A Look at the Tesla Cybertruck's Lightbar and Its Software Features

By Karan Singh
Not a Tesla App

The first few Cybertruck Off-Road Lightbars have now been installed on customer vehicles, and we finally got a better look at their capabilities. They’ve got a bevy of unique software options – so let’s take a look at what you get for going with an OEM Tesla Off-Road Lightbar.

Lightbar Software Options

Installing the Off-Road Lightbar adds a new category to the vehicle’s settings. You can navigate to Controls > Outlets and Mods and see a new option for Light Bar. Pressing it will enable the Lightbar, as well as show additional controls in the Outlets and Mods menu.

Once you turn it on, you’ll see an image of the top of your Cybertruck with the Lightbar installed. Below, the option to turn on the Ditch Lights, Flood Lights, or Both will be available. You’ll also be able to adjust the overall brightness of the Off-Road Lightbar.

The new options that appear after you enable the Off-Road Lightbar
The new options that appear after you enable the Off-Road Lightbar
Beastew / CybertruckOwnersClub

Ditch Lights and Flood Lights

The three options give you additional control over the spread of light in the Lightbar. This can be extremely beneficial for off-roading, as it can help you prevent glare or widen your field of vision.

The Off-Road Lightbar Ditch Lights setting lights up the edges of the lightbar toward the edges of the road where there could be ditches on either side of a one-way off-road path. This can be extremely helpful for keeping the vehicle centered when you’re out and about but don’t want to cover everything in a bright glare of light.

The Floodlight setting will do the opposite – covering the front path of the vehicle with light instead. It can provide a considerable amount of light out to quite a distance – we’re expecting 1,500 feet forward or more. More to follow once we get some confirmation on its specs and use.

You can also choose to enable all of the Lightbar lights, essentially enabling the Ditch Lights and Flood Lights at the same time for maximum coverage. Whichever option you choose, you’ll be able to adjust the brightness of the lights.

Currently, the Off-Road Lightbar doesn’t appear to support any adaptive functionality, such as adjusting brightness or enabling/disabling certain lights based on the vehicle’s surroundings or nearby vehicles. This will likely stay this way—due to its brightness, the Off-Road Lightbar isn’t legal for use on roads throughout North America.

Third Party Lightbars

Currently, while there are about 3-4 different third-party lightbars for the Cybertruck available, none of them get to use this new OEM software interface to manage to directionality or intensity of the lights. We’re hoping that Tesla opens up the API and interface for more modding and functionality in the future.

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Tesla Adds Options to Actually Smart Summon, Supports Sunglasses in FSD 12.5.4

By Karan Singh
@roger_kappler

Yesterday, Tesla released FSD v12.5.4 with update 2024.27.25. The update includes improvements to Tesla’s vision-based attention monitoring and Actually Smart Summon. This update initially rolled out to early-access testers yesterday, but since then, it has rolled out to more users, with the latest wave coming just moments ago.

This update includes more than just FSD bug fixes, so let’s take a look at what’s changed.

Actually Smart Summon Improvements

Actually Smart Summon is now officially known as Actually Smart Summon (Supervised), as per Tesla’s latest video on X (see it below). When Tesla released Actually Smart Summon, it added support for Tesla Vision, live camera feeds, and additional options.

Range Increase: Now, Tesla has brought even more improvements to the table. To start, Actually Smart Summon has had its range increased by about 50 feet – for a total range of 279 feet, or 85 meters. This also comes alongside a few new features, including completion and abort sounds.

Sounds: You can now choose to have the vehicle play a sound when Summon completes successfully. You can select from several – including Applause, “Ta Da,” “Ba-dum Tiss,” and Random. For now, unlike with your vehicle lock sounds, you can’t customize it just yet. To play summon sounds, your vehicle will need a functional Pedestrian Warning Speaker, or PWS. The abort sound only has one option right now – Emissions. Tesla’s engineers love their fart jokes.

Sadly, Actually Smart Summon is also missing a couple of features—HomeLink compatibility isn’t available for Summon, and Tesla says it's coming soon. The Side Clearance option, which previously let you choose between Standard and Tight clearances, is also gone.

For now, you’re also required to use Continuous Press to summon your vehicle. Usage without Continuous Press is coming soon though.

Actually Smart Summon Requirements

This new version of Actually Smart Summon also comes with some interesting requirements. Just like with previous versions, the doors, tailgate, and frunk must be closed before the vehicle is moved. However, the vehicle must also have a TPMS PSI of 34 or higher (on a Model 3 – this is likely the optimal PSI for your vehicle’s standard tires).

You’ll also need a Tesla app update – v4.37.0 is now the required version, which is currently available for iOS, but not available yet in the Google Play store..

