Tesla to slow Texas Cybertruck output next year for Cybercab ramp
Tesla will wind down Cybertruck production at Gigafactory Texas around the middle of next year to make room for increased Cybercab output, Elon Musk said Friday on X. The stainless-steel pickup’s bulk, weight and angular shape won regulatory approval mainly in more permissive markets; EU rules that stress pedestrian safety made it impossible to register the vehicle for European roads, where its size would also have been impractical. In the United States, by far the largest pickup market, the electric powertrain was likely a barrier against gasoline rivals such as the Ford F-150, Chevrolet Silverado and Dodge Ram.
The announcement followed a difficult week around the U.S. midterm elections, in which Republicans struggled despite Musk’s major donations and his companies lost billions of dollars in combined market capitalization. Asked by a user who called the Cybertruck Tesla’s best vehicle and an “end of an era,” Musk replied “True.” He had heavily promoted the truck, saying at the 2023 launch that “finally, the future will look like the future.” Depending how fast the wind-down is, the production run could be shorter than the five-year research and development phase. Tesla does not publish model-level sales; Kelley Blue Book put U.S. Cybertruck sales at 20,237 last year, down from 38,965 in 2024, far below Musk’s launch forecast of nearer 250,000. Ford sold more than 800,000 F-Series pickups in the United States last year, starting at less than half the Cybertruck’s U.S. list price. SpaceX’s IPO this year showed it was comfortably the largest Cybertruck buyer in 2025, purchasing $131 million of vehicles at list price with no bulk discount.
The Cybercab is central to Musk’s push to reorient Tesla toward AI and robotics. It has no steering wheel, pedals or mirrors and is meant never to have a human in control, supplying a global robotaxi network. In recent months about 300 have been registered and begun operating on approved Austin-area roads near the factory, adding to autonomous Model Y vehicles inside a geofence of about 680 square kilometers (264 square miles).
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