Tesla has not said how many customers have been invited. Elon Musk says the offering will go nationwide once Tesla receives regulatory approval, and he has publicly called the monthly fee "too high." Ashok Elluswamy, who leads Tesla's AI and self-driving work, says the car will operate unsupervised in the same geographic areas as the robotaxi service. One outlet's review found those areas are significantly smaller than Tesla's marketing suggests. Tesla's ordering agreements limit use to personal, non-commercial purposes, so ride-hailing or rental requires separate authorization that has not been described.
For attorneys, the key questions are regulatory and contractual. Watch whether NHTSA's inquiry leads to a formal action or a compliance finding on the no-controls design, and whether Tesla's national rollout depends on approvals that have not yet come. Review the ordering agreement's non-commercial restriction, the subscription terms, and the geofence language, since those define what buyers actually own. The sale is also the first consumer sale of a steering-wheel-free vehicle from a major automaker, which makes it a likely test case for product liability and consumer protection claims.