Tesla Relents, Reportedly Stops Using the Term ‘Autopilot’ in California

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Tesla has ceased its use of “Autopilot” in California as a marketing term for its driver assistance feature, rather than face the penalty of not being able to do business in the state. Tesla would have been subject to a 30-day suspension by the California DMV if it kept using the term.

Tesla had already moved last month to stop shipping Autopilot as standard equipment, pushing customers toward its more advanced, subscription-based version of the system.

As the Chronicle notes, this legal fight began in 2023, with the DMV taking issue not just with “Autopilot” but also with “Full Self-Driving,” which Tesla later apparently changed to “full self-driving (supervised).” Instances of “Full Self-Driving” and “FSD” on the Tesla website now have “(Supervised)” in parentheses.

Steve Gordon, California DMV director, said Tesla has now taken “the required action to remain in compliance with the state of California’s consumer protections.”

In a ranking last year from Consumer Reports, Tesla’s driver assistance was placed eighth, below similar systems from Ford, General Motors, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Nissan, Toyota, and Volkswagen. Kelly Funkhouser of Consumer Reports called it “not nearly as good as what you might think it is,” according to CNBC.

Recent NHTSA filings Tesla provided about the performance of its small number of robotaxis showed that Tesla apparently struggled throughout December and January. It reported five crashes in that time, which amounts to four times the crashes of the average human driver across the same amount of driving.