While Tesla’s futuristic new Cybercab was truly the highlight of its recent ‘We, Robot ‘event, Tesla did have some other tricks up its sleeve—like the Robovan. But even beyond that, they had plenty of other secrets they showed off but didn’t announce during its keynote.
One of the largest unannounced features is Unsupervised FSD and FSD V13. So, let’s look at what Tesla’s AI team has been cooking up in the background.
Unsupervised FSD
Elon Musk confirmed at the We, Robot keynote that Unsupervised FSD was coming. And while we know it’s been the pie in the sky for Tesla to achieve for quite a while, it was something else to see it in action at the event. Musk even provided dates and locations.
The initial locations in which Unsupervised FSD will be available will be Texas and California sometime in 2025. Additionally, that will be initially limited to Model 3 and Model Y vehicles, with it rolling out to Cybertruck and Models S and X shortly afterward. The Cybercab isn’t expected to hit production until late 2026.
Many states follow California, New York, and Texas’ direction on legislation – and for the tech sector – it's primarily focused on following California. Interestingly enough, this also includes Canada, which generally follows along once New York approves something (due to the closeness and population that crosses the border every day).
So, we could be looking at Unsupervised FSD arriving throughout North America faster than most people think. It is conceivable that by the end of 2025, Unsupervised FSD will be available in multiple US States.
FSD V13
If you use FSD or have been following it, you know that it's unable to reverse the vehicle in its current state. Currently, it can only reverse when using Actually Smart Summon, but not when using FSD on regular roads.
One of the goals for Tesla’s AI Roadmap is to bring FSD V13, with Park, Unpark, and Reverse being some of the key features. Apparently, the Robotaxis (and specifically - a Model Y Robotaxi) at We, Robot was capable of reversing and conducting 3-point turns. This video below from AI DRIVR on X shows the vehicle reversing at the event.
FSD V13's ability to reverse is an excellent example of the team’s progress on the next batch of features. Tesla also demonstrated the Unpark feature at the event—when the Robotaxi pulled up at the curb, it smoothly shifted out of park and proceeded. We predicted we’d see these features come to life at the Robotaxi event, and apparently, the prediction was right.
We’re excited to see what’s coming next. FSD V12.5.6 has been on early-access tester vehicles for about a week now, and FSD V12.5.5 has already been released to most Cybertrucks on the road.
It seems that the next major version that goes out wide may be FSD V13, with a litany of new features. Of course, the ability to reverse is just one of the biggest features - we’re looking forward to Banish Autopark and Autopark becoming smoothly integrated into FSD as well.
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Tesla has greatly improved the smoothness of FSD visualizations in FSD V12.5.6 by fixing a 4-year-old bug. The fact that Tesla knew about this bug suggests it may have been difficult or time-consuming to fix, and they preferred to dedicate resources toward new features, but now that it’s fixed, users with FSD 12.5.6 are reporting much smoother visualizations.
Bug Fix
While not detailed, this bug that plagued the rendering pipeline had been an issue in Tesla AI’s backside for four years, according to Ashok Elluswamy, the head of Autopilot and AI at Tesla. Funnily enough, Andrej Karpathy, the previous Director of AI at Tesla, replied, “omg.”
Because we fixed a four year old bug in the rendering!
It sounds like Andrej knew about the bug in the rendering pipeline during his Tesla days but was also unable to fix it, likely due to other priorities. We’re glad to see Tesla is going back and working on squeezing the most performance from its hardware—in any capacity.
Smoother Visualizations Video
The updated visualizations are considerably smoother after the bug fix. What’s immediately noticeable is less jitter in vehicles around you and vehicles starting to show up from further away. This is a fantastic update, as it helps to provide better information for the supervising driver about what FSD sees around the vehicle.
We’re looking forward to what else Tesla can do to optimize and make its visualizations look even better. In the meantime, check out these two videos below that include the improved FSD visualizations.
We first noticed FSD 12.5.6 on update 2024.32.30 on October 8th, right before the Robotaxi event. FSD 12.5.6 is more than just bug fixes; it includes major changes such as new FSD profiles, improved lane changes, and changes to Auto Set Speed. However, it's still only available for early-access customers. While Tesla’s AI team was likely focused on the event and has now earned a well-deserved rest, it appears that this FSD release may see another revision before it is expanded to regular customers.
