Lifestyle
Tesla drivers add to Supercharging with ChargePoint’s EV charging network
I love California in many more ways than one. Show me a land that seemingly basks in eternal sunshine and is home to arguably one of the most iconic automotive brands in history, Tesla, and I’ll tell you that any Model S owner like myself would be hard-pressed to imagine the Golden State as anything less than a basket of rainbows and unicorns. Except, I don’t live there. And the thought of possibly having to wait in long lines to charge my Tesla frightens me.
I’m a Philly Gal who’s grown used to my electric car lifestyle over the years, and in a region where finding a charging station was once akin to playing a game of Where’s Waldo. We don’t have Tesla Superchargers in every town like our left coast friends (unicorn world). Not to mention that it took a long while before Tesla installed one of their Supercharger stations along the east side of Pennsylvania where I would frequent.
However, Tesla has done a phenomenal job of making long distance and cross-country travel possible with its ever-expanding Supercharger network. Still, I found solace in being able to plug my Model S into a Level 2 charger from time to time, especially during my local routines like going to the market or dining out in the city. And it’s for those reasons that I turned my attention to California-based ChargePoint, the world’s largest electric vehicle charging network, to highlight reasons why Tesla owners might want to extend their charging options beyond Superchargers.
Teslarati’s Interactive Map includes over 42,000 ChargePoint chargers
I asked our development team if we can somehow include ChargePoint chargers into our Teslarati mobile app for iOS and Android, as it could bring value to the incoming Model 3 crowd that won’t have free Supercharger access, but more importantly help advance the adoption of electric vehicles around the world. Furthermore, Tesla owners that have the CHAdeMO adapter will be able to locate their nearest ChargePoint DC Fast Charger through our app and initiate a charge that would replenish roughly 200 miles (322 kilometers) of range per hour. I’m happy to report that ChargePoint was kind enough to let us integrate their charging locations into Teslarati’s app, and explained the reasons as such:
“ChargePoint’s mission is to help every driver get behind the wheel of an electric vehicle. We are committed to electric mobility and are eager to partner with progressive organizations like Teslarati to make it easier for EV drivers to charge up, and ultimately, help advance the adoption of electric vehicles around the world. We are excited to work with Teslarati to offer even more choice for drivers as more Teslas hit the road.”
Life beyond Superchargers
Because our mobile app now features integration with ChargePoint’s public charging stations, we encourage Tesla drivers, current and future, to feel unbounded by the types of all-electric journeys they can make in their vehicles. Gather information about those locations; check-in and share your favorite recommendations, like the tens of thousands have done across their Supercharger travels, and further the adoption of electric mobility.
Teslarati App available for iOS and Android
As convenient as Tesla’s Superchargers are, the chargers are generally located along major freeways and meant for long distance travel only. Level 2 chargers on the other hand are great for topping off and arguably easier to use for local charging.
I recall a plan I had to utilize nothing but Tesla Superchargers on a recent road trip, only to be pleasantly surprised when we saw a ChargePoint station at our destination. This wasn’t at a fancy hotel or winery like where some of Tesla’s destination chargers are located, but at a nearby strip mall next to where we were staying. Plugging into the Level 2 charger allowed us to charge up overnight and skip the first planned Supercharger on our way out, which would have required us to drive into a traffic congested area that’s off of a major highway.
Having the option to charge at a typical 6.6 kW Level 2 speed at home is the ultimate in convenience. But not everyone has the option. This is where work place Level 2 charging comes into play. Be it your actual employer or some nearby business, grabbing a few hours of charge during your work day can be the difference between owning an EV effortlessly and having to plan for and make dedicated charging trips.
In fact, major cities across the country are starting to get hip to this need. Where I live, having dedicated parking is something only certain neighborhoods enjoy. The coolest of places to live are in or near our center city, which are overwhelmingly full of rowhomes with no garages and a first come, first served street parking system. Most of these folks can only now start considering EV ownership as Level 2 chargers pop up in their neighborhoods, at their shopping destinations and other places they frequent. The city itself is considering how to facilitate and encourage a charging network that results in increased EV ownership. Sustainability and cleaner air are priorities in many places, including my beloved Philadelphia.
Having a mobile app with location services to tell you where nearby chargers can be found is key to convenience. Even more importantly, being able to find a trusted charging provider like ChargePoint, along with crowdsourced comments and photos, and access to charging station statuses will make trip planning even easier.
Happy electric journeys.
Elon Musk
How to use Grok Bot to block spam calls and texts
Musk told users to ask Grok Bot to scrub their phone numbers from spam lists.
Elon Musk has a new use case for Grok Bot, and it is the spam call. On Thursday he replied to an X user named Arash with a short instruction: “Ask your @Grok @Bot to remove your phone number from spam call & text lists!” Arash had said he got tired of the calls, had an AI bot find his number on listing sites and file removal requests, and packaged the process as a free skill for others.
The skill is called Spam-Call Scrubber, which is described to find a phone number on people search sites and data brokers, submits the opt outs, completes the confirmation emails those sites send back, and rechecks on a schedule the user picks. Using it requires the Grok Bot app. The pitch is time saved, since most broker opt outs sit behind separate forms on separate sites.
