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Tesla will designate Model 3 Performance as first test drive cars
Tesla will use the Model 3 Performance as its test drive cars for individuals interested in the compact electric car. In a recent announcement on Twitter, Elon Musk stated that Tesla is aiming to start test drives in the Model 3 Performance within 4-6 weeks.
Elon Musk’s update on Tesla’s test drive cars for the Model 3 line came as a response to an inquiry from the Model 3 Owners Club, who inquired when Canadian reservation holders can order their Model 3. Responding to the group, Musk noted that order pages for the Model 3 Performance are being rolled out over the next week. Musk further teased that test drives in the Model 3 Performance will be a “mindwarp.”
Model 3 Performance order page progressively rolling out to reservation holders over the next week or so. It’s a really great car. Not saying that lightly. Test drive is a mindwarp. Aiming to have these as our first test drive Model 3 cars in stores within 4 to 6 week’s.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 3, 2018
Prior to Musk’s announcement, Model 3 reservation holders have mostly resorted to more unconventional ways to test drive the vehicle. Some, for example, have opted to rent the car through online services such as Turo, in order to check out the electric car’s performance and functions. Others coordinate with members of the Tesla community to get in touch with existing Model 3 owners.
Tesla’s test drive cars have proven to be popular among the electric car community. Last year, it was revealed that test drives in Tesla’s South Korea branch in the Cheongdam-dong, Gangnam District in Seoul ended up with a six-month wait time, due to the number of people interested in trying out the vehicle. According to a local news report then, Tesla Korea sent emails to customers who pre-ordered the Model S 90D that test drives are being offered. With only ten test drives being conducted every day, the wait list for the Model S 90D stretched out to six months. That’s longer than the three months it took to import the Model S 90D from the United States to South Korea.
Apart from providing an update on Model 3 test drives, Musk also announced an update on Model 3 leases. According to Musk, Tesla would probably not offer Model 3 leases for 6-9 months, considering that leasing would negatively affect the company’s cash flow.
Leasing negatively effects Tesla cash flow, so we prob won’t offer Model 3 leases for 6 to 9 months. Loan financing is a better deal anyway, as bank conservatism for new car models is v conservative about residual value, but Teslas have always had strong residual value.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 3, 2018
Elon Musk has stated that Tesla would be profitable by the third or fourth quarter of 2018. With this in mind, Tesla’s decision to not offer leases for the Model 3 for the next 6-9 months is a step in the right direction. After all, when buyers purchase the Model 3, Tesla gets paid upfront; whereas the company gets paid over time when the vehicle is leased. Tesla’s focus on profitability and keeping its cash flow positive was also highlighted by Musk recently, when he discussed why the $35,000 standard range RWD Model 3 is not being produced yet.
While Musk has stated that test drives in the Model 3 Performance would be a “mindwarp,” another Tesla electric car would most definitely have test drives that are even more extreme. Last month, while responding to a Tesla fan on Twitter, Musk revealed that test drives for the next-generation Roadster would be offered “towards the end of next year.” With 10,000 Nm of torque, a top speed beyond 250 mph, and a 0-60mph time of 1.9 seconds, a test drive in the all-electric supercar would undoubtedly be far beyond ludicrous.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk and Tesla AI Director share insights after empty driver seat Robotaxi rides
The executives’ unoccupied tests hint at the rapid progress of Tesla’s unsupervised Robotaxi efforts.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk and AI Director Ashok Elluswamy celebrated Christmas Eve by sharing personal experiences with Robotaxi vehicles that had no safety monitor or occupant in the driver’s seat. Musk described the system’s “perfect driving” around Austin, while Elluswamy posted video from the back seat, calling it “an amazing experience.”
The executives’ unoccupied tests hint at the rapid progress of Tesla’s unsupervised Robotaxi efforts.
Elon and Ashok’s firsthand Robotaxi insights
Prior to Musk and the Tesla AI Director’s posts, sightings of unmanned Teslas navigating public roads were widely shared on social media. One such vehicle was spotted in Austin, Texas, which Elon Musk acknowleged by stating that “Testing is underway with no occupants in the car.”
Based on his Christmas Eve post, Musk seemed to have tested an unmanned Tesla himself. “A Tesla with no safety monitor in the car and me sitting in the passenger seat took me all around Austin on Sunday with perfect driving,” Musk wrote in his post.
Elluswamy responded with a 2-minute video showing himself in the rear of an unmanned Tesla. The video featured the vehicle’s empty front seats, as well as its smooth handling through real-world traffic. He captioned his video with the words, “It’s an amazing experience!”
