Tesla to end Cybertruck production in 2027, shifting Texas plant to Cybercab

Tesla will stop building the Cybertruck next year, Chief Executive Elon Musk said this week, ending a three-year run for the angular stainless-steel pickup that never came close to the sales volumes the company once promised. Musk announced the decision in a post on the social platform X late Thursday, saying production at Gigafactory Texas in Austin would wind down "around the middle of next year" to make room for Tesla's two-seat autonomous Cybercab.

The move was confirmed within hours by multiple outlets, including TechCrunch and Fox Business, which both cited Musk's post directly. It was not immediately clear whether Cybertruck production would be discontinued entirely or shifted to another facility; Gigafactory Texas is the only Tesla plant currently equipped to build the truck.

Tesla will be "winding down production of the Cybertruck at Gigafactory Texas around the middle of next year to make room for increased Cybercab production," Musk wrote.

In a reply to a user on X, Musk called the Cybertruck the "best vehicle Tesla has ever made" and described the decision as the "end of an era." Wes Morrill, the Cybertruck's lead engineer, posted separately that the truck "lives on through Cybercab," calling it "an incredible technology development platform."

A launch that missed its own targets by a wide margin

The Cybertruck's run fell well short of what Tesla told the public to expect. When Musk unveiled the vehicle in November 2019, he said it would start under $40,000 and offer up to 500 miles of range on its longest-range version; at the event, an executive's demonstration of the truck's "bulletproof" windows went wrong when two panes cracked on stage. Deliveries did not begin until nearly four years later, in late 2023, after delays that Tesla attributed partly to the COVID-19 pandemic. By then the starting price had risen to roughly $60,000 and top-end range had fallen by more than 100 miles short of the original pitch.

Musk had predicted the truck would sell around 250,000 units a year. It never got close. According to Kelley Blue Book data cited by Fox Business, Tesla sold 38,965 Cybertrucks in the United States in 2024 and just 20,237 in 2025 — a 48% drop. Cox Automotive figures reported separately put U.S. sales at only 11,586 units through the first nine months of 2026, putting the model on pace for a second consecutive steep annual decline.

Design was part of the problem: the truck's sharp-edged, unpainted stainless-steel body polarized buyers, and its price crept up as cheaper trims were repeatedly discontinued or delayed. Tesla has also had to manage a string of safety fixes. According to data Tesla itself filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Cybertruck has been the subject of 11 recalls since its debut, covering issues ranging from an accelerator pedal pad that could dislodge to a trunk-bed trim panel that could detach. The largest, covering 63,619 trucks built between November 2023 and October 2025, was triggered after Tesla found that vehicle-controller software could make the front parking lamps exceed federal brightness limits — a defect Tesla disclosed and fixed with an over-the-air update, according to the company's Part 573 safety recall report filed with NHTSA.

Betting the factory on a driverless robotaxi

The Cybertruck is the third Tesla model line effectively phased out in 2026. Earlier in the year, Tesla ended regular production of the Model S sedan and Model X SUV, converting part of its Fremont, California, factory to build the company's Optimus humanoid robot instead. Musk has increasingly described Tesla as an artificial-intelligence and robotics company rather than simply an automaker, with the Cybercab robotaxi and Optimus as the two flagship bets.

Tesla began commercial Cybercab robotaxi rides in Austin on September 3, according to the company's own third-quarter 2026 shareholder update filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which lists installed annual capacity of more than 125,000 units for both the Cybertruck and Cybercab lines at the Texas plant — though the filing does not break out how many of either vehicle Tesla has actually built or delivered. The same filing shows Tesla's overall vehicle deliveries fell 2% year-over-year in the third quarter to 486,532, even as production rose 4% to 464,391, and free cash flow dropped to $1.53 billion from nearly $4 billion a year earlier.

The Cybercab's unusual design — it has no steering wheel, pedals or mirrors — has already drawn federal scrutiny. The same day Austin rides began, NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation opened an audit query, according to the agency's own investigation summary, to examine "the process and technical data on which Tesla relied when certifying the Cybercab" and whether the company's self-certification properly accounted for federal motor vehicle safety standards that assume a human driver is present. The inquiry covers an estimated 1,000 vehicles and remains open.

Who is affected

• Roughly 70,000–80,000 existing Cybertruck owners in the U.S., whose vehicles Musk said will "always continue to exist in the fleet" even after production ends.
• Gigafactory Texas workers on the Cybertruck line, whose roles are expected to shift toward Cybercab assembly.
• Tesla suppliers tied to Cybertruck-specific components, including its stainless-steel body panels and 48-volt electrical architecture.
• Prospective robotaxi riders in Austin and, as Tesla has signaled, Dallas, where Cybercab service is expected to expand next.

Reaction and what comes next

The reaction from Tesla's fan base was mixed. Some owners and investors framed the shift as a logical, if abrupt, pivot toward the robotaxi business Musk has long promoted as Tesla's real growth engine; others said they were skeptical the market needs as many Cybercabs as Tesla plans to build. Some industry analysts have said they would have preferred Tesla replace the Cybertruck with a more conventional pickup rather than retire the segment altogether, given lingering demand for electric trucks in the U.S. market.

Tesla shares traded around $358, up more than 4% on Friday, according to Fox Business, though the move was not directly tied to the Cybertruck announcement in that day's trading commentary. Musk gave no indication of a next-generation pickup to replace the Cybertruck, and Tesla has not said how many trucks it expects to build before the line closes next year. The open NHTSA audit into Cybercab's certification, due to be resolved in the coming months, could also affect how quickly Tesla can expand the robotaxi service the Cybertruck line is being sacrificed to support.