The Tesla Model 3’s 2024 ‘Highland’ update is finally here, bringing the first-ever facelift to the EV that changed the world, and we got an early hands-on. While the original Model 3 was an exceptional car on its own terms, a cheaper-than-usual EV with fairly good range and a beautiful OS, the 2024 Model 3’s objective is not merely proving that Tesla means business but retaining its crown as the king of EVs.
I’m not confident that the 2024 Tesla Model 3 achieves this lofty goal.
I found the improvements that the 2024 Tesla Model 3 makes to be questionable, especially at the $62,000 price point. Gear shifting (drive, reverse, neutral, park) is now primarily done through the centre console, and there’s no blinker stalk. The most noticeable changes are cosmetic – a gorgeous new exterior, a small screen in the back seat, and an RGB strip that runs along the internal trim.
Here are my thoughts from a weekend away with the 2024 Tesla Model 3.
Haptic hell
If you were to hop into it without being prepared for the changes it makes to the dash, the 2024 Tesla Model 3 could be rather confusing. With the indicator controls now on the steering wheel and the gear shift on the right side of the touch screen (with a secondary gear shift on the roof), the leap from a traditional car into the new Model 3 is now rather wide.
Below, you can see those roof gear shift buttons. They’re haptic buttons, in that you need to press your finger in hard to activate them, and the light only activates after the area has been pressed. The purple lights in the photo are infrared and aren’t visible to the human eye.
We need to get these features out of the way first because I think they take what is otherwise a brilliant car and make it a more frustrating experience. They make it neither undrivable nor entirely bad, but they absolutely make its usability more difficult than it should be.
Starting with the gear shift, the placement on the right side of the screen is at least good. The fact that you need to swipe up or down to activate drive or reverse is bad. Buttons would suffice, and every time I’ve gone to drive this car, I’ve at least had one instance of needing to go back and swipe either forward or reverse again because the car didn’t register my input. At best, it needs work. The haptics on the roof aren’t much more responsive and are further out of the way than I’d like, but at least there’s a second option.
Meanwhile, the blinker buttons are also disappointing. When turning the wheel, I normally like having my blinkers in the same spot, so that, no matter where my hands are on the wheel, I know where I can activate them. With the blinkers fixed to the wheel, I not only need to put my hand in an awkward place to activate the blinkers at certain moments, I need to be confident that I’m pressing the right one, because my brain isn’t perfect and it isn’t always clear.
Ultimately, both of these changes are rather pointless. They don’t improve anything, and I don’t think they make the cabin look any better. I hope that this gets axed in a mid-life update because, in the time I’ve spent with the car, I’ve come to really hate them.
Ugh
The sign of a good car feature is how much you miss it when it’s gone. In this case, we’re talking about 360 birds-eye view cameras.
It’s pitiful that Tesla’s $62,000 car doesn’t have a birds-eye camera, instead offering 3D renderings of the obstacles around you and poorly estimated distances to your closest objects. Every one of the Model 3’s closest competitors, including the Polestar 2, Cupra Born, Volvo EX30, and much cheaper models like the BYD Atto 3 and high-end versions of the MG4, have this feature – yet the Tesla doesn’t. I am told an upcoming software update will add a similar feature.
There’s no good reason why Tesla doesn’t already have this feature in the car as a matter of course. The technical reason is that Tesla’s cameras aren’t actually wide enough to facilitate a stitched-together view, but this is not a good reason. I know the common excuse for this is that the CEO envisions a driverless future where there’s no need for such things, but that doesn’t fly with me. I’ve driven this car into some pretty bad tight streets and up some dreadful driveways, and compared to other cars with the birds-eye system, the Model 3 comes out behind.
While we’re here, let’s pick through some other new features. With the Model 3’s facelift, we’ve got a new screen in the back, and a new RGB lighting strip across the cabin. Both of these things are largely pointless, but they both improve the experience… in their own ways.
For example, the lights across the cabin might be a bit extra for some drivers. I certainly found the red to be a bit distracting, but I was comfortable with the blue and green. It looks nice, but it’s super unnecessary (and it can be disabled).
