general problems of the 2023 Tesla Model 3 - part 1

The vehicle’s brakes did not work, automatic emergency brakes and collision warning both did not work. I pressed on the brake for about 5 seconds but the brakes did not work, resulting in a collision with the car in front. Everything is available for inspection if needed. Both my safety and the driver of the vehicle in front of me was at risk. The problem has not been confirmed yet. The vehicle is currently at a shop, waiting inspection. There were no warning lamps, messages, or symptoms.

The contact owned a 2023 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated that while driving at an undisclosed speed in the third floor of a parking garage, the vehicle suddenly accelerated to full speed unintendedly, and the steering wheel and the brake pedal were inoperable, causing the contact to lose control of the vehicle. The vehicle crashed into a wall and crashed into the vehicle in front, and the vehicle stopped. No further information was available. No warning lights were illuminated. The front driver's side air bag deployed. The vehicle was towed to a tow lot and was deemed a total loss by the insurance company. A police report was filed. There was no injury sustained. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The failure mileage was 66,000.

On September 18, 2025, my 2023 Tesla Model 3 (VIN: 5yj3e1eb9pf632327) suddenly accelerated on its own and the brakes failed to respond despite repeated pressing. To avoid hitting other vehicles, I turned into a property driveway and struck a tree. The airbags deployed. This was a case of sudden unintended acceleration combined with complete brake failure, creating a serious safety hazard. Forward collision warning also did not prevent the impact. A police report was filed by the dekalb county police department, GA, USA (report #25-074809, case #0440200), which specifically documented brake failure as the cause of the accident. The report also notes that the driver was injured by the airbag and that the vehicle had to be towed from the scene. A copy of the police report can be provided upon request.

Vehicle information: 2023 Tesla Model 3 VIN: [xxx] incident date: [xxx] location: [xxx] summary of the problem: on [xxx], while autopilot was active, my 2023 Tesla Model 3 suddenly accelerated without driver input. I was pressing the brake pedal, but the vehicle surged forward uncontrollably, struck a fence and a tree, and caused major property damage. Both I and my wife (passenger) required urgent care treatment after the crash. Details / safety defect evidence: •Tesla’s own raw logs show the accelerator spiked to 100% immediately before impact. •brake pressure was recorded prior to impact, proving the brake pedal was applied. •despite this, Tesla’s official vehicle data report falsely states “manual brake not applied. ” •autopilot did not disengage when the brake was pressed, contrary to Tesla’s design claims. •the vehicle logged a “near-deploy collision” at ~27 mph, yet the airbags did not deploy. Why this is a safety defect: this incident reflects multiple critical failures: 1. Sudden unintended acceleration. 2. Failure of brake-override safety design. 3. Airbag non-deployment in a crash severe enough to trigger “near-deploy. ” 4. Inaccurate Tesla reporting that conceals braking input. This defect created an extremely dangerous situation that could easily have resulted in fatalities. I am requesting NHTSA investigate Tesla vehicles for unintended acceleration, brake override failure, and airbag non-deployment. Information redacted pursuant to the freedom of information act (foia), 5 u. S. C. 552(b)(6).

On August 7th, 2025 at around 8 am in the morning, my vehicles mobile phone car key was in-operable and I was unable to get in the car which led me to trouble shoot how to fix this issue with the car. Upon researching I was directed by Tesla to directly complete a soft reset of the vehicle holding down both buttons on the vehicle once I was inside, and pushing on the brake pedal. Upon completion, my vehicle booted up and I realized that all camera systems were down, my navigation systems were down, my safety features were down, my auto pilot, lane keeping assist and auto brake were down, sensors were down and I was no longer able to pre heat my battery to charge my vehicle due to issues with the navigation. I then took the vehicle to Tesla service center irvine where a service advisor quoted me 2900 for a new ecu and bolts and told me that I needed to replace my whole unit and that I was to cover the cost of the repair even though my vehicle is only 2 years of age and this failure is due to the quality control and software of the vehicle. I have been driving around a vehicle with absolutely no safety features whatsoever such as no cameras, sensors, auto braking, or full self driving due to this ecu failure and I fear for my safety and well being while driving this car.

