Tesla delays ‘flying’ Roadster demo to April Fools’ Day, production to 2027/28

Tesla CEO Elon Musk pushed back the dates for a demo of the next-gen Tesla Roadster, which he has said will be able to “fly” and suggested that it might not even be a car at all.

Tesla has been teasing the existence of a future, high-performance sportscar model for years now. Originally it was unveiled in 2017 for a 2020 release, but has been repeatedly pushed back, with another delay today.

Just last week, Musk said that a demo was coming at the end of the year of the Roadster, and that it would be perhaps the most exciting demo of any product ever. Musk also stated that the Roadster will have more tech than all James Bond vehicles combined

Today, he was asked a question at Tesla’s shareholder meeting about the status of that project (including whether the “James Bond” tech would make it to other Teslas – to which Musk responded “um, no”). Here’s the full answer regarding the product’s unveiling:

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The product unveil of the Roadster 2, which will be very different than what we’ve shown previously, that demo event will be April 1 of next year. I have some deniability because I can say I was just kidding. But we are actually tentatively aiming for April 1, for what I think will be the most exciting, whether it works or not, demo of any product. And then I guess production is probably about 12-18 months after that. I think production is about a year or so after that.

When the questioner seemed to respond with disbelief with that answer (who ever thought that this car could ever possibly be delayed?!), Musk answered:

Well, I can’t give away secrets, but you won’t be disappointed.

Musk also said, during the meeting, that owners of Founders’ Series reservations, which represent a $250,000 loan given to Tesla for the last 8 years, would all be invited to the demo.

This new timeline represents yet another delay for the oft–delayed vehicle. The most recent official announcement suggested it would go into production this year, though Musk has waffled on that.

So, this official announcement puts us back to a timeline of April 1 for the reveal, which is a delay of at least 3 months from when it was supposed to occur as of last week, and production starting (not cars hitting the road) at least in April 2027, or at late as potentially October 2027. If we take the higher end of that range, then the Roadster is likely to only be available in 2028, 11 years after its first unveiling and 8 years after original estimates.

That said, it’s not much of a surprise that the Roadster would be delayed again. Just last week, we saw a new job listing for the Roadster, looking for a “concept development” engineer. That’s a fairly early part of the production process, and even makes it seem like a 2027 release could be optimistic.

In the interim, several other high-performance electric cars have appeared to give the “hard-core smack down” to gas-powered cars that Musk promised.

We’ve seen records set by the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra, built by a smartphone company from concept to production in just a couple years. We’ve seen the Rimac Nevera R get to 186mph faster than a Bugatti Chiron Super Sport. We’ve seen the Lotus Evija X, which set the third-fastest Nurburgring lap ever, only beaten by two one-off, track-only, purpose-built racecars (one of which is a hybrid, the other is electric). And we’ve seen the BYD Yangwang U9 Xtreme become the fastest production car ever at 308(!!!) miles per hour.

These are milestones that the Roadster might have been able to take a shot at, but time has passed it by, and others have stepped in in the Roadster’s absence.

But maybe that doesn’t matter, because Musk’s comments today suggest the Roadster might not be what we expected.

All along, it has been assumed that the Roadster will be something like the original version unveiled in 2017. But today, Musk said it will be “very different than what we’ve shown previously.” We don’t know what those differences entail – whether it just means the car will have new tech, or if it will be a completely different style of car.

We can imagine that anyone who gave Tesla a $250,000 loan for ten years might be bothered by ending up with a totally different bill of goods than they put their money down for, though, so we hope the plan is to at least keep it a sportscar.

There are some questions about whether these technologies Musk has mentioned will be on the car, though, and if they will be helpful for anything other than a demo if so.

Recently, Tesla patented a “fan car” system which would enhance grip. It’s actually a pretty cool patent, with interesting improvements over previous implementations of the same idea.

But it is decidedly not a “flying car.” In fact, being able to fly would not actually help sportscar performance, and would actually hurt it. Sportscars are typically looking to maximize downforce in the most efficient manner, in order to enhance grip, but to fly, one must create “upforce,” which isn’t a term anyone uses because it creates no actual performance benefit.

So, while it is highly expected that the Roadster demo might be able to “fly,” we hope that doesn’t make it to production on a sportscar, as that’s more of a parlor trick and would take performance benefits away from where they would be more useful – like having a fan car system, or directional jets to increase lateral acceleration, rather than useless upwards acceleration.

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