Wait what’s wrong with Tesla products? In my experience they are the most user friendly cars ever built. I never have to think about it — it locks, unlocks, and turns on and off without intervention, it opens and closes my garage door without intervention, it “has a full tank” for less money, and a conditioned cabin every morning (haven’t been to a gas station in 5 years), and I never need to think about oil, belts, or rotors needing attention. Autopilot and FSD significantly reduce my workload in the drivers seat. It’s not perfect, and Elon Musk is a total asshat, but I can’t think of a more revolutionary user experience when you consider what the other automaker’s offer. I can’t stress enough how easy my Tesla makes the act of transportation.
So why the hate? If for the ties to Elon, I get that and am fully on board, but I feel like most of you have never actually experienced the product?
Edit: Y’all have failed to convince me that Tesla ownership is equivalent to printer ownership.
Doesn’t most of this stuffapply to basically all EVs?
I have done zero research and I know these dealbreakers:
- Microtransactions for a car (e.g. autopilot features, features already built-in, but subscription locked)
- A tablet on the dashboard is a UX nightmare, since it can’t be used blindly (you should focus on the road, please).
- The futuristic retracting doorhandles are a nightmare for firefighters, since you can’t easily pull people out of crashed Teslas.
- The whole cybertruck debacle
- Wasn’t the estimated reach that the car supposedly had explicitly programmed to overestimate?
Edit: aparrently, the doors are very hard/mostly impossible to open when the power goes out.
I definitely do not want to defend Tesla here, but other manufacturers are unfortunately following the same path. It’s ridiculous. BMW is putting most of the extra features into the car on a technical level, but lock them down so you can’t use them unless you pay a fucking monthly subscription for e.g. the seat heaters. What the actual fuck has gotten into manufacturers?
And the touchscreens? I’m soooo glad that the German equivalent to road and safety announced that the safety rating of cars will go down in the future if there are no haptic controls. I definitely like a sleek appearance, but form follows function for fucks sake.
/rant
My mom has one, and the door handles are so awkward, I really don’t think I’ll ever get used to them. From the inside, it’s easy enough, but it’s also just a button, with no physical unlatching mechanism, and the window has to go down slightly when the door opens, so I would not want to be in there if it lost power.
She does generally like the thing though.
There’s a separate handle on the inside to be used when there’s no power. It’s to be used in an emergency, and works without the window going down
Yeah this has happened to me once, so I think I just defrost the car ahead of time now. Don’t recall what I did to get in that one time — probably just scraped some ice, waited a minute for it to defrost, or used a different door? It’s a con, but carries very little weight on my pro/con list. I like the frameless look and would make the same tradeoffs as Tesla did. It’s that insignificant of a problem IME
The high end Tesla’s have the stupid doorhandles. The low end (Y and 3) have manual door handles, they’re just recessed so you have to press the thick part in to present the handle. In practice it’s a non issue unless things that are slightly different stun lock you into inaction.
The subscription thing is overblown in my opinion.
Autopilot is the big one where it matters. You get TACC and Auto steer on freeways for free.
Navigation on autopilot, auto Lane change, auto park, summoning the car and moving the car through the app are all locked behind an Enhanced Autopilot option you can buy.
FSD unlocks austosteer on city streets and auto stoping/going at stop signs and traffic lights. You can buy it outright or rent it on a month to month basis, and switch between the three modes at will.
Most non-autopilot features are free but require internet, so you can either pay Tesla ~$9 a month for unlimited car data, or connect your car to wifi (hotspot while driving).
I think only careoke, live traffic / satellite view on maps, and remotely interfacing with the car (viewing the car cameras through the app, etc) actually require a subscription to premium connectivity, but I’m not 100% sure those don’t work over WiFi.
oh, there’s also a one-time performance package you can buy if you want to destroy your tires even faster than normal.
And I won’t defend the goofy Cybertruck (I would drive one of it had launched for at the promised price and range), but how does that existing count as a mark against owning an EV, or even a Tesla?
The subscription thing is overblown in my opinion.
I’d like to own my vehicle, please. Without the manufacturer requiring a backdoor into it, basically making repairs impossible.
but how does that existing count as a mark against owning an EV, or even a Tesla?
It doesn’t count as a mark against owning a Tesla. It’s just an example that you can’t assume that potentially good designs by Tesla engineers could be overturned by a billionaire manchild. And I never said anything against EVs in general.
I got the unlocked speed and I’m still on original tires at 28,000 miles. Still have plenty of wear before they need replacing too.
The problem is not stomping on the accelerator, since the car has very effective traction control. The problem is cornering. These are very heavy cars, and cornering is rough on tires even on a light car. So have a bit of fun off the line if it’s safe to do so, then corner like a grandma and your tires should last reasonably well.
