Tesla shook up the world of the autonomous vehicle this morning, with its Artificial Intelligence Director, Ashok Elluswamy, announcing today that Model Y has completed its first autonomous delivery of a customer car and this was done without even a single incident, and with the car achieving up to a speed of 72-miles per hour. The autonomous delivery comes just days after Tesla kicked off a limited pilot of its Robotaxi service in Austin, Texas.
The announcement serves as a historic moment in the history of Tesla and the self-driving cars as a whole, because it is the third (after vehicles used by SpaceX and Tesla employees) real-life, hands-free, front-to-back test of the Full Self-Driving (FSD) package in a commercially relevant environment.
A Smooth and Confident Ride
As Ashok has reported, the Model Y was released in a Tesla logistics hub and followed public roads, due to which it reached the home of one of its customers without being controlled by a human operator. Ashok said via X (formerly Twitter) that it is a self-driving vehicle that could deal with city streets, highways, lane changing, merging, traffic signals, and complicated intersections, among others. At one time, it even hit 72 mph on the freeway- smooth, stable, and safe.
Tesla also verified that the route of delivery was around 14 miles, and there was both a city and highway section in it. The delivery vehicle allegedly reacted to real-time road changes, including lane blocks and merging traffic, which provided real-time decision-making.
Full Autonomy in Action
Although Tesla has been beta-testing its FSD system for many years, this is the first delivery to a customer without a human safety driver and outside control. The step has been predicted by the long-term vision of Elon Musk to create Teslas into robotaxis and totally automated delivery machines.
This is not a tech demo only, Ashok noted. It is an end-to-end and customer-facing fully autonomous operation. No driver. No intervention. Only AI and engineering in action.”
🚨BREAKING: Tesla AI Director Ashok confirms Model Y hit 72 mph during first fully autonomous customer delivery
No issue at all. pic.twitter.com/Cvn1e5bIY4
— Muskonomy (@muskonomy) June 27, 2025
Regulatory Readiness and Implications
This delivery was in Texas, where Tesla is collaborating closely with the state transportation agency to make sure that regulation is observed as they keep changing with the AVs. To the present moment, Tesla FSD remains at the level of SAE Level 2, that is, requiring the driver to watch the road constantly. Nevertheless, this exhibit stretches the definition of that category.
Industry analysts think that it may lead to a re-evaluation of existing definitions and expectations regarding autonomy by the regulatory bodies.
It is the type of live deployment that alters the story, according to Jessica Monroe, who is an automotive analyst with Autonomy Insights. Tesla has just demonstrated that it is able to literally deliver vehicles by hand. That is no longer science fiction anymore.”