While driving to work on a local road, I approached a red light where there were no vehicles immediately ahead. However, my vehicle unexpectedly steered off the road in front of a construction sign, entering a ditch. Despite my attempts to regain control of the steering and braking systems, I was unsuccessful. The vehicle subsequently stopped automatically on an incline. Fortunately, I avoided a collision with a gas station and intersecting roadway, but sustained damage to my car’s front bumper. Law enforcement and a towing service were contacted to remove the vehicle. I tried calling the dealership almost half day without an answer, then I went to the dealership where they told me that the hardware is fine but they can’t do anything about the possible software issues which leaves me in a situation where I’m nervous to drive the car. I reached out to the company about the accident and didn’t hear back yet from them. I request a thorough investigation into this incident to determine the cause of the unexpected, highly dangerous, autopilot behavior. I am disturbed mentally and emotionally due to the accident. I also require confirmation of the vehicle's roadworthiness and assurance that it is safe to operate before resuming driving.

My Tesla Model 3 disengaged cruise control while going 68 mph and braked hard for no apparent reason. I was driving northbound on I-405 at 3:45 a. M. Going to lax airport in the number 3 or 4 of six or seven lanes. Cruise control had been activated for at least 10 minutes before the incident at a speed of 68 mph. There was no traffic within half a mile before or after me due to the time of day. Neither my left or right foot were near either the brake or acceleration pedal, nor were they in motion. Both hands were on the steering wheel and no control was being activated. The only noticeable environmental condition is that the road surface had just changed from a dark gray asphalt to a bright white new concrete roadway. No emergency braking alert was seen or heard, so I do not think it was a false collision detection, and there was no car within a half mile. However, I do believe the severity of braking could have caused an accident if there had been someone behind me. Tesla Model 3 software version was v12 (2025. 20. 6 046c4575d120).

I was traveling at highway speeds on a highway with no vehicles or other obstacles in front of me. I had adaptive cruise control on. Then, the emergency brakes deployed for no reason (so called “phantom braking”), decelerating the car quickly. I turned off adaptive cruise control as fast as I could and nothing bad happened. But the situation was dangerous, as if a car was close behind me it could have rear ended my vehicle.

The full self driving is very dangerous. I had several events that put me in danger. Like, going to the wrong lane. Going to the wrong way. Changing lanes that almost hit a car good thing I took over right away. It made the other car upset and honk at me.

The contact owns a 2023 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated that while releasing the accelerator pedal, the vehicle accelerated independently. The contact stated that the vehicle stopped accelerating after 3-seconds. The vehicle was taken to the dealer to be diagnosed, and it was determined that the tires needed to be replaced. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The failure mileage was 48,426.

On several occasions, the last being July 19,2024, auto correct on steering took control of my vehicle when no correction was needed. I’ve been taken by surprise and struggled on all occasions to gain full control of the vehicle. In addition, my car is not able to receive the over-air update to address the hood latch recall which leaves me more vulnerable to a catastrophic event. I can not reach a person in service as Tesla pushes every communication through the app. My appointment was pushed out over three weeks and I still have not heard from Tesla to confirm this appointment nor reach out with any concern whatsoever regarding this horrific safety concern.

On 5/28/24, while pulling up the driveway, the car suddenly accelerated and it’s so fast that we couldn’t react. The car crashed into the garage, knocked down one wall along with the main electrical panel. It stopped because it got stuck on 10 in foundation’s of garage structure. The collision mitigation feature did not get triggered and didn’t give any alert or helped to stop the car from crashing into the garage. Airbags on both driver and passenger sides did not deploy. Prior to this accident, the car already had issue with the driver’s profiles and the seat just moved back and stuck at the easy entry mode. The car became inoperable because the driver’s seat can’t be moved forward to a position where I could reach the gas and brake pedal. I contacted Tesla service and was told to delete the driver’s profile and create new one , power off the screen, power cycled the car. I’ve done all of that but the problem kept happening on and off. The car was scheduled to be looked at by Tesla on 6-20-24 but the accident happened on 5-28-24. We’d like to find out the root cause of the accident whether the car has any malfunction that could’ve triggered the sudden unintended acceleration. We’ve reported the accident to both Tesla and my insurance company. Tesla confirmed that the data was downloaded and being reviewed and there is no available information to be shared with me at this time.

When using cruise control, my 2023 Tesla Model 3 will aggressively brake without warning or apparent cause. The braking is near maximal - as though the vehicle is attempting to prevent an imminent collision. This defect poses a hazard to occupants of vehicles behind mine as well as myself and my passengers as sudden braking could cause a rear-end collision and cascading loss of control. Inclement weather would have exacerbated the problem. This problem is documented. From my brief research it appears phantom braking has been the subject of a NHTSA investigation previously but for prior model years. The issue persists. When I questioned Tesla service regarding this life and limb threatening problem their staff was aware and well versed at requesting the customer report the issue as though it were a minor software glitch. This is a significantly more serious problem necessitating an appropriate response.