The tire pressure requirement could be a big change, especially as many people who use aftermarket winter tire sets don’t run TPMS units. If you don’t have TPMS sensors in your tires, you may not be able to use Actually Smart Summon at all.

Update 2024.27.25

FSD Supervised 12.5.4
Installed on 9.7% of fleet
319 Installs today
Last updated: Sep 27, 1:30 am UTC

Vision-Based Attention Monitoring Improvements

The second major update with 2024.27.25 is for Vision-Based Attention Monitoring. Vision monitoring allows FSD to function without users constantly having their hands on the wheel. Instead, it monitors the driver’s eyes to see if they’re paying attention.

Previously, this was limited to users not wearing sunglasses, although Tesla said the functionality to support sunglasses use would be coming soon. With this update, users can wear sunglasses and enjoy no-nag Full Self Driving.

This is a major update, as one of the biggest consternations with FSD V12.5 was that while vision monitoring was fantastic, it wasn’t always available to the driver if they wanted to wear sunglasses.

An undocumented change for vision monitoring is that if it detects a device—such as a cellphone—in your hand, it will say “Attention Monitoring unavailable—Detected device in hand.” This popped up when the user, @WifeDirtyTesla, leaned her head on her hand while her elbow was on the center console. It may have appeared that she was holding a phone up to her head.

That’s definitely an interesting little undocumented change, and we’re glad to see that Tesla is working to improve user safety for FSD (Supervised).

The new
The new
DirtyTesla

Tesla Update 2024.26 - All the Undocumented Changes

By Not a Tesla App Staff
Not a Tesla App

As with all Tesla updates, a slew of smaller features often go undocumented. If you’re anything like us, you love to know all the little changes in a release.

Below are all of the changes that were included in Tesla update 2024.26 but didn’t make it to the official release notes.

Show Next Preconditioning / Charging Event

If you have scheduled a preconditioning or charging event, Tesla will now show you the next event that will take place.

An event to precondition the cabin will appear at the climate screen's top right corner. If you have set a charging schedule, your next charge time will now show up in the charging menu under Controls > Charging.

Hide Music Services Per Profile

Not a Tesla App

When you hide a music service, the music service/app will no longer show up in the all apps menu. Music search will also not display results for services you have hidden.

With this update, Tesla now saves hidden music services per driver profile. This allows a driver to hide any services they don't use while making them accessible to other drivers.

You can hide specific music apps/services by tapping the audio settings icon in the music player and choosing services.

Audio Balance Per Profile

Not a Tesla App

Your audio balance that controls how much sound goes to each speaker is now saved per driver profile. This allows each driver to save their own preferred listening preferences.

You can set your audio system's balance by tapping on the audio levels icon in the music player and choosing Balance.

Service Center Tips

Not a Tesla App

If you have a Service Center appointment, your Tesla will now display tips on screen when you arrive at your appointment.

The tips will remind you that you can see your service appointment status and review your summary in the Tesla app.

Reduce Fan Speed Hint

Not a Tesla App

As Tesla points out in 'Other Updates,' they have improved the the climate menu by simplifying the screen by removing certain options when they're unavailable and reshuffling buttons around to make them easier to access for drivers and passengers.

Reduce Fan Speed Option

Not a Tesla App

When in Auto, the fan speed may now automatically lower to reduce the sound of ambient noise during a phone call.

This feature can temporarily be turned off under Controls > Bluetooth if you need to prioritize cooling or heating the cabin.

New Key Required Screen

Not a Tesla App

This update introduces a new key-required screen when you try to perform an action that requires a key and there isn't one nearby.

Improved Front Camera Clarity

Not a Tesla App

Video post-processing is now applied to the front camera for hardware 3-based vehicles.

Improved camera clarity was first noticed in update 2023.32 when Tesla began applying post-processing filters to achieve sharper and more natural-looking video to the vehicle's repeater and rear cameras.

With this update, Tesla appears to now be applying the same techniques to the vehicle's front-facing cameras.

Traffic-Aware Cruise Control Chime

Not a Tesla App

In Tesla update 2021.40, Tesla added the option to receive an audio alert when Traffic-Aware Cruise Control is enabled.

This was an option that could be turned on or off under Controls > Autopilot > Traffic-Aware Cruise Control Chime, however, with update 2024.26, this option has now been removed. With this update, TACC will always chime when the feature is engaged or disengaged.

New Ambient Lighting Options

Greggertruck/X

There are now additional options for your vehicle's ambient lighting. Under Controls > Lights, you can now control the brightness of the vehicle's accent lights. In addition, you can choose for the accent lights to only turn on when the vehicle detects dim conditions outside.

If you’ve seen any other changes in update 2024.26, be sure to let us know.

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