Autonomy+ Pricing Lock includes future improvements / updates free?

[mnewber1]

I am guessing no one here knows for sure, but if I purchase Autonomy+ for my VIN at $2,500 - will that protect me from inevitable price increases once more autonomy features come out?

I haven't followed Tesla, how did they handle this situation?

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[lefkonj]

The 2500 is for the life of the vehicle and tied to the VIN. The 49 a month is for your account for the month.

 

[BrianB]

Same question. What did Tesla do with the subscription pricing when they added driving assistance capability? EG, when they got to point to point drivers assistance that stops at red lights and makes turns?

After a couple days with Rivian enhanced driver assistance on local roads, I’m finding it not useful. I love it for the interstate, but off the interstate I’m having to take over for stoplights and for turns every minute or so. As much as I’d like to buy something like Tesla level driver assistance, Rivian’s $2500 is looking expensive for adaptive cruise control with lane keeping.

After testing a friend’s Tesla with point to point driver assistance, having it stop at lights and make turns, I don’t think I can get my wife to go with Rivian for her vehicle.

 

[dduffey]

It doesn't cost $2500 for adaptive cruise control and lane keep, that's free. Rivian has no automatic stop light or turn by turn control (yet), and neither does Tesla's Autopilot.

What you tried is Rivian Driver+ (free) which has none of these things. What you experienced in the Tesla is FSD for $8k, that would be similar to Rivian Autonomy+ for $2.5k (not Driver+ which is free).

To compare apples to apples Driver+ is like Tesla's Autopilot (not FSD) which is highway TACC and lane assist: https://www.tesla.com/support/autopilot. Tesla Autopilot also "fails" miserably on point to point local driving because both Rivian Driver+ and Tesla Autopilot are not intended to be used on local roads.

So your wife can't experience the Tesla FSD experience in Rivian, because it doesn't exist yet. Today you can only compare TACC and lane keep on highway driving. So more of a matter of time, if you need point to point local driving today, Tesla is the only option and it will be an $8k add on.

 

[TexasBob]

@mnewber1 to answer your specific question about how Tesla handled this, the TL : DR version is they lied and left their customers in the lurch and teh $8k they charged ended up being a horrible deal. The more detailed answer is:

• 2016 - launched HW2 with "all the hardware required to be fully autonomous." Charged $5k for "life of vehicle" EAP (on-ramp to off-ramp full highway autonomy) and $8k for robotaxi autonomy.
• 2017 - launch HW2.5 after it was clear that HW would not be sufficient. Charged $5k EAP / $8k for robotaxi autonomy.
• 2019 - realized HW2.5 could not do that, offered upgrade to everyone who purchases the full $8k FSD (to HW3), everyone else left in lurch.
• 2023 - launches HW4, while denying obsolescence of HW3 and claiming it was still fully capable. In Jan 2025, finally admitted HW3 would never achieve L3 or L4 autonomy.
• 2024 - quietly launches HW4.5 upgraded sensor suite to try to enable unsupervised autonomy. Effectively admits that the old HW4 will not be able to achieve L4
• 2025 - delays HW5 to 2027, still claiming that HW4 (really 4.5) can achieve L4 but rumor says the current "robotaxi" fleet is now using revised compute hardware.

Along the way the software stack has moved form rules-based, to end-to-end neural network, to the current NN plus reasoning layer (more similar to Waymo and Baidu). The company has not yet publicly acknowledged that HW4 will also be incapable of achieving the promised L4 autonomy but I cannot do it.

Tesla has, in its trade-in policies, recognized that there is little-to-no value in the $8,000 upgrades its customers bought. The market value for HW4 FSD is less than $1,000. The market value for earlier generations is $0 - $500. Tesla itself has not traditionally given any trade-in value bump for vehicles with lifetime FSD.

So what to learn from Tesla:

1. The HW and Software may never achieve the promise and the company will stop supporting it
   1. the current Rivian HW is very limited and will not move much beyond basic EAP
   2. the Gen 3 Rivian HW is comparable to the next generation Tesla AI 5 which will be released in 2027, the Gen 3 software approach is consistent with where Tesla is taking FSD 15, but it is less mature for now
2. The trade-in value of Autonomy+ is basically ZERO but if you are an optimist it may be $500
3. Data says that ~90% of Tesla owners do not buy FSD, they rent it on occasion (for example if they are going on a long road trip).
   1. Rivian is cheaper by a lot, but the payback at $50 a month is still more than four years of continuous use.
   2. Your money, your choice. I am at the "fool-me-twice, shame on me" stage of realization.