When using fsd beta, vehicle would fail to stop for red lights. Vehicle also attempted to merge me both into a tractor trailer traveling the opposite direction and a jersey barrier. This is a very dangerous and unsafe system that will lead to many fatalities.

Driving normally down I-5, no other cars nearby and system suddenly phantom brakes. I am lucky no other cars were behind me as it may have well caused an accident. There were no other cars in front of me within at least 1 mile.

I have twice experienced a sudden acceleration when decreasing pressure on the accelerator pedal. It felt like the motor was producing full power. In both cases, I was able to quickly apply the brake which stopped the acceleration. Both episodes happened at slow speed, less than 20 mph, while either starting to slow for a stop or making a turn. Software on the car is fully up to date as of February 2024.

Unintended acceleration after I tried to park take off before I can parked it violently crash into the wall.

Vehicle does not have the proper software updates needed to clear the two NHTSA recalls for my VIN.

I was driving my daughter to school on the freeway when we heard a loud bang toward the back of the vehicle and the vehicle alarms started going off. It said the car was powering down and would not restart. The car immediately reduced speed from 65 to 35 mph and I had to maneuver across 4 lanes of rush hour traffic to safely park on the side of the freeway. Thankfully this did not cause a collision but we were lucky. Even though the car was charged at 55% within 10 minutes the car was completely dead and powered off. I was able to take a picture of some of the error messages on the screen quickly before it died. Vcfront a191 electrical system power reduced vehicle shutting down, vcfront 192 electrical system is unable to support all features switching off features to conserve energy, bmsa 059 vehicle may not restart, bms a170 acceleration and top speed reduced, hvp w028 vehicle may not restart. There was no visible damage to the outside or undercarriage of the car. At the dealership when I had the car towed there I was specifically asked if I had washed the car or gotten it wet, which I had not. It has been a week and I have not had a response from Tesla as to the cause of this terrifying event. I have only been told that it has been escalated to the “higher ups” and they are still diagnosing the problem and will not tell me what defect they have found in the car or any date as to when they might have answers. The life and safety of myself and my child were put in danger due to this total shut down of my car on the freeway. Thankfully I was able to safely navigate to the side of the freeway at reduced speed but I do not want this to happen to anyone else. I hope I can get some answers to prevent this from happening in any other 2023 Model 3 .

I decided to take my first road trip in the new telsa Model 3. The trip was from seattle to portland down i5 which is a pretty straight and easy road. Because of this I decided to use the autopilot feature (I purchased the fsd package) to help take the stress out of driving. (note, this is my first electric vehicle and even my first vehicle with a screen, so I stayed very aware and present the whole time driving with hands on wheel). After a while of driving I noticed the 'arrow' icon on the maps, which indicates my car, wasn't centered on the road and was in fact about quarter to half an inch to the right of the road. I didn't think much of it as I've seen my google maps do this before and after a little bit it readjust and fixes it. As the car was driving, it performed a sudden deceleration and then put on the blinkers to turn left (which I'm on the interstate so there was no left turn). What I noticed was that because the icon on the map wasn't centered on the road, it thought I was off the side of it. When it came up to a side street, it then thought I was on the side street. Thus it rapidly slowed me down to the side street speed limit (35 mph vs the 70 on the interstate), and then thought it needed to turn left to get on to an on-ramp to get me back on the interstate highway. Luckily I was able to catch it in time, but I had to fight with the blinkers for almost a full minute to get them to turn off. After this happened again several more miles down the road, I decided to manually drive the rest of the way. Once I got to a charging station and powered the car off and on, the icon then was centered on the road again. I have noticed a few times since, that it 'gets confused' on what road I'm on and it is concerning that this has a lot of control over the car. It would be great to have a manual way to tell the map that I am currently on which road so it can then note that.

