Business Tesla discontinuing Model S and Model X to make room for robots - "Musk said the reasons for cancelling the vehicle programs was to make room at Tesla’s Fremont factory for production of its Optimus humanoid robot."

Production of the two pioneering models will end in the second quarter of 2026, Elon Musk says.​

by Andrew J. Hawkins
Jan 28, 2026, 10:49 PM UTC


Image: Tesla

Tesla will discontinue the Model S and Model X in the second quarter of 2026, Elon Musk said in an earnings call with investors today.

Musk said the reasons for cancelling the vehicle programs was to make room at Tesla’s Fremont factory for production of its Optimus humanoid robot.

“It’s time to basically bring the Model S and X programs to an end with an honorable discharge, because we’re really moving into a future that is based on autonomy,” he said. “So if you’re interested in buying a Model S and X, now would be the time to order it.”

The Model S is Tesla’s luxury sedan, first released in 2012, while the Model X was its SUV with gull-wing doors, introduced in 2015. Sales of both vehicles has been declining steadily, as the company shifted focus to its mass-market Model 3 and Model Y.


Tesla Model X Image: Tesla

In 2025, Tesla sold 50,850 “other models,” a category that includes Model S, Model X, and Cybertruck. That represented a 40.2 percent decrease in sales, year over year.

Musk has been attempting to transform Tesla from an automotive company to one that makes self-driving cars and humanoid robots. The transition has been rocky, with Tesla reporting a 61 percent decrease in profits in the fourth quarter.

Developing…

Source (Archive)

 

[The Lawgiver]

Musk has been attempting to transform Tesla from an automotive company to one that makes self-driving cars and humanoid robots. The transition has been rocky, with Tesla reporting a 61 percent decrease in profits in the fourth quarter.

Maybe because the robots are boring and ugly and the idea of a self driving car goes against the entire point of a car, basically turning cars into trains with extra steps you have to pay MORE to use.


Like the thing they named the robots after is such a more neat design people pay money to have tiny app controlled robots of for like five thousand dollars. Now That's WAY too much money for that kind of thing but this tesla thing is more expensive and built like a knockoff asimo while having none of asimo's charm.

Logos are even in similar positions too, it's so fucking ridiculously blatant lmao.

Everyone who has had a much better robot design/idea the last 12-ish years has basically been snubbed from ever being allowed to learn how to make some things or even afford the tools to make said things. The people behind everything these days just make it shitty , buggy, and expensive.

YWNBAP

 

[DiabeticSydePhil]

In 2025, Tesla sold 50,850 “other models,” a category that includes Model S, Model X, and Cybertruck. That represented a 40.2 percent decrease in sales, year over year.

Selling sub 100k a year cars to redditors is certainly a good return on your weird incestuous venture funding.

Unless the basic bitch models of Tesla are selling like hot cakes (and they aren't) I don't understand why it took them this long to pivot out of cars besides Musk having so much money none of this matters anyways.

They're crap cars even by electric vehicle standards only purchased by retards. And even retards hate Tesla/Musk now.


Who's going to buy you overpriced humanoid robots? Not any actual business, they want robots that do the job they were designed for effectively, which is never a humanoid shape. If Taco Bell or Mcdonalds goes fully automated in the kitchen, its gonna be some nightmare machine cycling food bits into different stacks, not a humanoid shape flipping burgers.

 

[Point and Laugh]

Soon…

 

[Pee Cola]

The Model S is getting long in the tooth anyway. It really hasn't changed much since it was released over 10 years ago. The Model X is hardly a volume seller, and it's nearly as old as the Model S.

As for Tesla itself, it feels like Uncle Elon has lost interest in it as EVs are no longer the new hotness. I'm sure they'll keep building Model 3s and Model Ys for as long as people will buy them. It's not like Tesla is investing in R&D to replace those any time soon, so demand for these will eventually dry up.

The only thing stopping Tesla receiving an atomic wedgie from Chinese EV-centric auto brands like BYD (at least in the US) is Trump and his obsession with tariffs.

