All Teslas now come standard with Autopilot, but if you want the full capabilities you’ll currently have to cough up $10,000 USD for Tesla’s Full Self-Driving package or wait for the upcoming FSD subscription, which should be available in May.
The FSD package adds additional capabilities, which currently include Navigate on Autopilot, Auto Lane Change, Autopark, Summon and Traffic-Light and Stop Sign Control. In all honesty, in its current offering, the package isn’t worth $10,000 for most people.
Navigate on Autopilot (NoA) is likely the most useful feature there so that you can change lanes without disengaging and then reengaging Autopilot.
However, as we know Tesla has been completely rebuilding its neural networks and rewriting Autopilot software so that it can traverse city streets with much higher levels of reliability than we’ve ever seen. It’s truly exciting. They’re achieving what no one else has with image processing alone. They don’t use lidar, and they’re moving away from radar use as well and focusing strictly on image processing. Which is why everyone who already has the FSD package is so anxiously awaiting that promised FSD beta button which will allow anyone to try the latest FSD features and blow our minds.
Elon Musk first mentioned that The Button would become available in April, but he has recently updated the timing and gave a more realistic expectation. Elon tweeted that the button will hopefully be available in May. He goes on to say that May is aspirational, but he would be surprised if the wide release of the FSD beta was any later than June.
Sure, this is disappointing to those of us waiting patiently, but I do like Elon’s choice of words here. He appears realistic and is setting some real-world expectations. There may be no need to convert anything to Elon-time this time. It looks like we won’t have to wait much longer before getting our hands on that sweet, sweet beta.
Update: On August 15th, 2021, Elon gave another update on the latest target for the FSD Button. You can read about it here.
