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Seat Upgrade: Tesla's Cybercab Chief Engineer Says New Seats Are Coming 'Very Very Soon'
Eric Earley told the X Takeover crowd at Giga Texas that new seating improvements and "very cool upgrades" to the cabin are on the way. A September rider survey hints at what riders asked for.
Sam Ellison, Live desk
Published · 2 min read
AUSTIN, Texas - The Cybercab is getting new seats. Eric Earley, the engineer who leads Tesla's Cybercab program, told a packed tent at the X Takeover event at Giga Texas on Saturday that a seating change is close. "We will be launching new seating improvements here very very soon," he said, according to attendee Dan Burkland, who posted the quote on X.
Earley's keynote, titled "Inside Cybercab: Engineering the Future of Everyday Transportation," carried a second promise. "Some very cool upgrades are coming to the experience in Cybercab very soon," he told the crowd, as quoted by attendee Nik Harris. He did not say what those upgrades are or when they will arrive. Not a Tesla App reported the remarks on Monday.
Today the two-seater's seats work more like a bench. Both slide forward and back together, and each seatback reclines on its own through the touchscreen, according to Not a Tesla App. The cabin has room for riders well over six feet tall, and Tesla set the seat height to match a standard wheelchair so riders with limited mobility can slide across from the side.
Tesla may already have a shopping list. In early September, shortly after public rides began, it asked Cybercab riders to pick from possible cabin features, including heated seats, ventilated seats, fully reclining seats, a tray table, a wireless phone charger and extra storage, with space to suggest their own. The Cybercab has no heated or ventilated seats today. It preconditions the cabin for each rider before pickup instead.
The upgrade talk lands as the fleet grows fast. Tesla has more than 300 Cybercabs in Austin, and Earley's panel repeated that Dallas is the next city in line for Cybercab rides. Attendees said he described the Austin fleet as only the beginning.
New hardware such as seats would most likely arrive first on cars still coming off the line, while software features can reach the cars already on the road through an update. Riders have been sitting in the two-seat cabin since paid rides began on 3 September. Earley's word for what comes next was "soon." He used it twice.
