Tesla owners in China sue the company over lack of autopilot

In August 2025, seven Tesla car owners in China sued the American electric car manufacturer, accusing the company of lacking the promised Full Self-Driving (FSD) feature. The lawsuit was filed in the Daxing District People's Court in Beijing, ChinaEVHome reported, citing Chinese media.

The plaintiffs are seeking a refund of the FSD feature and treble damages from Tesla. The case has already been accepted for consideration and is now awaiting a trial.

One of the plaintiffs, using the pseudonym Liu Ming, said he purchased FSD for 56,000 yuan (~$7.8 thousand) in May 2020, but even five years later he still had not received it, although the feature itself had risen in price to 64,000 yuan (~$9,000).

"At the time, both the store salesperson and Elon Musk claimed that FSD full self-driving would definitely be achieved and soon available in China, and that the price would increase later. I believed them and bought it," Liu said in a statement.

Although some Tesla owners in China have already received the first version of Autopilot for urban roads, Liu Ming learned from the support service that the feature only works on cars with the fourth-generation computer (HW4.0). Cars with HW3.0 are not eligible for the update.

Other owners of the company's electric vehicles who requested a refund through customer support in the Tesla app did not receive a response. Instead, they were told that "Intelligent Driving Assistance purchases are not refundable."

Full Self-Driving is an autonomous driving system that allows Tesla electric vehicles to steer, accelerate, brake, change lanes, and turn on their own. However, it still requires constant driver supervision.

Recall that at the end of August, the results of a survey also appeared, which showed that FSD more often scares away potential buyers of Tesla electric cars than it interests them. At the same time, for half of customers, the autopilot system does not affect the choice of car at all.