Tesla Roadster release date
Tesla put a year next to the car at the 15 October reveal. It is the first date in nine years that came with a source, and it is still only a target.
Production target
2028, as stated at the reveal on 15 October 2026.
Shown so far
A demonstration car at SpaceX's McGregor test site, not a production build.
First promised
November 2017. The date has moved every year since.
Buy one today
No. A $50,000 reservation buys a place in a queue that has no deliveries yet.
Checked on 19 October 2026 from Tesla's own page and the coverage of the 15 October reveal. MyCarFly is not Tesla and does not sell cars.
The dates so far
The Roadster was shown at the Semi event: 0-60 in 1.9 seconds, 620 miles of claimed range, $200,000. Deliveries were talked about for 2020.
The program slipped every year. The answer was always next year, and the car kept getting attached to other priorities at the company.
Reservations reopened at $50,000: $5,000 on a card, $45,000 wired within ten days.
A redesigned Roadster was unveiled at SpaceX's rocket test site in McGregor, Texas. It left the ground on cold-gas thrusters, flipped and landed on its wheels.
Production start, as stated at that reveal. No delivery date has been given to the people holding reservations.
What Tesla actually said on 15 October
The event was a demonstration, not a launch. A car at a test site in Texas, thrusters firing at the back, a hop that turned into a barrel roll, wheels down at the end. Next to that footage Tesla put a year: 2028.
That is the only date with a source behind it. The other years in circulation, 2020, 2021, 2023, next year, soon, came from interviews and posts, and every one of them has expired. If somebody quotes a date to you without a Tesla source from 15 October onwards, assume it is a guess.
Reuters called it what it is: nine years after the first reveal, nobody has shown the car coming off a production line, and the reservation queue still has no delivery date attached to it.
Why the date kept moving
The Roadster is a halo car. It exists to make the rest of the range look faster than it is, which means it loses every argument about factory space and battery supply to the cars that actually pay for the company.
Each delay was cheap to announce and expensive to admit. A CEO can say next year in an interview and move the car to the following calendar without a single line of public accounting. That is why the timeline on this page has five entries and four of them are slips.
The thrusters made it harder, not easier. A car that leaves the ground needs a whole second set of systems tested, and the cold-gas package people saw on 15 October was described as an option, not as standard equipment.
The flying was real. Most of the videos are not.
The demo car did leave the ground. That footage is Tesla's, filmed at their test site, and it is the thing everybody copied in the following week.
What filled feeds after that was not Tesla. It was ordinary cars, hatchbacks and pickups, lifting off over traffic, over police cars, off ramps. Those are AI videos, made from photographs of cars that cannot fly and never will.
If you came here for the date, the answer is 2028 and no delivery date. If you came here because of the flying, the flying is the part that already exists, and it costs $4.99 rather than $200,000.
Straight answers, no hedging
What is confirmed, what is not, and what to assume when somebody quotes a number at you.
When is the Tesla Roadster coming out?
Production is targeted for 2028, the year Tesla put next to the car at the 15 October 2026 reveal. Tesla has missed every earlier date it has given, so treat 2028 as a plan and not a promise.
Can I buy one right now?
No. You can reserve a place for $50,000, and that queue has not produced a single customer car. There is no order book, no delivery window and no configurator with a price on the options.
Was the flying Roadster real, or AI?
The demonstration was real: a test car at SpaceX's site in Texas, cold-gas thrusters, a jump and a barrel roll. The videos of ordinary cars flying that spread afterwards are AI, made from photos, and they are the ones we make.
How much will it cost?
Tesla still lists $200,000 for the base car and $250,000 for the Founders Series. Final pricing for a production version has not been confirmed, and the thruster package has never had a price at all.
Why has it taken so long?
The car keeps losing priority to models that pay the bills, and the thruster version added a set of systems that had never been put in a road car. Nine years of delays is the summary; the detail is a series of annual moves.
Will there be a cheaper version?
Nothing has been announced. The only numbers Tesla has published are the two on the reservation page, and both are in supercar territory.
Do you sell the car?
No. MyCarFly makes AI videos from photos of cars people already own. We are not Tesla, we are not affiliated with Tesla, and the only thing we sell is a six-to-ten-second clip.
The flying car part is already on sale
Not the car. The video. One photo of your own car goes in, six to ten seconds of it leaving a road comes out. $4.99 for the first one, no subscription.