Elon Musk claims that Tesla’s always ‘coming next year’ Roadster can fly

Elon Musk is again claiming that Tesla’s always “coming next year” Roadster will be able to fly.

The prototype for the next-generation Tesla Roadster was first unveiled in 2017, and it was supposed to come into production in 2020, but it has been delayed every year since then.

It has become a sort of running joke, and there are doubts that it will ever come to market despite Tesla’s promise of dozens of free new Roadsters to Tesla owners who participated in its referral program years ago.

But earlier this year, CEO Elon Musk made some rare new comments about the next-gen Tesla Roadster, reviving hope that the vehicle will finally happen.

Musk said that Tesla will unveil a much-needed updated version of the next-gen Roadster since the design of the yet-to-be-revealed vehicle is already 7 years old, and he said that vehicle would come to market in 2025.

We haven’t heard anything bout the vehicle since and it wasn’t in Tesla’s shareholders meeting presentation.

Now, Musk has again made a rare new comment about the new Tesla Roadster – saying that it “can fly”:

The CEO had previously talked about an updated version of the new Tesla Roadster with something called ‘SpaceX package’, which would include cold air thrusters that could theoretically make the vehicle “fly”, or rather jump and possibly hover, for short distances.

Electrek’s Take

It’s pretty funny that Elon is responding to a guy using the classic technology complaint that “we were promised flying cars, but they are never coming” with a vehicle that Tesla has been promising every year for the past 4 years.

At this point, the Roadster, like FSD, is something that entered the “put up, or shut up” phase.

Bring it or stop talking about it, especially the flying part. The Roadster was supposed to be the “halo effect” for electric cars. I’m not sure how the cold air trusters play into this.