The updated model was shown during the company’s 2025 shareholder meeting, featuring new design details, efficiency improvements and enhanced autonomous driving capability. Yet, despite the visual overhaul, the truck’s production story remains a familiar one: still in its prelude.
The redesigned Tesla Semi now sports Model Y-style headlights, a slimmer front bumper and improved aerodynamics. According to Electrek, the drag coefficient has been reduced to around 0.36, roughly 30 percent better than that of a comparable diesel tractor unit.
Tesla says the upgraded version consumes about 1.7 kWh per mile, retaining the promised 500-mile (800 km) range while lowering overall vehicle weight. The truck also supports 1.2 MW charging, enabling roughly 400 miles of range to be added in half an hour, timed conveniently with mandatory driver rest breaks.
The new model is also designed for future autonomy. Side-mounted cameras, an updated sensor array and the same AI toolkit used in Tesla’s passenger cars suggest that the Semi could eventually operate with higher levels of driver assistance.
Production still limited
While the company described the Nevada “Giga Semi” factory as being in the final stages of construction, the timeline for mass production remains uncertain. Tesla’s head of the Semi programme, Dan Priestley, said at the meeting that “larger builds” would begin by the end of 2025, with “real volume” coming in the second half of 2026.
That would mark yet another shift from the company’s original plan. When Elon Musk first revealed the truck in 2017, production was promised for 2019. It slipped to 2020, then 2021, then 2022. In December 2022, Tesla delivered a handful of units to PepsiCo and claimed that production had begun; but the output remained a pilot programme producing only dozens of vehicles.
Tesla now aims to reach 50,000 units a year once the Nevada plant is fully operational, though this target has not been independently verified.
Commercial promise meets commercial reality
According to Tesla’s figures, fleet operators using the early production Semi trucks, including PepsiCo and US Foods, reported energy costs up to 50 percent lower than diesel alternatives, along with reduced maintenance needs thanks to regenerative braking and the absence of oil changes.
However, industry analysts point out that those savings depend heavily on charging infrastructure, electricity tariffs and vehicle utilisation: factors that vary widely between markets. For long-haul operators, the economics of switching to electric remain challenging until charging networks and service facilities are more widespread.
Europe: still waiting
Although Tesla has long hinted at bringing the Semi to Europe, no firm launch date has been set. Electrive.com reports that the company is preparing a European homologation plan, but that 2026 is the earliest realistic timeframe for sales to begin.
The delay is partly regulatory (European cab-length and weight limits differ from those in the US) and partly competitive. Established truckmakers such as Volvo, Daimler Truck and MAN have already begun series production of battery-electric HGVs, with widespread service networks and aftersales support already in place.
Even Chinese manufacturers, including Windrose and Sany, have recently entered the European market with their own heavy-duty electric trucks.
A decade of missed deadlines
For all its technological ambition, the Semi remains an example of Tesla’s struggle to scale up beyond passenger cars. Battery production bottlenecks, factory delays and competing internal priorities have slowed progress.
The Nevada facility, a $3.6 billion investment covering 1.7 million sq ft, is still being fitted with equipment. In the meantime, the Semi exists largely as a fleet trial project.
Even in the United States, total sales are estimated to be under 300 units, a fraction of what Tesla originally envisioned. No official European sales have taken place.
