According to Electrek, Tesla, which famously doesn’t have a public relations department and doesn’t spend money on advertising, is now looking to change its referral program rewards again, removing the reward of a thousand miles of free Supercharging for people who refer new customers.
I had a thousand miles of free Supercharging because I used the referral code of a cousin when I bought my Tesla. I bought it during the pandemic so I wasn’t going anywhere. I went ahead and supercharged a few times just to see what Supercharging was like. Since my free Supercharging miles expired six months after I bought my car, it’s all gone now even though I used only about two hundred miles of free Supercharging.
It’s certainly true that some people got lots of free Supercharging because they had a YouTube channel with Tesla-themed videos so lots of people used their link when they bought their Tesla. Tesla says it has spent twenty-three million dollars in the last quarter alone on free Supercharging rewards. Tesla relies on owners, and YouTubers to do their advertising for them. And that advertising must be working since Tesla seems to be able to sell as many cars as they can make. I’m seeing Teslas everywhere I drive these days.
According to the article in Electrek, they’re going to stop awarding miles to people whose referral code was used. In fact, they’re going to stop using referral codes entirely. That will prevent some people from getting large rewards because their referral code was attached to their YouTube videos. Instead, they’re going to use the Tesla app to link potential Tesla buyers to current owners who are willing to give test drives. If the potential buyer who took a test drive becomes an actual buyer, the person who gave the test drive will get rewarded. The article doesn’t say what, exactly, the reward will be.
So, thinking about this new situation, it seems like Tesla wants to reduce the number of test drives at the Tesla stores. There was a time when Elon Musk wanted to eliminate the stores entirely, but cooler heads convinced him that people want test drives, and test drives lead to sales. It looks to me like he’s trying again to reduce his expenditures for salespersons. So what does that mean for us, the current Tesla owners?
I suspect that everything will depend on the reward. Do I want to spend time giving test drives to strangers in my personal car? Not really, unless the reward is interesting. Let’s face it, 1,000 miles of free Supercharging would cost about forty-two dollars. And, if that was the reward for making a sale, you’d get it only when you actually made a sale. You might need to take three or four people on test drives, maybe more than that, in order to make a sale. Let’s say it’s four test drives per sale. Each test drive would last around a half-hour. So that’s two hours work to earn 1,000 miles of Supercharging, around forty-two dollars, or $21 an hour. That sounds like a lot if you’re an unemployed person, but it’s not much if you’re a person who can afford a Tesla Model 3 or Model Y. It’s peanuts if you’re a person who can afford a Tesla Model S or Model X, and it’s inconsequential if you’re a person who can afford a Tesla Roadster.
And why does Elon Musk want to do this? He wants to sell cars without spending much money on the sales process. Tesla makes great cars, but I don’t think they’re going to sell themselves. I have to hesitate before I tell someone as successful as Elon Musk how to run his business. I’m not as smart as he is. But I suspect that the reward for making a sale will have to be more interesting than a thousand miles of free Supercharging. So far, the reward is unspecified. Stay tuned, though. We should find out more soon.
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Tesla has been quietly building something pretty unique on the streets of Hollywood—and we’ve been keeping a close eye on it. That’s right: the long-anticipated Tesla Hollywood Drive-In, Diner, and Supercharger is shaping up to be one of the most creative approaches to EV charging yet.
But this isn’t your average Supercharger site. It features a retro-futuristic, 24-hour diner and an outdoor movie theater, blending the charm of the 1980s with the tech-forward vibe of the 2020s.
Tesla hacker Greentheonly managed to spot some new evidence of changes within Tesla’s 2025.8.6 software build, which includes a new modal for “Charger Diner Controls”. While there isn’t anything to activate this new modal just yet, it is an indication of how Tesla intends to integrate the experience right into each and every Tesla.
The text in the modal reads: “Plug in, place your order, recharge” - which means that once you arrive and are plugged in, you’ll be able to place your order - and likely pay through Tesla’s payment system. It seems like this will all be done through either the Tesla app or the vehicle’s tocuh screen. No need to fumble with a separate app or pull out your wallet.
This is definitely a level of integration you just can’t have anywhere else - and just like any other Supercharger site, the Tesla Diner will appear as a suggested site for charging when you’re navigating or looking around the Hollywood area.
This is our best look yet at the two 45-foot LED screens at @Tesla's upcoming Hollywood diner and Supercharger.
