For Elon Musk, a $25,000 Tesla that is not fully autonomous would be “ridiculous”

Following the publication of Tesla's results for the third quarter of 2024, better than at the start of the year, Elon Musk held a traditional question and answer session with investors. The opportunity to clarify the manufacturer's plans, particularly regarding its future entry-level vehicles, but we come away at least as confused as we were before.

As a reminder, Elon Musk has promised since 2018 an entry-level model selling for around $25,000, nicknamed Model 2 by the press. However, we learned at the beginning of the year that Tesla had abandoned this project, retaining only the plans for a model dedicated to autonomous driving.

Elon Musk gets confused over the prices of his next electric cars

Now for Elon Musk to produce a $25,000 Tesla that isn't fully autonomous “would be ridiculous. It would go completely against what we believe”he told investors. He then added that the Cybercab autonomous taxi, promised for 2026, would be sold at this price of $25,000. However, earlier in the discussion, he had indicated that this Robotaxi would cost less than $30,000, as had already been announced, but taking into account government aid. Nothing to do with a price of $25,000, then.

Furthermore, if Elon Musk believes that he would be “ridiculous” to produce a $25,000 Tesla that is not fully autonomous, he nevertheless confirmed that electric cars cheaper than the Model 3 and Model Y were indeed in the pipeline, with a steering wheel and pedals. These models, this time promised for the first half of 2025, will take over part of the architecture of the Model 3 and Model Y and will therefore not allow such a significant reduction in costs. If he would “ridiculous” to offer a model with a steering wheel at a price of $25,000, identical to that of the Cybercab, or perhaps not elsewhere, how can we describe the idea of ​​producing more expensive models, but still with a steering wheel? A completely ridiculous idea? Unbelievably ridiculous?

Or perhaps Tesla is aware that the Cybercab is unlikely to be ready for large-scale commercialization in 2026 and that more accessible models are needed for its near-term development. For the moment, we do not know to what extent they will be similar to the Model 3 and Model Y, but this decision clearly shows that Tesla still wants to increase its sales volumes with cars equipped with a steering wheel and pedals, despite its communication focused on fully autonomous driving which is still long overdue.