Meanwhile, the screen in the back perplexes me. Rear air conditioning controls go through the screen, along with controls for pushing the front passenger seat back and forward. This is useful for taller passengers that need extra space, or if you’re hunched over the seat trying to strap your child in. It feels as though Tesla has gone looking for other ways to use the screen, and they don’t all make sense.
Ultimately, the reason for using a screen in the back is primarily to watch things. Of course, if you’re a Tesla driver with kids in the backseat, you’ve probably already bought your kids an iPad. If you’re anyone else, you likely have a phone.
These additions to the Model 3 are nice to have and everything, but I think a lot of drivers would prefer to lose these extras and save some money. With this in mind, Tesla’s removal of the emergency cable from all new orders (a $550 cable that pretty much every other company includes with your order of a new EV), along with Tesla’s monetisation of features accessible only through its OS ($10 per month for inbuilt maps, music streaming, and other smart features after the first eight years), reeks. That last point would annoy me less if you could use Android Auto or Apple CarPlay with a Tesla, but nope, neither of these things are available. At least Tesla doesn’t charge for these features for quite a while, although it makes for a headache on the second-hand market (and to be fair to Tesla, they’re not the only automaker that offers feature subscriptions like this. They are, however, one of the only ones that don’t have Android Auto or Apple CarPlay).
The good part of the review
It’s unfortunate that the 2024 Tesla Model 3’s biggest changes are so lukewarm because in every other respect, it’s a great car. The suspension on the road is some of the best I’ve felt in any car, the battery range is brilliant (513km WLTP in the RWD model, 629km in the AWD), the changes to the exterior design certainly make it look more prestigious.
Tesla’s operating system, for all the complaints I might have over its pointless extras and built-in games, is still one of the best you can get in a car, although I prefer Android Automotive as it appears in the Polestar 2.
Here’s how the back looks compared to the 2021 model. Oh, hey, look, it’s Alex Kidman and his white 2021 Model 3 – he did a really good feature breakdown on YouTube. Thanks for letting me take these snaps, Alex.
The interior feels exceptional, though you may be annoyed by the lack of information behind the steering wheel and the moonroof that gets quite hot. The seats are airy and nice to sit in for a long drive, and Tesla’s driver assistance capabilities, though not perfect and not ideal for inner-city driving, works brilliantly on highways and motorways – just don’t let it do all the work for you, please don’t be unsafe.
The boot space is also exceptional for a sedan, and the phone app integration is still phenomenal. Being able to blast the aircon with my phone about 10 minutes before I hit the road, all while I’m outside of the car, was such a cool feature.
Not to mention Tesla is running circles around everybody else when it comes to public charging. This trip was the first time I got to experience Tesla’s 250kW superchargers (I used the supercharger at Tuggerah twice), and not only was it exceptionally easy – all I needed to do was park, open the hatch, and plug in, no activation prompt necessary as my information was saved to the car – I was also warned in the car of how many chargers were available on my way to the station, and the car suggested I navigate to an alternative when they were all full. Just to be clear – I found the battery estimation of my model to be pretty on-point.
Not to harp on, but gosh it’s a gorgeous car.
The verdict: should you buy the 2024 Tesla Model 3?
There is no doubt in my mind that Tesla has been the most important automaker over the past 10 years. Far ahead of much larger car companies and pioneering the EV space across several product divisions, the company deserves, at the very least, recognition for its effort.
But the age of ‘Tesla the start-up’ is over. The era of the early EV adopter is gone, the auto industry is catching up, and if you want a greener car, your options have grown considerably in the last two years.
I think the 2024 Tesla Model 3 is a gorgeous car. It’s nice to drive and would be a pleasure to be driven in. However, there are alternatives from other car companies, in particular Polestar and MG, that I would recommend drivers consider, for saving some money at least, but also for finding a more reasonable alternative with a more appropriate range of included features. I don’t think you’d regret it if you bought this car, but you’d sure as heck would need to be comfortable with the gear shift and indicator changes.
The 2024 Tesla Model 3 is a great car surrounded by equally great cars.
The Tesla Model 3 RWD starts at $61,900, and the AWD model starts at $71,900.
Image: Zachariah Kelly/Gizmodo Australia
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