 

[deleuzeon]

Soon…
Ver archivo adjunto 8488365

Will Stancil furiously honking his car horn and blowing his rape whistle at the cold, unfeeling robot as it snaps a Guatemalan's spine right in front of him. "YOU STUPID FUCKS WHAT ARE YA DOIN," he screams. The robot turns to Will, eyes red. A strange appendage extends from its groin.

 

[Point and Laugh]

Will Stancil furiously honking his car horn and blowing his rape whistle

One lifts the back bumper of his Honda fit while he frantically screeches “I’m a legal observer! A LEGAL OBSERVER!”

 

[AMHOLIO]

Soon…
Ver archivo adjunto 8488365

Excuse me, you mean:

 

[TowinKarz]

The real reason is his customer base deserted him over (albeit petty) political reasons and the fact the EV market is saturated and can't grow any more, let alone survive, without hefty government subsidies that are being cut.

And after a decade? Everyone who wanted a Tesla has got one and the charging infrastructure needed to make them viable for more people than the well-heeled techbros? Hasn't been built. (what little has was also through now-defunct subsidy)

There's just no money in building EVs.

There's even less in his fantasies about whatever he thinks the Optimus is going to be able to do if we just had MORE of them.

 

[deleuzeon]

There's even less in his fantasies about whatever he thinks the Optimus is going to be able to do if we just had MORE of them.

This is a good-faith question as I know nothing about the topic, but couldn't you do something like replace everyone that works in an Amazon facility loading and unloading trucks? That'd be pretty big scale, surely?

 

[TowinKarz]

This is a good-faith question as I know nothing about the topic, but couldn't you do something like replace everyone that works in an Amazon facility loading and unloading trucks? That'd be pretty big scale, surely?

Doing it with a human-shaped human-sized robot mimicking human-based tasks is grossly inefficient.

It's a better bet to automate the bog-standard forklift with a boring laptop in place of the driver's seat than put a humanoid robot in it's place that has to use human-like arms and legs and hands to manipulate the controls.

If you want to automate a water spigot? The cheapest/easiest way to do it is attach a servomotor to the faucet. Not spend $50 billion to develop a robotic human hand that can reach out and turn the handle.

Elon is an autistic moron for whom "automation" means OMG ROBOTS!!!!!!!!!

 

[Kether]

Everyone who has had a much better robot design/idea the last 12-ish years has basically been snubbed from ever being allowed to learn how to make some things or even afford the tools to make said things.

they exist but they get fuck all in investment money, like yes a clunky robot with a stupid face like you'd see in 70s uk slop would be better, but investors are psychopaths who want slaves.

I shop at BJ's Wholesale and they have a retarded clunky robot called Tally that mainly just is there to drive people insane with its beeps, but every fucking kid and their cousin loves it. it has a pair of goofy eyes and looks retarded but it has a name and goofy eyes so its like the mascot of the entire brand now.

the average consumer prefers something that looks retarded vs cyborgs, but big investors refuse to give people that.

Elon is an autistic moron for whom "automation" means OMG ROBOTS

Elon's similar to Steve Jobs where he's just the exact right amount of retarded to know what the investor wants. its like the concept of a "comedian's comedian" or a wrestler that appeals to "smarks"

yes anyone that isn't a midwit hates his retarded ideas and knows they're ineffiecent and a gross waste of money, but the guys running VCs are so fucking retarded that they don't know any of that. so Elon wins by default.

like at resturants they have robots deliver the food and they're literally just a serving tray on wheels, but it doesn't have the "wow" factor of a cyborg doing it so investor money doesn't come rolling in.

Musk has been doing this shit for years, Tesla's entire marketing factor was "what if EV cars didn't look gay, but looked cool instead" even though it would be inefficient and bad at its job, it made him rich beyond belief because he got midwits and VC money into his company and got government backing.

You know Musk has some defense contractors jerking off to some models of cyborgs he's shown to them and we're about 2 years from it being announced Tesla has some trillion dollar contract for army robots.

