2020 Tesla Model X Reliability Report

The car suddenly speeds up at low speed: while parking, in drive-thru lines, or sitting at a light. Drivers say braking did not stop it. Seven of the 12 complaints involve crashes and two involve injuries, and some happened on nearly new cars. Other reports describe hard phantom braking on Autopilot or adaptive cruise at highway speed with nothing ahead, which nearly caused rear-end collisions. In one report the cruise control set speed jumps up or down on its own several times a day.

These are mixed complaints. Some describe sudden unintended acceleration with injury, and others describe phantom braking on Autopilot. After software updates, owners report the lane-keeping drifting over the right line, the speedometer reading zero while moving, and the driver display going black during FSD while the center screen reboots at highway speed. The rearview camera can freeze while reversing, which led to one crash into a bollard. Coolant valves leak and disable the car more than once a year. Owners also report inner tire wear and a tire delaminating at 15,000 miles.

Phantom braking dominates these reports. On Autopilot or adaptive cruise, the car brakes hard with no traffic or obstacle ahead. It happens on open highways, when cresting a rise, or when the car seems to think it is in a construction zone, dropping from 60 or 70 mph to 45. Some owners say it happens weekly and caused several near rear-end collisions, so they stopped using the features. Reports span roughly 10,000 to 50,000 miles. The single crash entry mentions only sudden acceleration.

In one report the driver's seat moves toward the steering wheel on its own at 70 mph and again while parked. In others it sticks after reclining and won't adjust, or slides on its tracks during driving and braking. One car got a whole new seat assembly. Rear seat restraint and seat safety system fault messages also appear. One owner was told the service center has been investigating the error for two years without a fix.

This category has only three complaints, and each is different. One car surged while pulling into a parking space and hit a retaining wall. In another, the accelerator pedal broke off while climbing a hill, which left the car stranded on a blind curve and needing a tow. A third car made a constant grinding and whining noise at about 30 mph. The dealer traced it to a front half-shaft at about 46,000 miles.

In one report a front subframe bolt sheared after a dip in a parking lot. After that, every turn and bump made a metal-on-metal noise. A rear falcon door doesn't close on the first press, scrapes the C-pillar, and sometimes stops halfway, so passengers have to climb over to get in or out. Repeat service visits haven't fixed it. In another case the side mirrors unfolded while backing out of a garage, which damaged one mirror.

The rearview camera freezes on a single frame while reversing, so the driver doesn't see what is actually behind the car. This has led to near misses with cross traffic in parking garages, and the image can stay frozen after the car stops. The other report describes the car lunging forward while holding with the brake applied and hitting the vehicle ahead. That crash caused an injury, and emergency braking reportedly did not intervene.