Overview
- The California lawsuit, which won class certification in September, now faces a Tesla appeal to the Ninth Circuit over whether lead plaintiff Tom LoSavio can represent roughly 3,000 owners limited by arbitration agreements.
- Plaintiffs seek refunds for people who bought or leased new Teslas from 2016 to 2024 and ask the court to stop the company from marketing its cars as self-driving.
- Many early buyers paid about $8,000 for lifetime Full Self-Driving expecting future autonomy, yet analysts say millions of Teslas now lack the hardware needed to run the company’s most advanced software.
- Tesla now sells Full Self-Driving (Supervised) as a $99-per-month driver-assist that still requires hands-on human oversight, and older vehicles often need costly or unavailable computer and camera upgrades.
- Parallel actions are building overseas, with an Australian class case filed and a Dutch campaign organizing owners after regulators allowed FSD only on Tesla’s newest hardware, as the company pilots about 500 robotaxis and touts a two-seat Cybercab concept without a firm path for existing cars.