- Elon Musk gave a non-committal answer on Tesla's Q2 2026 earnings call about upgrading Hardware 3 (HW3) cars to run the latest Full Self-Driving (FSD) software, offering vague options and timelines instead of a firm plan.
- Musk floated upgrading HW3 cars to either a moderate improvement over Hardware 4 (AI4) or the more powerful AI5 chip, but AI5 is not in volume production yet and will first go to Tesla's Optimus robot.
- Tesla has spent years walking back its 2016 promise that all cars had 'all the hardware necessary' for self-driving, with Musk admitting HW3 lacks the capability for unsupervised FSD due to insufficient memory bandwidth.
- Retrofitting roughly 4 million HW3 cars is a logistical and financial nightmare, with Musk previously suggesting 'micro-factories' that remain unconfirmed, leading Electrek to conclude Tesla's strategy is to stall until the problem becomes moot.