So thanks to your interference my autopilot on my Tesla is broken. . . You guys think you are making our cars safer by getting your controlling poorly educated stupid hands into Tesla systems that are designed to be more safe. On paper Tesla autopilot is factually proven to be more safe than a human driver, these reports are publicly available perhaps your team was too lazy to read them. My car disengaged autopilot randomly while driving with 2 cars behind me and freaked out and told me I was not paying enough attention to the road just because I reached to unlock my phone screen. . . Not even pick it up off the wireless charging pad. . . Just unlocked the screen. So thanks to your agencies interference and forcing Tesla to levy this bogus "recall fix" on us I almost got rear-ended. . . In the car I work so hard to pay for, the car that I love because it keeps me and my family safe because guess what we are humans and not robots. Just as you do and everyone in your agency we all have to look at our phones briefly while driving because we live lives where we have to make sure those we love are ok or make sure our phone is charged for when we reach our destination. You are going to do exactly the opposite of your agencies supposed mission of keeping us safe. You will kill people with this stupid "recall". Get your crap together and tell Tesla to reverse autopilot back to its normal safe operating parameters and stop banning people from autopilot otherwise there are going to be a lot more wrecks and deaths. I'm not saying you should be taking duck selfie pictures for social media with your phone while in autopilot on a rural back road. . . That person deserves to be a victim of modern natural selection. But what your doing is over-controlling and you have no right to dabble in things you obviously don't understand. Your agency should be ashamed of itself, you are about as efficient as our government is at managing money. . . Fix it back.

Vehicle will repeatedly aggressively brake while using “enhanced autopilot”, posing a danger to any cars behind. Complaints given to Tesla have been unresolved.

Vehicle auto stopped in the middle of the parkway.

On 2 separate occasions, the cruise control set to 80 and suddenly decelerates. Very scary. Term being used in Tesla chat rooms is 'phantom breaking'.

Multiple times, the vehicle braked on its own while traveling eastbound on the interstate 8 freeway between yuma, az & gila bend, az. This was when no other vehicle or obstruction was on the freeway within a mile of the vehicle. The braking was very jarring, and if another vehicle was behind us it could have easily caused a high speed rear-end collision.

When cruise control is engaged, the vehicle suddenly decelerates, (at times dropping speed by more than 20 mph in less than 2 seconds). This occurs as often as 5-10 times in a single 60mi trip, and occurs at least once per trip on this same route (divided highway, sometimes with hills, often with no other cars ahead of or around the vehicle, speed 60-70mph) these events are unsafe because unexpected braking is a hazard for following cars and my passengers. My job as a driver is to be as predictable as possible, but when I use the cruise control the car behaves unpredictability problem reported to dealer, confirmed by remote diagnostic, and car was serviced but the problem got worse. There are no warning lamps or error messages displayed in conjunction with these sudden braking events. First appeared when the car reached 2000miles on odometer.

Tesla Model 3 policy #: tla-CA-a-t-tau4lfj7 claim number: cl-64-u4lfj7-1 I hope this email finds you well. I am writing to report an incident involving my Tesla Model 3 (blue) and to initiate the process for an insurance claim. The incident occurred on September 22nd, 2023, at approximately 2:15 pm. My fiancée was the driver of the vehicle at the time of the incident. Incident details: - date: September 22nd, 2023 - time: approximately 2:15 am - vehicle: Tesla Model 3 (blue) location: the incident took place on the freeway merge from ramp 87, where it merges onto 85 southbound. Heading home. Circumstances: my fiancée was operating the vehicle in autopilot mode while maintaining her hands securely on the steering wheel. As she approached the freeway merge from ramp 87, heading onto 85 southbound, she experienced an unexpected jolt. Despite her continuous control of the steering wheel, the autopilot system seemed to be accelerating without her input. Simultaneously, my fiancée felt a sudden tire malfunction, which resulted in a significant loss of control over the vehicle. Despite her best efforts to maintain the car's position within the lane, the Tesla Model 3 veered off the freeway and entered the adjacent ravine area. Impact and airbags: upon entering the ravine area, the vehicle experienced a collision. Multiple plants/highbrush/uneven terrain as well as having to maneuver around 2 large palm trees which resulted damage to side mirror. Notably, none of the vehicle's airbags were deployed during the incident, and there were no sensor alerts, except for the tire pressure warning light. Also there wasn't any record of dashcam recording when we checked the car. We are seriously concerned that the airbags did not deploy , attached are photos concerning the damage. I would like to emphasize that my fiancée was diligently following safety guidelines and had her hands on the steering wheel while using autopilot. This incident occurred suddenly and unexpectedly.