- Yes, cars being built today are copying features from Teslas. New ones still don’t match my UX from a 5 year old car.
- Micro-transactions are so very stupid, and I’m not saying Tesla doesn’t have any (think I paid a one-time fee to increase the 0-60 performance after Tesla improved the tuning of the same motors for another product), but IMO there is nothing being sold that a reasonable person would expect to have come with the initial purchase. Y’all make it sound like it needs a constant internet connection to check if you’re subscribed to Tesla+ in order to put the car in drive or something.
- The TESLA tablet is pretty incredible. Other vehicles tablets are not. I will die on this hill (should have happened by now according to the many people who haven’t used it). I can easily travel with zero screen taps or glances due to the amount of things that have been considered and automated. If I do need to change something, I DON’T need to look DOWN near the cup holders or try to decipher a couple stalks. I have zero disdain or concern for the lack of physical buttons. I realize that my generation may have some biases in this regard.
- The door handles are different and require a few seconds to figure out the first time, sure, but I’m not concerned. Firefighters are experienced and resourceful and the Tesla has a higher safety rating than other vehicles.
- Cybertruck pedal design flaw is horrible. It’ll be fixed before it causes further injury. The news of this is not enough to make me think I should be looking at other manufacturers yet (have you seen the flaws they produce?).
- Oh right forgot about that range SW. I do count that against them. Luckily for me and most other Tesla drivers, it didn’t make a difference due our ability to wake up to full range and access the really good routing and supercharging network. But yeah, glad it was caught.
- There are backup door handles that require no power. They are intuitive (most first timers use it instead of the electronic ones by accident).
Was gonna reply to your points but I’m not gonna do the research for you lol
Please tell me, how a door that doesn’t open if the power goes out is a good idea?
I know that you can manually open it if you rip out some speaker grills and pull at a hidden lever. But try to remember that in an accident where you accidently drove into a pond, because you didn’t realize the car was in reverse because a touchscreen has no haptic feedback of the state the car is in.
It’s honestly really hard to distinguish genuine criticism of the product from rabid Elon-hate on the internet. He’s an ass, and I’ve read what seem like real complaints about Teslas, but the internet tends to lose all rationality when it hates someone, so I try to take anything I read with a grain of salt.
Yeah man. People love to bash Elon and rightfully so. I live in Southern California, I drive a Tesla and a lot of my friends do also. I used to travel a lot for work, and would regularly rent nice cars for weeks on end. My Tesla is the car I’ve enjoyed most ever, and it’s not really even close.
Yeah it has problems. But what car doesn’t? Nothing is perfect. But for me, the features that Teslas have check all the boxes in a really novel and enjoyable way.
This sounds a lot like my experience with public transport. Fuck am I glad I don’t live in the US.
Uh, lol:
Grandpa can turn cruise control on in any 20 year old car and take a nap, but everyone’s fine with that. Meanwhile Tesla issues a software update to marginally improve their camera and torque based driver monitoring system that can literally tell if you’re not looking at the road, and everyone loses their minds.
JD power is paid for those ‘reports’ by the auto companies.
Toyota blatantly disregarded complaints about unintended acceleration but they’re still considered great cars. https://www.autosafety.org/major-recalls-toyota-sudden-acceleration/
I get the Musk hate, but honestly his attachment to the company is probably the worst part of Tesla.
And the doors not closing because of poor build quality? Or the doors needing power to unlock (unless you reach under the seat? Or the touchscreen needed to reverse?
Literally no other cars have these problems. Are you going to try to explain away each one? You’ll be here all day.
That just sounds like a shitload of expensive stuff to go wrong. I want my car to be as minimally computerized as possible. I can set the AC, press the garage door button, and drive myself thanks.
Tesla maintenance costs consist of washer fluid and tires, essentially. That “minimally computerized” car you’re talking about costs significantly more to maintain its ability to transport the same amount. I know because I also have experience with ICE cars and have seen my transportation budget get cut in half over the 5 years I’ve owned this Tesla. Automating routine tasks isn’t required, but it’s really really nice.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/22/tesla-lowest-maintenance-repair-cost-any-brand/
If the company was owned by a less controversial character people would not hate Teslas as much as they do. Now the logic for the most part is that hate comes first and then they look for justification after.
Are there issues with Teslas? Yeah, just like with every other car out there.
Is it still user-friendly if you need to exit in an emergency, like a fire?
It’s 100% the car I’d choose to escape from in a fire emergency — there’s nothing wrong with the doors or handles, and there’s less risk of me dying by explosion because the fire has no gas tank to spread to.
Gas doesn’t explode, that’s just in movies. It does burn though, just like batteries. Not a case for gas cars over EVs, but Tesla and their retracting door handles, or handles that don’t work without power (like from a fire), are definitely reasons why I wouldn’t choose Tesla over another EV.