Tesla brought out something not many expected at its Robotaxi event—the Robovan. It’s a fairly large vehicle, and just like the Cybercab, it's fully autonomous: there is no driver’s seat, steering wheel, or pedals.
In its default configuration, the Robovan can seat up to 20 passengers, and Tesla has already envisioned multiple other uses for it, including package delivery, RVing, and others.
So, get your futuristic bus pass ready, and let’s take a ride to see what the Robovan is bringing!
Exterior
The Robovan takes Art Deco – the classic 1950’s style, to the future. It's a spectacular showcase vehicle and doesn’t look like anything you would ever expect to be pulling up to the curb to pick people up. The Robovan looks almost like a train or tram engine and has a sleek front with no visible windshield, and the wheels are tucked underneath the body, where you can’t see them.
It’s a painted aluminum shell, just like the Cybercab, but also mixed with glass. The glass is tinted dark from the exterior – so you can’t really see inside, affording a fairly high level of privacy to those in the vehicle.
One of the most interesting things about the Robovan is its super low ground clearance. It looked like it was floating mere inches off the ground when it pulled up at, We, Robot. According to Elon Musk, this super-low clearance is achieved by having an automatic load-levelling suspension that raises and lowers based on road conditions.
This means that the Robovan will be able to traverse obstacles such as speedbumps and potholes – and that this feature is likely to make its way to FSD sometime in the future. While FSD can already (mostly) correctly identify speedbumps, it cannot identify other obstacles on the road, such as debris or potholes. Having FSD be able to identify and avoid potholes to smoothen the ride would help to improve the comfort of the experience.
The Art-Deco aesthetic is back!
Not a Tesla App
Interior
The interior is quite spacious – it's able to seat up to 20 passengers in its maximum configuration. In a bus or passenger van format, the Robovan could easily be used to replace short-route buses or, with increased frequency – compete against a full-size 40-seat bus.
Tesla also intends for the Robovan to be used in a delivery capability, as it will be available to order in a format without any seating, which provides a fairly spacious interior for package handling on last-mile and local routes. It could conceivably be a competent competitor to large vans once FSD can reach a fully autonomous state.
Beyond that, Tesla also sees the Robovan being fitted for things such as Tesla Service, RVing, or any other use for vehicles with large interior spaces. There’s a lot of open space on the interior, so we’re looking forward to seeing what ideas people come up with. Maybe a mobile diner?
As per Elon, it is very easy to see out of the Robovan, as the dark windows seem to be one-way tints. Some interior videos, like the one below, also show just how much visibility is afforded to passengers. And those big glass doors? They slide open. It seems that the Robovan has the same set of doors on both sides, but all the pictures showing it off have it only opening on the street side (right side), with right-hand-drive here in North America.
Back to the passenger configuration – the interior showed off was in a clean and classic Tesla white, with lots of interior lighting and HVAC on the interior ceiling. There is a bench seat at either end of the cabin, and then a pair and single seat with an aisle dividing them. The configuration shown was symmetrical and only seated 14.
The van also features a large screen at either end of the cabin, which could be used for entertainment or route information. Tesla didn’t provide any detail on these displays, but they appear fairly large.
Beyond the delivery capacity, the Cybervan also has storage at the rear and front – both fascia plates slide upwards to expose additional storage room – essentially a bus-sized frunk and trunk.
The frunk, oddly enough, looks like it has far more capacity than the trunk in this case – with about 10 suitcases in the open frunk, while the open trunk only looks like it has capacity for 2 suitcases.
The frunk storage. Very spacious!
Not a Tesla App
The trunk storage. It seems oddly small.
Not a Tesla App
Release Date
There’s no date or pricing for the Robovan just yet. While it hails back to the 1950’s, it may be further out in the future than Tesla made it seem. Tesla didn’t share a price point or time frame for when the van would become available.
Oh, and Elon mentioned that it's called the ruh-BO-vahn. Like Suburban, but Robovan. We’d love to see what everyone thinks about its name. Let us know how you think it's pronounced.
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