A new survey suggests that Tesla’s Full Self-Driving system may be doing the opposite of what the company hopes. Instead of drawing buyers in, it seems to be driving them away. The poll, conducted by Slingshot Strategies through the Electric Vehicle Intelligence Report, asked 8,000 U.S. consumers how they felt about the technology. Only 14 percent said FSD would make them more likely to buy a Tesla, while 35 percent said it would make them less likely. The rest, 51 percent, said it would make no difference. To make matters worse, almost half of respondents said the feature should be banned entirely, according to CNBC.
Tesla has long promoted FSD as a game-changer, a feature that sets it apart from other carmakers. But the survey shows that many drivers are skeptical, and some are outright alarmed. The issue isn’t just whether the system works, but whether people trust it enough to want it in their cars.
One detail that stands out is how strongly people feel about the hardware involved. Seventy percent of respondents said autonomous vehicles should rely on both LiDAR and cameras, while only 3 percent agreed with Tesla’s vision-only approach. That’s a sharp contrast to the company’s insistence that cameras alone are sufficient. The numbers suggest that Tesla may be out of step with what most people believe is necessary for safety.
This is especially problematic because Tesla is already facing headwinds in the EV market. Sales growth has slowed, competition is heating up, and other automakers are making steady progress with their own assisted-driving systems. If FSD is seen as a liability rather than a selling point, it risks undercutting one of Tesla’s most heavily advertised features.
The survey paints a clear picture: consumers want more reassurance, not less. They want to feel confident that advanced driving systems are designed with every possible safeguard in mind. Without that, even the most ambitious technology may struggle to gain public acceptance. For Tesla, the message is simple but difficult – trust matters as much as innovation.
