8 Years Later, Tesla’s Still Taking $50K Roadster Reservations Musk Promised For 2020
Prospective buyers can put down $5k today and need to hand over another $45k in 10 days' time, but are offered no firm schedule for delivery or even a price
https://www.carscoops.com/author/chris-chilton-cc/
by Chris Chilton
Tesla’s website still contains a reservation page for the vaporware Roadster.
The two-door EV can be reserved for $50k, but there’s still no official launch date.
Elon Musk revealed the Roadster in 2017, claiming it would be available in 2020.
This year, there’s hope we’ll get a look at Tesla’s long-awaited affordable EV, which some sources claim will be a “shorter” Model Y, costing at least 20 percent less to build and promising to shake up the industry all over again.You won’t find any trace of it on the automaker’s website right now, but at the same time they’re more than happy to take $50,000 off you to reserve another mythical EV that’s been even longer in the making.
More: Musk Says Tesla Roadster Isn’t A Priority, But Thanks “Long-Suffering Deposit Holders”
That car is the second-generation Roadster, which Elon Musk unveiled way back in November 2017. Almost eight years on Tesla is still taking deposits even though the website contains no information on when reservation holders might expect to have their sports cars delivered.
Production Deadlines Keep Slipping
Musk originally claimed it would enter production in 2020, but that date slipped to 2021, then 2022, 2023, and now 2024. You can see a pattern here, right? Last fall, some months after suggesting a 2025 build date, Musk thanked Roadster deposit holders for their patience and said the company was close to finalizing the design, but warned that mainstream models would always take priority in terms of development.
Of course, this doesn’t even scratch the surface of the more colorful claims made over the years. We’re talking about promises of sub-one-second 0-60 mph times and a SpaceX-branded option package featuring ten rocket thrusters allegedly capable of improving acceleration, top speed, braking, cornering, and maybe even allowing the thing to fly At this point, it feels like the only limit is the imagination… or physics.
Although the Roadster doesn’t appear on the website alongside cars like the Model 3, Model Y and Cybertruck in Tesla’s drop-down menu when you click the ‘vehicles’ tab, it is listed in a separate menu to the right, along with the Semi commercial truck.
$50,000 For A Placeholder
Click that link and a page opens up containing various CGI images of a red Roadster both with and without its targa top in place, as well as a video of the presentation Elon Musk made years ago. Text on the page promises zero to 60 mph (96 km/h) in 1.9 seconds, an 8.8-second quarter mile (400 m) time, 250+ mph (402 km/h) top speed and 620-mile range. It also says the Roadster will be all-wheel drive and, unlike most rivals, have seating for four.
More: Musk’s Inner Circle Claims DOGE Obsession Trumps Tesla Crisis No Matter How Bad It Gets
A ‘Reserve Now’ button takes you to a simple reservation page on the Tesla US website that features a single profile image of a red Roadster and offers no configuration, color or trim options. Tesla doesn’t even give a ballpark estimate on price, though years earlier it listed the EV at $200,000-250,000.
But Tesla fans not put off by the lack of concrete info are invited to place an initial $5,000 deposit using a credit card, and are told they’ll need to send an additional $45,000 the brand’s way via wire transfer in 10 days’ time. It also warns that reservations are not confirmed until the hefty wire transfer part of the deal has been completed.
It’s now almost eight years since we first saw the Roadster, an entire life cycle in car terms, so it’s unknown whether when the car does finally arrive this year or the next (or the year after that…) it will be the same one that was promised in 2017 – and what’s still promised on the retail website.
More: T-Online Pulls Tesla Survey After 253,000 Votes Cast From Just 2 IPs In The US
That being said, do you think the Roadster would still make a splash if it debuted with that design and those specs, or is it now looking a bit stale? Leave a comment and let us know.