The cruise control was set at 70 mph. The car braked itself and tried to stop itself even though I had no cars or objects in front of me. I had to apply the accelerator to get it to out of stopping itself. It happened twice in a short amount of time on that morning. The car is available for inspection. This is a safety issue as it could have caused an accident if I had someone too close behind me while driving on freeway I-75. I have not had the car inspected as this just happened yesterday 09/22/2023 and today is 09/23/2023. There was no warning prior to this happening and no issues with the car. Again this happened on 09/22/2023 for the first time. Thank you.

It happened in a parking lot around 8:20 pm on 09. 13. 23. When I slowly moved to parking space car suddenly accelerated, jumped over raised pavement for pedestrian walking, hit parked car on the other side of walking path, continue going with uncontrollable high speed across the parking, then car slowed down and I finally parked. Woman who witnessed accident and called the police told the police officer that she saw brake lights of my car were on. Two women from the car I hit showed me the markings from my tires on pavement. My husband who arrived to the place of accident by this time took pictures of these marks and next morning we return back to take another pictures and video. My car's odometer reading was less than 100 miles. We are having problem of uploading our pictures. We can supply to you our pictures and video if you need them.

On 09/11/2023 at approx. 6am cst, my wife went to a nearby walmart store for groceries. As she was parking the car in the parking space, the car started to accelerate by itself and went around the parking lot in random directions. She couldn't control the steering and brake despite the continuous tries. It was such a traumatic experience, and the car went on to hit couple of other parked cars and the cart return stations in the parking lot. After few seconds of random self-drive in multiple directions of parking lot, it finally came to a halt as it got on a curb that flattened the tires. By god's grace, the car stopped right before entering the main busy road due to flat tires and also no pedestrians at that time. Otherwise, the situation could have been worse as the car was going in an uncontrollable manner. The incident was reported to 911 and they got the car towed to a towing garage. We got the incident report from the police department. They also have the cctv footage of this incident. We also have the dashcam videos recorded by Tesla and pictures taken after the incident. I will provide any supporting documentation you might need to understand this incident and address the issue. We are trying to come out of the trauma from this incident and would like to bring this issue to the attention of all concerned parties for next steps.

I was driving on I-35 from kansas city to des moines on 9-11-23, and three times the car experienced phantom braking (I. E. The car suddenly braked for no apparent reason) while the adaptive cruise control was activated. During these instances the car would suddenly brake and slow down and on one occasion I had to accelerate immediately to avoid possibly being rear ended. On all occasions there were no obstacles on the road or cars within 1/4 of a mile ahead of me.

1. When vehicle is on autopilot mode. Vehicle will all a sudden brake by itself with no reason as to why, no cars in front of me intermitly. Mostly happens when driving at highway speeds and when approaching a overpass. 2. Could be crash from the rear. 3. Have not notified Tesla. 4. No inspections have been performed 5. No warnings and no beeping either just brakes by itself intermitly.

The contact owns a 2023 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated that while their spouse was parking the vehicle and pressing the parking button the vehicle suddenly accelerated. The vehicle jumped the curb, crashing into two different vehicles to eventually be stopped after crashing into a tree. The air bags did not deploy. There was damage to the other vehicles and to the tree. The driver received injuries to their neck and back. Medical attention was not needed. A police report was filed. The vehicle had been towed. The vehicle was taken to a certified mechanic who had not diagnosed or repaired the vehicle as of yet. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The approximate failure mileage was 500.

Ever since I purchased my 2023 Tesla Model 3 I have periodically experienced a phenomenon widely referred to on the web as "phantom braking". Google it (though you probably already know about it). When it makes the biggest impression on me is when I am driving at over 50 mph on an open highway and the car suddenly slows down, to the extent that it feels like someone is applying the brakes. Every time it happened in recent memory there were no cars in front of me for hundreds if not thousands of feet, which is why it's surprising because there has never been an apparent reason for the sudden deceleration. Instinctively, I look in the rear view mirror to see if anyone is behind me because if someone were relatively close behind me such a sudden slow down could, imo, cause an accident - or at least alarm the other driver enough to slam on their brakes. Having read about phantom braking I believe that Tesla removed the traditional lidar (or equivalent) technology used by other car makers for adaptive speed control or a similar feature, and instead relies solely on cameras to make judgements. This decision, imo, has led to a dangerous weakness in the reliability of Tesla's cruise control.

I was coming to a stop due to a train passing by. As I got closer to the other vehicles that were waiting for the train, I let go of the acceleration and then the vehicle on its own launched forward rear ending the car in front of me.