2026 Tesla Model Y with HW4 and FSD V14. As suggested in the upper left: Tap the brake and then push the blue Start Self-Driving button or push the right scroll wheel and off you go. In this case, the car then automatically left my garage. June 11, 2026. Photo by Fritz Hasler.
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I lived through almost 7 years of numerous releases of Tesla’s Full Self Driving (FSD) as it progressed in my 2019 Model 3 using “Hardware 3” (HW3), finally reaching FSD V12. Elon Musk promised every year that all of us Tesla owners with HW3 would see Level 4 self-driving in the next 12 months. L4 means you can read a book or go to sleep while FSD safely drives your car. It never happened! In 2023, HW4 with a significantly improved computer and significantly improved cameras was released in all new Teslas. In 2025, significantly improved FSD V14 was released, but only for HW4 cars. In my 2019, I was stuck on FSD 12. We got occasional bug fix releases, but there were almost no prospects of further improvements in FSD. I was “stuck” in my 2019 Model 3 until it was totaled in an accident on May 9, 2026. I had overridden FSD 12, which would have prevented the accident.
