There's good news and bad news for Tesla owners. The bad news is that your car might've just gotten recalled over safety concerns. The good news is that you don't have to take it anywhere.
In an official notice, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (or NHTSA) ordered the recall of more than two million Teslas in the U.S. due to accidental collisions that might take place with the "autosteering" feature turned on. The specific models affected are as follows, per The Verge:
- 2020-2023 Model Y
- 2016-2023 Model X
- 2017-2023 Model 3
- 2012-2023 Model S
There's one major caveat to all of this: It's not actually a recall in the sense that owners will have to surrender their cars to be physically repaired. Instead, it'll come in the form of an over-the-air software update in December that will limit autosteering in certain conditions, among other things.
In case you don't know, autosteering isn't the same as full self-driving. It's a basic Tesla feature that can help keep your car in a driving lane at cruising speed, but it requires that you keep your hands on the wheel at all times. The software update as part of this recall will apparently include more alerts prompting users to not take their hands off the dang wheel.
2023 has been a banner year for Tesla recalls. Back in February, a similar recall was issued over full self-driving issues that were also fixed with a software update. In July, some Teslas were actually physically recalled for seatbelt issues that had to be repaired the old-fashioned way.
Just remember, when buying a Tesla, that this is always a possibility.
