Firmware
Tesla Firmware 6.0 Calendar App Review
Following our review of how Tesla’s new keyless driving feature works, we’ll be taking a closer look at another new feature of Firmware 6.0 – the Calendar app.
Tesla Firmware 6.0 Calendar App
The Calendar app., currently in BETA at the time of this writing, appears as a top level application alongside Nav, Web and other frequently used features of the Model S. Clicking into the Calendar will list your current day’s calendar events as well as the following day’s worth of events.
The following need to be taken into account in order for the Tesla Calendar app to work:
- Version 2.0 or higher of the Model S app on your smartphone
- You must provide access to your smartphone calendars to the Model S app
- The smartphone and your car must have internet connectivity and paired via bluetooth
Allowing the Model S mobile app to access to your calendar events also means that your data is being sent (and stored) on Tesla’s servers which then in turn sends them down to you car’s 17″ touchscreen for you to view. While this is a common method to synchronize data between source data and third party apps that use it, it does call into question some of the security aspects with such an approach. Is my calendar information open to Tesla employees? How do they ensure this private data is secured?
The calendar data is sent periodically to Tesla therefore it’s not instantaneously reflected on the Model S Calendar app. The timestamp for when the last data synchronization occurred appears on the upper right corner of the calendar alert.
You’re given the ability to set when the Calendar app appears upon entering the car (under settings).
Tesla Firmware 6.0 Calendar app will display all upcoming appointments for the current day as well as the following day. If there are no events for the current day, the app will show only following day’s appointment. There’s no ability to look beyond that date range. A really nice added feature of the Calendar app is the ability to navigate directly to your event’s location if you click on the event itself. Pressing on the event will feed the associated event location directly into the Tesla Nav app. Turn-by-turn navigation launches assuming the calendar event location can be found, otherwise you’ll be prompted with the standard navigation search results.
Tesla Firmware 6.0 Release Notes indicate, “When you have an event on your Calendar that will take place within the next hour and has a uniquely specified location, the Model S navigation system will notify you if there is a better route due to traffic, even if you’re not using navigation.” This is something I have yet to experience so I’ll be keeping a close eye on it over the coming weeks.
Device Compatibility
My original review of the Calendar app was done via an iPhone 5 running iOS 8 however I was unable to make it work. I followed all of the steps Tesla outlined within its notes but even after six hours I did not see my calendar events appear within the Model S display. I later found out that un-pairing the bluetooth phone first and then pairing again will allow the data sync to take effect. Since I was already getting an iPhone 6 the following day, I decided to use it as my device to review the Tesla Calendar app. It paired instantly and worked without a hitch. All of the calendar events synchronized and I was able to see both my iCloud calendar entries as well as my Google Apps calendar events from the car.
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NOTE: All calendars that you’re subscribed to will appear on the Model S even if it’s set as hidden or disabled on your smartphone.
I’d like to see Tesla provide an option to hide/unhide selected calendars from within the Calendar app or somehow synchronize with the smartphone’s calendar settings.
Summary
Despite Tesla labeling this as a “BETA” app, it performs quite well with no noticeable bugs or major issues, especially after the initial data sync is complete. That said, I still think there should be some statements around privacy as well as an added feature to show/hide various calendars within the Calendar app itself. But overall I think its a great addition to the car.
RELATED: Tesla Firmware 6 Reviews
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Firmware
Tesla unlocks in-car web conferencing to extend Google Meet, Teams and beyond
Tesla’s Summer Update lets owners join Google Meet, Teams, and Discord calls via cabin camera.
Tesla’s 2026 Summer Update, which just began rolling out to customer vehicles, now links the built-in web browser with the in-cabin camera feed and microphone input, thereby letting owners join video calls on nearly any browser-based service instead of just Zoom.
The change appears in Tesla’s own release notes for software version 2026.26 under “Web Browser,” which states that the vehicle can now use its interior camera and cabin microphone when a website requests access, with permission granted the same way a desktop browser handles it. As NotATeslaApp notes, this feature opens the door to Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Discord, and other webcam-enabled sites to activate the in-car cabin-facing camera. The feed automatically crops and zooms to center the driver in frame.
Tesla has offered in-car video calling before, but only through a dedicated Zoom app that launched at the end of 2022, a stripped-down browser preloaded with Zoom’s own web client and gated behind Premium Connectivity. Opening the full browser to any camera-requesting site removes that walled garden. Elon Musk first called video conferencing “definitely a future feature” back in 2020, when the pandemic pushed remote meetings into daily life, so this update effectively finishes something Tesla has been promising for six years.
