Tesla CEO Elon Musk marked the milestone by writing: “Congratulations to the Tesla Team! 10 million vehicles manufactured is an incredible amount of work.” Although Musk is often mistakenly described as Tesla’s founder, he joined the company after its establishment and played a pivotal role in scaling it to its current size.
The production milestone also highlights the company’s rapid growth. Tesla reached the one-million-vehicle mark at its Fremont, California, plant in spring 2020. It then took just six years to increase cumulative production tenfold, despite a 9 per cent decline in vehicle sales in 2025.
The rapid increase in production—and, consequently, sales—was driven primarily by the global expansion of Tesla’s Gigafactory network. In addition to the Fremont plant, the company opened Gigafactory Shanghai in January 2020, launched Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg in Grünheide in March 2022, and inaugurated Gigafactory Texas in Austin in April 2022 with its ‘Cyber Rodeo’ opening event.
Tesla laid the foundation for this industrial growth with its premium models, the Model S and Model X, before expanding into higher-volume segments. Production of the Model 3 electric saloon began in July 2017, followed by the Model Y crossover in January 2020. The Model Y has also been built at the Grünheide plant since 2022.