We can also see the second Supercharger lot on the left with solar canopies. This will be one of the largest Supercharging spots in North America. pic.twitter.com/aWUe67M5vw
Those two absolutely gigantic 45-foot LED screens have now been turned on for the first time, meaning that Tesla is likely close to opening the Supercharger site. The screens were spotted displaying some test patterns, as well as some Tesla-themed content. It really brings the construction site to life - and it's the clearest sign that the Diner is well on its way to completion.
We’re hoping that this first Tesla Diner sees plenty of success - and that Tesla begins opening more of these types of facilities throughout North America, and eventually globally. Given Tesla’s penchant for unique Superchargers, we imagine this could truly be the case one day.
As Tesla continues to push the capabilities of its hardware as it prepares for autonomy with FSD Unsupervised, there has been a distinct divergence in features between HW4-equipped vehicles on FSD V13, and HW3-equipped vehicles on FSD V12.6.
There are definitely reasons for this, and Tesla hacker Greentheonly, over on X, went into great detail on some of the reasons why this divergence has continued and is likely to continue.
If you’re interested in some background, we recommend the following articles. Although they’re not necessary, you may enjoy reading them before diving right in if you enjoy this topic.
Back in the summer of 2024, we reported that Tesla’s HW4 had yet to reach its full potential, and that HW3 still had some compute to work with. However, FSD has undergone a rapid evolution - there are now fundamental differences driven by the hardware capabilities and sheer scale of the latest builds of FSD.
FSD V13’s Gargantuan Neural Networks
FSD V13 is a substantial leap for Tesla. It features substantially larger neural networks - the core brain that processes all the environmental data and makes decisions. Those networks are far larger in V13 than in V12, which results in a much smoother and human-like expereience.
Tesla’s FSD computers contain two nodes. According to Green’s analysis of FSD V13, Node B, which handles the actual end-to-end driving logic, tripled in size from 2.3 GB in V12 to a staggering 7.5 GB in V13. That’s a substantial increase, and one of the main reasons why HW3 can’t handle FSD V13. While Interestingly, Node A on HW4 remains similar in size to FSD V12, using up about 2.3 GB.
However, this massive size is also pushing the limits of HW4. While this isn’t necessarily a big problem immediately - at the end of the day, there is a limited amount of compute and ram available and model sizes will likely grow in the future. In fact, Tesla is planning to scale model sizes in the next FSD version and has already said they’ll need to optimize them, as context size is limited by on-board memory.
HW3 Limitations
Since HW3 can’t run the latest FSD models, where does this leave millions of Tesla vehicles equipped with the now-legacy FSD hardware? Are they hitting a dead end? Not exactly - Tesla has promised to replace HW3 computers with new units during the Q4 2024 Earnings Call, but only for those who have purchased FSD and only if Tesla is no longer able to update HW3 vehicles.
There’s no doubt Tesla hopes to achieve autonomy and then work backwards to make it compatible with HW3, but that’s unlikely to happen with the limited ram available on HW3.
Tesla’s AI team has continued to say that they’re still working on updating HW3 vehicles - but that they will be taking a backburner to updates for HW4 until the team can optimize the model efficiently enough to run on the smaller footprint. That means V12.6 isn’t just V13 “lite” - it is a distinctly different software branch tailored specifically for HW3’s capabilities.
Green's analysis showed that HW3 under V12.6 runs NNs totaling 1.2 GB on Node A and 3.1 GB on Node B, which is significantly smaller than the footprint of V13. Back in November, we discussed how Tesla is running a smaller and optimized FSD model on HW3, with the specific goal of achieving similar performance to V13. FSD V12.6 appears to be the current implementation of that smaller model strategy.
Green also found that of the total neural nets used for FSD, 135 are shared between the current V12.6 and FSD V13.2 releases, which is the result of Tesla’s AI team working to optimize and refine the V13 model for HW3. So some neural nets are shared between the two sets of hardware, while others are specific to HW3 or HW4.
AI4 in the Future
The fact that V13 is already stretching HW4’s limits makes us wonder about Tesla’s imminent release of AI5. Last year, Tesla mentioned that AI5 would be 18 months away - which is now about 8 months away, and potentially even sooner to help solve the autonomy problem.
At the same time, Tesla is looking to launch Unsupervised FSD in June in Austin, Texas, with presumably HW4, which would indicate that they’re confident in its capabilities.
Unless Tesla launches the Robotaxi network with AI5, we don’t believe AI5 will be a “must have” item. Undoubtedly, it will result in similar improvements to HW4 compared to HW3. However, the software needed to take advantage of the newer hardware could still be years away.
All eyes will be on Tesla’s Robotaxi network launch and the hardware required for it. For now, HW4 owners are in good hands with future updates are on the horizon, and we’re certainly excited for what’s next.
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