Tesla Summer Update begins rolling out: a look at the new features
The feature keeps the same restrictions that applied to Zoom on Tesla vehicles. It only works while the car is parked; shifting into Drive disables the camera feed, according to the release notes. It is also limited to vehicles running Tesla’s AMD Ryzen infotainment hardware, meaning older Intel-based Model S and Model X units, along with early Model 3 and Model Y builds, don’t get it.
Turning the browser into a general entry point for the in-cabin camera, rather than routing everything through one local app, widens the number of third-party sites that can ask for access, even though Tesla’s permission prompt.
With the Summer update only days into its rollout, be sure to stay with us on TikTok and X to see the latest video demonstrations.
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Elon Musk
Tesla confirmed HW3 can’t do Unsupervised FSD but there’s more to the story
Tesla confirmed HW3 vehicles cannot run unsupervised FSD, replacing its free upgrade promise with a discounted trade-in.
Tesla has officially confirmed that early vehicles with its Autopilot Hardware 3 (HW3) will not be capable of unsupervised Full Self-Driving, while extending a path forward for legacy owners through a discounted trade-in program. The announcement came by way of Elon Musk in today’s Tesla Q1 2026 earnings call.
🚨 Our LIVE updates on the Tesla Earnings Call will take place here in a thread 🧵
Follow along below: pic.twitter.com/hzJeBitzJU
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) April 22, 2026
The history here matters. HW3 launched in April 2019, and Tesla sold Full Self-Driving packages to owners on the understanding that the hardware was sufficient for full autonomy. Some owners paid between $8,000 and $15,000 for FSD during that period. For years, as FSD’s AI models grew more demanding, HW3 vehicles fell progressively further behind, eventually landing on FSD v12.6 in January 2025 while AI4 vehicles moved to v13 and then v14. When Musk acknowledged in January 2025 that HW3 simply could not reach unsupervised operation, and alluded to a difficult hardware retrofit.
The near-term offering is more concrete. Tesla’s head of Autopilot Ashok Elluswamy confirmed on today’s call that a V14-lite will be coming to HW3 vehicles in late June, bringing all the V14 features currently running on AI4 hardware. That is a meaningful software update for owners who have been frozen at v12.6 for over a year, and it represents genuine effort to keep older hardware relevant. Unsupervised FSD for vehicles is now targeted for Q4 2026 at the earliest, with Musk describing it as a gradual, geography-limited rollout.
For HW3 owners, the over-the-air V14-lite update is welcomed, and the discounted trade-in path at least acknowledges an old obligation. What happens next with the trade-in pricing will define how this chapter ultimately gets written. If Tesla prices the hardware path fairly, acknowledges what early adopters are owed, and delivers V14-lite on the June timeline it committed to today, it has a real opportunity to convert one of the longest-running sore subjects among early adopters into a loyalty story.
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Tesla announced its Spring 2026 software update, and it’s the most feature-dense seasonal release the company has put out. The update covers twelve named changes spanning FSD, voice AI, safety lighting, dashcam storage, and pet display customization, among other things.
The centerpiece for owners with AI4 hardware is a redesigned Self-Driving app. The new interface lets owners subscribe to Full Self-Driving with a single tap and view ongoing FSD usage stats directly in the vehicle.
Grok gets its biggest in-car upgrade yet. The update adds a “Hey Grok” hands-free wake word along with location-based reminders, so a driver can now say “remind me to pick up groceries when I get home” without touching the screen. Grok first arrived in vehicles in July 2025, but each update has pushed it closer to genuine daily utility. Musk framed the broader vision clearly at Davos in January, saying Tesla is “really moving into a future that is based on autonomy.”
On safety, the update introduces enhanced blind spot warning lights that integrate directly with the cabin’s ambient lighting, building on the blind spot door warning that arrived in update 2026.8.
Dog Mode has been renamed Pet Mode and now lets owners choose a dog, cat, or hedgehog icon and add their pet’s name to the display.
Dashcam retention now extends up to 24 hours, up from the previous one-hour rolling loop, with a permanent save option for any clip. Weather maps now show rain and snow with better color differentiation and include the past hour of precipitation data along the route.
Tesla has now established a clear rhythm of two major OTA pushes per year. As with last year’s Spring update, that cycle started taking shape in 2025 with adaptive headlights and trunk customization. The 2025 Holiday Update then added Grok to the vehicle for the first time. This Spring follows that structure: the Holiday update introduces new architecture, and the Spring update broadens it across the fleet.
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Two notable features still did not make it. IFTTT automations, which launched in China earlier this year, were held back from this North American release for unknown reasons, and Apple CarPlay remains absent, reportedly still delayed by iOS 26 and Apple Maps compatibility issues.
Below is the full list of feature updates released by Tesla.
— Tesla (@Tesla) April 13, 2026
SpaceX and Nvidia team up on Musk’s orbital AI bet
SpaceX reports beat in first earnings while minimizing losses