Ask your @Grok @Bot to remove your phone number from spam call & text lists!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 15, 2026
Musk said Grok Bot now gives each bot its own email address, and that it can detect scam emails. On Thursday he also said SpaceX would make users whole if the bot botches a purchase or leaks a card, then told users to shop away from Amazon after the retailer blocked the agent, as Teslarati reported. The terms of service we reviewed at the time put responsibility for what an agent does on the user.
For Tesla owners, Grok Bot is not just a phone app. Tesla brought Grok Bot into its vehicles on September 22, and we argued earlier this week that the Cybercab’s real advantage may be the errands it runs during a ride. Every Cybercab and the rest of the Model Y Robotaxi fleet has it enabled. The more routine tasks like this one become, the more a rider has reason to hand over something personal in the back seat.
The new Spam-Call Scrubber skill can be downloaded for free and works on sites that honor removal requests, while noting that listings can reappear, and illegal robocallers do not check any registry. Whether Spam-Call Scrubber cuts anyone’s call volume is something the first wave of users will find out, and Musk’s endorsement guarantees that wave is coming.
For a century, the car has asked the same thing of its owner, which is basically to pay attention. Even the best ride-hailing app like Uber or Lyft only moved the problem into someone else’s hands. You stopped driving, but you still sat in a stranger’s car, while half listening, and wondering whether to take a phone call in the car without being rude. The Cybercab has no wheel, no pedals and no driver. With Grok @bot now live inside it, it becomes something else entirely, and I think that matters more than the fleet count that everyone is tracking.
Grok @bot is an agent, not a voice assistant. A rider signs in once, and from then on can say what they need and watch it happen. Order dinner from a favorite restaurant. Fill the grocery cart. Move money, answer email, adjust a calendar, push a work project forward. Tesla engineer Yun-Ta Tsai confirmed it is enabled across every Cybercab and the rest of the Model Y fleet, and Tesla’s own pitch is that Full Self-Driving handles the commute while Grok handles the errands.
Think about what that does to a thirty minute ride. Uber sells you a trip, while Waymo sells you the same trip in a more private setting. Tesla is selling the thirty minutes themselves, returned to you with an assistant attached. Errands that used to eat a Saturday get done between pickup and drop off. The ride stops being dead time between two places and becomes a place of its own.
Tesla integrates Grok Bot into its vehicles for the ultimate personal assistant
Best of all, your Bots follow you into any Cybercab, and presumably your own Tesla, then logs you out automatically when you step out. Anyone can bolt a chatbot onto a screen, but much harder to own the vehicle, the autonomy stack and the assistant at once. It also quietly ties SpaceX’s Super Intelligence business to Tesla’s fleet, after Tesla converted its xAI stake into SpaceX equity. The relationship between those two companies is getting harder to describe as separate.
This is also where the hard questions start, because an agent that can spend your money in a vehicle other people also ride in needs some answers. How does it handle a voice it shouldn’t trust? What gets recorded, who can see it, and for how long? What happens when a rider leaves halfway through a task?
If Tesla gets those answers right, the scoreboard changes. We have been counting Cybercabs and wait times. The more telling number may be what riders accomplish per trip. That is data almost no one else will ever have, and it is the real reason to watch Grok @bot.
What do you think? Leave me a comment.
Lifestyle
Tesla’s mirrorless Cybercab will give riders a visibility upgrade
Tesla engineer confirms Cybercab update letting riders pull up rear and repeater cameras on demand.
Tesla is working on a Cybercab update that would let passengers pull up the vehicle’s rear and side cameras on demand, and the request came straight from a rider.
The exchange played out on X late Friday. Cybercab rider Dan Burkland shared photos of the two-seater’s cabin screen after an evening ride, praised the UI team’s work, and left one request: let riders open the rear and repeater cameras whenever they want, “especially for peace of mind.” Tesla UI software engineer Evan (@CarCoder) answered with two words: “In development.”
The Tesla UI team absolutely crushed it with the infotainment software. Nicely done @CarCoder!
One feature request: Allow folks to pull up the rear & repeater cameras on demand. This would be great especially for peace of mind. https://t.co/mNAOSLx6pE
— Dan Burkland (@DBurkland) October 10, 2026
The idea fits a pattern Teslarati has tracked since public rides began. Days after paid Cybercab service opened in Austin, Tesla sent riders a survey that asked them to rate the touchscreen, the app and the cabin, and to pick the features they wanted most. We reported on that survey in September, and a camera view is the kind of small software change Tesla can push quickly if riders keep asking.
It also speaks to something unique about the vehicle. With no steering wheel, no pedals and no driver, passengers have no mirror to check and no way to see behind them. The hardware is clearly built for camera awareness, from the repeater cameras to the rear camera. Letting a passenger look through those same cameras would give a nervous first time rider a way to confirm what is around the car.
The timing matters because the fleet is growing fast. Tesla’s Robotaxi account said on Saturday that more than 300 Cybercabs are now serving Austin, an eightfold increase in 30 days, and Tesla AI chief Ashok Elluswamy named Dallas as the next city. More cars and more cities mean more people riding in a driverless vehicle for the first time, which is exactly when small trust features carry weight.
For now, the feature is confirmed only as in development. If Tesla follows its usual pattern with Cybercab software, riders could see it appear in a point release without any announcement, and Teslarati will watch for it.
Tesla Cybercab gets a for sale date at last
Tesla Q3 2026 Earnings results: in-line revenues, slight beat on EPS