 

[JeffC]

I specifically asked about this at the San Francisco autonomy update, meet and greet. The answer from the engineer is that the $2,500 is for the life of the vehicle and transferable when sold. He said that all future updates will be included.

However, when I pressed him about whether they may just change the name when new functionality rolls out and charge extra for the expanded features, he admitted that he's just an engineer and doesn't have any insight into what the marketing /business folks will decide to do.

 

[NeedSumCoffee]

No it absolutely won’t protect you. New improvements and features will largely be hardware limited. So you’ll never get the newest updates/features unless you buy the newest model.

 

[Eury]

I specifically asked about this at the San Francisco autonomy update, meet and greet. The answer from the engineer is that the $2,500 is for the life of the vehicle and transferable when sold. He said that all future updates will be included.

However, when I pressed him about whether they may just change the name when new functionality rolls out and charge extra for the expanded features, he admitted that he's just an engineer and doesn't have any insight into what the marketing /business folks will decide to do.

Transferrable is a new thing I haven't read before. Everything I've read says that it is tied to the vehicle. I'd be much more likely to spend $2500 if it stayed with me when I upgrade to the next gen R1T at some point in the future.

 

[JeffC]

When I wrote "transferable" I meant "transferable to the new owner of the truck" - i.e. it stays with the vehicle. Sounds consistent with what you've read. The good news is that it should increase resale value. The bad news is that we'll probably pay more for the same option on future vehicles.

 

[zamazenta]

@mnewber1 to answer your specific question about how Tesla handled this, the TL : DR version is they lied and left their customers in the lurch and teh $8k they charged ended up being a horrible deal. The more detailed answer is:

• 2016 - launched HW2 with "all the hardware required to be fully autonomous." Charged $5k for "life of vehicle" EAP (on-ramp to off-ramp full highway autonomy) and $8k for robotaxi autonomy.
• 2017 - launch HW2.5 after it was clear that HW would not be sufficient. Charged $5k EAP / $8k for robotaxi autonomy.
• 2019 - realized HW2.5 could not do that, offered upgrade to everyone who purchases the full $8k FSD (to HW3), everyone else left in lurch.
• 2023 - launches HW4, while denying obsolescence of HW3 and claiming it was still fully capable. In Jan 2025, finally admitted HW3 would never achieve L3 or L4 autonomy.
• 2024 - quietly launches HW4.5 upgraded sensor suite to try to enable unsupervised autonomy. Effectively admits that the old HW4 will not be able to achieve L4
• 2025 - delays HW5 to 2027, still claiming that HW4 (really 4.5) can achieve L4 but rumor says the current "robotaxi" fleet is now using revised compute hardware.

Along the way the software stack has moved form rules-based, to end-to-end neural network, to the current NN plus reasoning layer (more similar to Waymo and Baidu). The company has not yet publicly acknowledged that HW4 will also be incapable of achieving the promised L4 autonomy but I cannot do it.

Tesla has, in its trade-in policies, recognized that there is little-to-no value in the $8,000 upgrades its customers bought. The market value for HW4 FSD is less than $1,000. The market value for earlier generations is $0 - $500. Tesla itself has not traditionally given any trade-in value bump for vehicles with lifetime FSD.

So what to learn from Tesla:

1. The HW and Software may never achieve the promise and the company will stop supporting it
   1. the current Rivian HW is very limited and will not move much beyond basic EAP
   2. the Gen 3 Rivian HW is comparable to the next generation Tesla AI 5 which will be released in 2027, the Gen 3 software approach is consistent with where Tesla is taking FSD 15, but it is less mature for now
2. The trade-in value of Autonomy+ is basically ZERO but if you are an optimist it may be $500
3. Data says that ~90% of Tesla owners do not buy FSD, they rent it on occasion (for example if they are going on a long road trip).
   1. Rivian is cheaper by a lot, but the payback at $50 a month is still more than four years of continuous use.
   2. Your money, your choice. I am at the "fool-me-twice, shame on me" stage of realization.

Let's see how it residualizes. Most people lease so the actual effective price may be far lower than $49.

 

[Skeldog99]

Looks like the price went up

 

[zamazenta]

Looks like the price went up

I think this is Canadian pricing.

 

[Skeldog99]

I think this is Canadian pricing.

How is the hell did I get to CA site. Thank you

 

[zamazenta]

I am glad that Rivian is a car and robot company and not an SEO one. Their SEO game is poor.

How is the hell did I get to CA site. Thank you

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