Like everything else he makes, its not about us its about what the rich retards want, and Musk knows how to give it to them nice and hard

 

[TowinKarz]

You know Musk has some defense contractors jerking off to some models of cyborgs he's shown to them and we're about 2 years from it being announced Tesla has some trillion dollar contract for army robots.

I agreed with everything except this, the Army has trialed robots before, including the entire Boston Dynamics catalogue, they always come to the same conclusion.

The ambulatory robot is inefficient, costlier, noisier and can't go a lot of places the old meat soldier can. It's 1/3 as capable for 5x the price.

No defense contractor is going to invest in robots when they have existing contracts for boring ol' combat drones that look like boring, functional aircraft instead of Optimus Prime.

 

[Google.com]

500,000 cybertrucks robots a year

 

[MadStan]

It's a failure, plain and simple. If he was doing well with sales they wouldn't cancel it. He is claiming they are low on sales because...one day they want to build robots? No, they are low on sales and have failed and are moving to something. You wouldn't see Elon fold Tesla and say "Oh we're going to space now", would you? You don't shut down a venture unless it is failing. And Tesla as it is, is failing.

Its like Trump saying he was going to shutter a hotel to open a gold course, no, he would just run both.

How do Elon fan boys fall for this gullible shit every time he farts nonsense?

 

[Gandhi's Left Hook]

I look forward to Elon blowing his fortune on retardation and using his last dime to crash land on Mars.

 

[Catch The Rainbow]

This is a rational move sadly, I talked about it here:

They lost their emission credits which was a significant part of their profit:

https://insideevs.com/news/742024/tesla-regulatory-sales-profit/
Over 40% Of Tesla's Profit Comes From Selling Regulatory Credits

They need to make that up somehow.

It's also not worth it to keep making them. In 2025, they sold 50k of S, X, and CT combined. The 3 & Y sold 1.6M combined.



The Fremont factory is the oldest Tesla factory. Why update an old factory when you have 3 others?

As retarded as this seems to be on the face of it, it makes a lot of sense.

The real stupid thing is getting rid of their basic autopilot and locking it behind a $99/month subscription. A basic Kia now outdoes a brand new tesla with no subscription in lane centering/adaptive cruise control.

That $99 dollars a month is only going to go up as well

 

[quaawaa]

This is a rational move sadly, I talked about it here:

They only sell 50k units a year because the Model S and X are 10 year old designs and are now worst-in-class. If they updated them, they’d sell more. Every other car company would have updated them several times by now, but Musk is extremely cheap and doesn’t want to buy new tooling.

The Cybertruck is a total failure because it’s ugly and because its battery is half the size that it should be (GM’s electric trucks, unlike Tesla’s, actually have a usable range).

I guarantee you fewer people will buy his robots than bought the Model S/X.

 

[Megaton Punch]

The Model S is getting long in the tooth anyway. It really hasn't changed much since it was released over 10 years ago. The Model X is hardly a volume seller, and it's nearly as old as the Model S.

As for Tesla itself, it feels like Uncle Elon has lost interest in it as EVs are no longer the new hotness. I'm sure they'll keep building Model 3s and Model Ys for as long as people will buy them. It's not like Tesla is investing in R&D to replace those any time soon, so demand for these will eventually dry up.

The only thing stopping Tesla receiving an atomic wedgie from Chinese EV-centric auto brands like BYD (at least in the US) is Trump and his obsession with tariffs.

I would rather walk everywhere for the rest of my life than drive a Chinese EV.

 

[Breadbassket]

Doing it with a human-shaped human-sized robot mimicking human-based tasks is grossly inefficient.

It's a better bet to automate the bog-standard forklift with a boring laptop in place of the driver's seat than put a humanoid robot in it's place that has to use human-like arms and legs and hands to manipulate the controls.

If you want to automate a water spigot? The cheapest/easiest way to do it is attach a servomotor to the faucet. Not spend $50 billion to develop a robotic human hand that can reach out and turn the handle.

Elon is an autistic moron for whom "automation" means OMG ROBOTS!!!!!!!!!

Perhaps Elon Musk is completely unaware what the KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) design principle is?