Business Wire/AP
- Online sleuths are growing excited about the possibility of Tesla’s “more affordable” vehicle hitting the market soon.
- One Reddit user posted what appeared to be a cheaper Tesla on the road. An X user said they found signs in Tesla’s site code.
- Tesla’s social account appears to be fanning the flames, responding to some posts on X with GIFs and jokes.
Tesla fans are clamoring for the company’s long-awaited “more affordable” model. Just look at the GIFs sprawled across X in the last 24 hours.
While it’s not clear if an unveiling is imminent, a reveal is expected sometime in the fourth quarter, which began in October.
Tesla has long teased the possibility of a more affordable electric vehicle. In January, Tesla gave an update, saying that it would start production on new models, “including more affordable models,” in the first half of 2025. In July, Tesla’s vice president of vehicle engineering, Lars Moravy, said that the company expects the new vehicle to be “available for everyone” in the fourth quarter of 2025.
Now, some internet sleuths think that the vehicle is arriving soon.
On Thursday, Reddit user @Fantastic_Train_7270 posted an image of what may be the vehicle to the Tesla subreddit. The vehicle in the photo is completely undisguised, unlike previous possible sightings, which showed what appeared to be the front and rear of the vehicle covered.
New affordable Model Y byu/Fantastic_Train_7270 inteslamotors
There are clear differences between the current Model Y slate and the vehicle in the photo. The rear light bar is missing, and the Tesla logo is not visible from the back.
Other fans said they have found evidence of a “Model Y Standard” in the Tesla site’s source code, including a possible low-resolution image.
The big question is how much the vehicle will cost. The base Model Y costs around $46,000, including delivery fees. In 2020, Elon Musk said to expect a $25,000 vehicle in roughly three years, but that was before the $7,500 EV tax credit now expired.
Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.
Fans speculate over Tesla influencers’ visit to Austin factor
Waiting on Tesla’s more affordable vehicle/larger SUV pic.twitter.com/hHtOv0W0cz
— whoisdisdude (@whoisdisdude) October 2, 2025
Online speculation hit a fever pitch on Thursday evening when fans realized that some Tesla influencers — including popular X poster Sawyer Merritt — were visiting the automaker’s Austin headquarters.
A since-deleted video posted on X by Kim Java showed a group of people taking what appeared to be a tour of the Tesla gigafactory, with some covered vehicles visible in the background.
Merritt and some of the other Tesla influencers have since posted that they’ve left Austin.
The bottom line? It’s unclear whether any vehicle announcement is coming soon, and it’s also possible that the influencers were visiting for Tesla’s quarterly deliveries announcement.
$TSLA is currently working on:- Humanoid robots- Full self driving cars- Robotaxi fleet- More affordable vehicle- Building another gigafactory- Scaling energy storage deployment- In house battery development- The Tesla Semi- Robovan$TSLA bears: ‘But look at the P/E’ pic.twitter.com/fC8i6rihgF
— Benny The Bull (@bennybigbull) October 3, 2025
That hasn’t stopped fans from theorizing, speculating, and posting endless memes to X. “AFFORDABLE TESLA MODEL Y IS HERE,” one wrote with the mind-blown emoji.
“If the new affordable Tesla model is anywhere near $35K, this time it’s REALLY game over for legacy auto,” another account wrote.
For its part, Tesla hasn’t exactly looked to tamp down the rumors — quite the opposite. The @Tesla X account responded to two posts seemingly referencing the new vehicle speculation.
— Tesla (@Tesla) October 3, 2025
When @Teslaconomics asked Merritt to explain what he was doing in Austin, @Tesla responded that he was “just craving some Terry Black’s,” a popular barbecue restaurant.
When Tesla fan account @WholeMarsBlog asked, “Who’s refreshing the Tesla website for us?”, Tesla responded with a GIF of its own: a finger mashing the F5 key.
Tesla influencer Jeremy Judkins implied that he’d been sworn to secrecy.
“Leaving Austin now,” he said in a post on X. “I can’t talk about anything so don’t ask.”
Do you work at Tesla or have a tip? Contact the reporter from a non-work device and email at [email protected]
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