Elon Musk admits that millions of Tesla vehicles won’t get unsupervised FSD

Tesla’s Hardware 3 Limitations

During Tesla’s Q1 2026 earnings call, CEO Elon Musk acknowledged that Tesla vehicles built with the company’s Hardware 3 (HW3) computers are incapable of supporting unsupervised Full Self-Driving (FSD) technology. According to Musk, around 4 million Teslas use HW3, leaving a significant number of owners—many of whom paid for the promise of FSD—without access to the autonomous driving experience Musk had previously promoted, unless their vehicles are upgraded.

Why HW3 Can’t Support Unsupervised FSD

Musk explained that the HW3 system simply doesn’t have the technical capacity needed for truly unsupervised FSD. Specifically, HW3 offers only a fraction of the memory bandwidth compared to the newer Hardware 4 (HW4). This bandwidth is crucial for autonomous operations, making HW3 insufficient for full autonomy without driver supervision.

Upgrade Options and Next Steps

For customers who have already purchased FSD, Tesla plans to offer discounted trade-ins for cars featuring the new AI4 (HW4) hardware. An upgrade option will also be available, which includes replacing both the computer and cameras. To streamline this process, Tesla intends to open specialized microfactories in major cities, as relying solely on standard service centers would be too slow and inefficient.

Musk suggested that, in time, upgrading all HW3 vehicles to HW4 will make sense, enabling them to join Tesla’s future robotaxi fleet and access unsupervised FSD capabilities.

For more details, you can read the original article at The Verge.