Lifestyle
Tesla Model S vs Porsche Taycan: Top Gear pits a tech titan against a true driver’s car
The Tesla Model S Performance and the Porsche Taycan Turbo S are destined to be benchmarked against each other, and if a recent Top Gear segment is any indication, what could very well be the most extensive test of the two vehicles to date has just been conducted. The results of the motoring media agency’s tests are interesting to say the least, as the veteran tech titan finally meets its greatest challenge yet — a true electric driver’s car.
Top Gear appropriately tested a Raven Model S Performance against the Taycan Turbo S. Performance-wise, the two are comparable, with the Taycan Turbo S having a little bit more torque and the Model S Performance having a bit more horsepower. The two vehicles do have a gap in terms of price and range, as the Taycan Turbo S is far more expensive than the Model S while offering about 100 miles less range.
First off in the motoring media agency’s tests was a drag race, something that the Model S usually dominates. The Silicon Valley-made electric sedan did beat the Taycan in the first parts of the race, though in the final dash to the quarter-mile mark, the German-made EV was able to overtake the Tesla. Strangely, the Model S clocked a 0-60 mph time of 2.68 seconds and a quarter-mile time of 11.08 seconds in the quarter-mile run — times that are less impressive than informal tests conducted by regular Tesla owners.
The rest of the comparisons between the two vehicles covered the Model S Performance and Taycan Turbo S’ features and behavior on the road. Top Gear deputy editor Jack Rix noted that the Taycan drives better as it provides a more intimate connection with its driver, but the Model S is still the gold standard when it comes to convenience. Tesla’s vast Supercharger Network, coupled with V10’s entertainment features such as Tesla Theater, as well as the Model S’ large interior space and trunk capacity, make the sedan a great vehicle for long drives with passengers.
The Taycan, on the other hand, provides a far more basic experience when it comes to driving. It drives excellently in true Porsche tradition, much better than the Model S, but it does not offer much in the way of comfort. The rear seats are notably cramped compared to the Model S, and its frunk and trunk capacity are far less than those in the Silicon Valley-made vehicle. The Taycan’s software and entertainment features are also a step down from the Model S. It does have Apple CarPlay, which the Model S does not have, but its infotainment system is basic compared to Tesla’s.
Overall, Top Gear‘s conclusions are pretty perfect for the two cars. For customers who want a quick daily driver that’s comfortable, capable of hauling people and luggage on long trips while being supported by a robust fast-charging network, it’s hard to go wrong with the Model S Performance. For drivers who wish to have a real connection with their vehicle and have an almost emotional experience while driving, there is no reason to skip the Taycan Turbo S. The Tesla Model S Performance and the Porsche Taycan Turbo S are different cars for different people, and they are both excellent in doing what they aim to do.
Check out Top Gear‘s comparison of the Tesla Model S Performance and Porsche Taycan Turbo S in the video below.
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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.
Elon Musk escalated his monthslong feud with Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey this week, pledging that his own AI video tool will produce a competing version before the year is out. Responding to a fan-made, AI-generated clip of the ancient epic, Musk wrote on X, “Before this year ends, Grok Imagine will make a full-length movie of The Odyssey that is historically accurate and true to the art of Homer.”
In June, Musk quoted an xAI-shared trailer built entirely with Grok Imagine Video 1.5, a two-minute-plus reimagining of The Odyssey styled after a 1970s classical Hollywood epic, and predicted “full movies by the end of the year,” as Teslarati reported at the time. That trailer, built from 36 consistent shots by a single creator, was Musk’s proof of concept. This week’s pledge turns that prediction into a specific commitment, tied directly to Homer’s text rather than a generic demo.
Before this year ends, Grok Imagine will make a full-length movie of The Odyssey that is historically accurate and true to the art of Homer https://t.co/bVHzUmY9WN
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 22, 2026
When a fan separately proposed that Musk fund a live-action alternative, to “give Mel Gibson $100 million to film an Odyssey adaptation with painstakingly historically accurate ships, armour, weapons, and casting, with all dialogue taken straight from the original poem and delivered in Homeric Greek,” Musk replied with two words: “I’m down.”
The Grok Imagine pledge lands as the tool’s underlying infrastructure has changed hands. Grok is no longer a standalone product, it folded into SpaceXAI after SpaceX’s acquisition of xAI closed in February, meaning the compute behind any Odyssey production traces back to the same Colossus supercomputers now bundled into SpaceX’s pitch to investors. Musk has separately said SpaceX’s own engineering data is being fed into the next major Grok training run, a two trillion parameter model he’s called the “2T run.”
Whether Grok Imagine can sustain a feature length narrative, rather than a series of impressive individual shots, remains the open question.
Cybertruck
Tesla Mobile App gets a new feature that wrap fans are going to love
Tesla’s Summer Update removes the USB drive step from customizing your car’s digital wrap design.
Tesla’s latest 2026 Summer Update quietly closes out one of the more tedious steps in personalizing a Tesla’s digital appearance. Uploading a custom wrap design used to require a USB drive. Now it doesn’t.
The feature is listed in Tesla’s release notes as “Send Custom Wraps from Mobile App.” The company described it plainly: “Skip the USB drive and upload a custom wrap of your car from the mobile app. Instructions for creating a custom wrap here: github.com/teslamotors/custom-wraps.”
The digital wrap tool has been around since Tesla’s 2024 Holiday Update, when it launched for Cybertruck owners first, as Teslarati reported at the time. Getting a design onto the car meant formatting a USB drive, creating a folder named exactly “Wraps,” dropping in PNG files sized between 512×512 and 1024×1024 pixels and under 1 MB each, then plugging the drive in and applying the wrap through Toybox. Tesla expanded the tool to other models and renamed it from “Colorizer” to “Paint Shop” with the 2025 Holiday Update, while also adding license plate and window tint customization alongside the wraps.
Custom wraps via mobile app https://t.co/5OydZ26g9p pic.twitter.com/uexU0ZePxu
— Tesla (@Tesla) July 22, 2026
The latest Summer Update removes the USB step from that process. Owners will be able to pull a design from wherever they saved it, whether that’s a download from social media or something built from Tesla’s own GitHub templates, and push it to the car directly through the app.
Tesla reveals 2026 Summer Update with crazy fixes to Nav and more
It’s a small fix relative to the rest of this latest release, which also included expanded Grok voice commands, automatic navigation that learns regular routes, and self-driving stats inside the mobile app, all detailed in our rundown of the full Summer Update. The USB requirement was one of the more common complaints about Paint Shop since it launched. Tesla did not say when the wrap upload change would reach individual vehicles, only that the broader update is rolling out now in waves.
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