioned the Model Y, Xpeng G7, and Li Auto i8.

Regarding the Model Y, he said:

“The Model Y is a great car, and Tesla also announced a number of promotions yesterday, so you might want to consider it.”

The Model Y has been the best-selling car in the world over the past two years, and it still leads in many markets as the most sought-after EV. However, in China, there are so many formidable competitors that customers are seemingly going for whatever they can get to first.

Of course, a car is a car, but Tesla has gained a more notable reputation for its industry-leading tech and driver assistance systems, including City Autopilot, which has been used in China for a few months now.

Tesla China owners share first impressions of FSD-style “City Autopilot”

Tesla is offering a tasty Supercharging incentive on inventory Model 3 units in Canada as it continues to push sales in the third quarter.

In the United States, Tesla is preparing for the end of the $7,500 electric vehicle tax credit. While it is offering a multitude of incentives in the U.S. to help push sales of its vehicles before the credit goes away, it is not saving the deals for Americans exclusively.

Yesterday, the company announced it is now offering Free Supercharging for life on all Model 3 inventory in Canada, a massive incentive for those who would use the vehicle as a daily driver:

Unlimited road trips through Canada

Free Supercharging now on all Model 3 inventory 🇨🇦

— Tesla North America (@tesla_na) August 15, 2025

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The deal would normally only apply to Superchargers located in Canada, meaning if a Canadian drove over the border into the United States and Supercharged, they would have to pay for it.

However, Tesla also confirmed that the charging deal would extend to the U.S. Canadians will be able to drive across the U.S. and Supercharge for free for the life of the vehicle.

Free Supercharging is such a great perk because the money an owner saves on charging factors directly into what they are saving if they were to own a gas car. While Supercharging and home charging are, on average, cheaper than filling up with gas, the savings are not massive.

When Supercharging is free, it can save consumers hundreds of dollars per month, especially if they plan to use the Tesla for their daily commute. Some people could fill their gas cars up two times a week to get to work, spending $80-$100 every five days on gas.

Tesla has been using incentives like this to push vehicles into customers’ hands. Q3 could be one of the best three-month spans in recent memory with the push it is making.

If there is any sign that Tesla is now confident about its self-driving program, it would be this. As could be seen on Tesla’s Careers page, the company is now hiring Autopilot Vehicle Operators in Delhi and Mumbai, India. 

As far as real-world traffic is concerned, one could argue that India’s city streets are the final boss of autonomous driving systems due to their complexity and congestion.

Tesla job openings

As per Tesla in its recent job openings, Prototype Vehicle Operators will be responsible for driving an engineering vehicle for extended periods and conducting dynamic audio and camera data collection for testing and training purposes. In both its job listings for Mumbai and Delhi, Tesla noted that successful applicants will be gathering real-world data on the weekends and around the clock. 

Considering the job openings in India, Tesla seems to be intent on rolling out its advanced driver-assist systems like FSD in the country. This is quite interesting, as Tesla is not hiring Prototype Vehicle Operators in other territories that recently launched, such as the Philippines. Perhaps Tesla intends to tackle FSD’s final boss of sorts before rolling out FSD in other territories.

FSD’s rollout

Tesla’s autonomous driving program uses the company’s Full Self-Driving system, which is currently available on vehicles in North America and China. Tesla, however, has a more advanced version of FSD called Unsupervised FSD, which is currently being used in vehicles that are part of the Robotaxi pilot in Austin and the Bay Area.

Elon Musk has also recently announced on X that Tesla will be releasing FSD V14 in the coming weeks. He also shared a number of improvements that can be expected from FSD V14. “The FSD release in about 6 weeks will be a dramatic gain with a 10X higher parameter count and many other improvements. It’s going through training & testing now. Once we confirm real-world safety of FSD 14, which we think will be amazing, the car will nag you much less,” Musk wrote in his post.