Towards Unsupervised operations
During an xAI Hackathon earlier this month, Elon Musk mentioned that Tesla owed be removing Safety Monitors from its Robotaxis in Austin in just three weeks. “Unsupervised is pretty much solved at this point. So there will be Tesla Robotaxis operating in Austin with no one in them. Not even anyone in the passenger seat in about three weeks,” he said. Musk echoed similar estimates at the 2025 Annual Shareholder Meeting and the Q3 2025 earnings call.
Considering the insights that were posted Musk and Elluswamy, it does appear that Tesla is working hard towards operating its Robotaxis with no safety monitors. This is quite impressive considering that the service was launched just earlier this year.
Elon Musk
Starlink passes 9 million active customers just weeks after hitting 8 million
The milestone highlights the accelerating growth of Starlink, which has now been adding over 20,000 new users per day.
SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service has continued its rapid global expansion, surpassing 9 million active customers just weeks after crossing the 8 million mark.
The milestone highlights the accelerating growth of Starlink, which has now been adding over 20,000 new users per day.
9 million customers
In a post on X, SpaceX stated that Starlink now serves over 9 million active users across 155 countries, territories, and markets. The company reached 8 million customers in early November, meaning it added roughly 1 million subscribers in under seven weeks, or about 21,275 new users on average per day.
“Starlink is connecting more than 9M active customers with high-speed internet across 155 countries, territories, and many other markets,” Starlink wrote in a post on its official X account. SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell also celebrated the milestone on X. “A huge thank you to all of our customers and congrats to the Starlink team for such an incredible product,” she wrote.
That growth rate reflects both rising demand for broadband in underserved regions and Starlink’s expanding satellite constellation, which now includes more than 9,000 low-Earth-orbit satellites designed to deliver high-speed, low-latency internet worldwide.
Starlink’s momentum
Starlink’s momentum has been building up. SpaceX reported 4.6 million Starlink customers in December 2024, followed by 7 million by August 2025, and 8 million customers in November. Independent data also suggests Starlink usage is rising sharply, with Cloudflare reporting that global web traffic from Starlink users more than doubled in 2025, as noted in an Insider report.
Starlink’s momentum is increasingly tied to SpaceX’s broader financial outlook. Elon Musk has said the satellite network is “by far” the company’s largest revenue driver, and reports suggest SpaceX may be positioning itself for an initial public offering as soon as next year, with valuations estimated as high as $1.5 trillion. Musk has also suggested in the past that Starlink could have its own IPO in the future.
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NVIDIA Director of Robotics: Tesla FSD v14 is the first AI to pass the “Physical Turing Test”
After testing FSD v14, Fan stated that his experience with FSD felt magical at first, but it soon started to feel like a routine.
NVIDIA Director of Robotics Jim Fan has praised Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (Supervised) v14 as the first AI to pass what he described as a “Physical Turing Test.”
After testing FSD v14, Fan stated that his experience with FSD felt magical at first, but it soon started to feel like a routine. And just like smartphones today, removing it now would “actively hurt.”
Jim Fan’s hands-on FSD v14 impressions
Fan, a leading researcher in embodied AI who is currently solving Physical AI at NVIDIA and spearheading the company’s Project GR00T initiative, noted that he actually was late to the Tesla game. He was, however, one of the first to try out FSD v14.
“I was very late to own a Tesla but among the earliest to try out FSD v14. It’s perhaps the first time I experience an AI that passes the Physical Turing Test: after a long day at work, you press a button, lay back, and couldn’t tell if a neural net or a human drove you home,” Fan wrote in a post on X.
Fan added: “Despite knowing exactly how robot learning works, I still find it magical watching the steering wheel turn by itself. First it feels surreal, next it becomes routine. Then, like the smartphone, taking it away actively hurts. This is how humanity gets rewired and glued to god-like technologies.”
The Physical Turing Test
The original Turing Test was conceived by Alan Turing in 1950, and it was aimed at determining if a machine could exhibit behavior that is equivalent to or indistinguishable from a human. By focusing on text-based conversations, the original Turing Test set a high bar for natural language processing and machine learning.
This test has been passed by today’s large language models. However, the capability to converse in a humanlike manner is a completely different challenge from performing real-world problem-solving or physical interactions. Thus, Fan introduced the Physical Turing Test, which challenges AI systems to demonstrate intelligence through physical actions.
Based on Fan’s comments, Tesla has demonstrated these intelligent physical actions with FSD v14. Elon Musk agreed with the NVIDIA executive, stating in a post on X that with FSD v14, “you can sense the sentience maturing.” Musk also praised Tesla AI, calling it the best “real-world AI” today.
Elon Musk and Tesla AI Director share insights after empty driver seat Robotaxi rides
Starlink passes 9 million active customers just weeks after hitting 8 million
