Tesla just revealed its redesigned second-generation Roadster powered by SpaceX thrusters, a vehicle that CEO Elon Musk called “the best of the latest human-driven cars.”
Musk showed off the car at an event outside Waco, Texas, with a demonstration in which the car used a mix of high-powered fans and thrusters to drive up an inverted ramp, turn around and land easily on the sidewalk below. The car also used the thrusters to lift itself over a Cybercab, Cybertruck, Tesla Semi, Model Y, and Model 3 when in motion.
“This will be the real car that goes on the roads,” Musk said of the car, which Tesla has shown accelerates from 0 to 60 miles per hour in one second. “It will literally inflate itself, and uh, and be able to do these maneuvers whenever you want.”
Musk said Tesla would finally build the long-awaited vehicle in 2028, but did not specify a price. Tesla will offer it in three versions. The first is “Performance,” which Tesla describes as “road-ready.” It seats two, has active aerodynamics, and has a “multi-mode vacuum system for next-level performance on and off the track.” The second version is “Thrust”, which is “race-ready” and seats two, and features rear-mounted cold gas thrusters that enable acceleration from 0 to 60 mph in less than a second. The third is “Rocket”, which is “air ready” and seats one person, and has 10 cold gas thrusters positioned around the car.
All three versions will have a range of 300 miles and can reach speeds in excess of 230 miles per hour.
Tesla’s website showed Thursday that the company was taking reservations for the car, charging $50,000 just to reserve the Performance and $250,000 for the Thrust. The Rocket version is priced “by invitation only”.
Vice President of Engineering Lars Moravy said at the event that the Roadster uses 10 thrusters connected to 600 liters of compressed air to lift and spin the car in the air. The air tank can be recharged, he said. “Every usable void in the car is filled with carbon fiber-wrapped pressure vessels (COPV),” Tesla wrote in an article on X, referring to the type of pressure vessel that has been the cause of several SpaceX rocket explosions. The company said “every usable void” in the car is filled with these containers.
Musk also said at the event that Tesla might attempt to jump the Snake River Canyon – the site of Evel Knievel’s famous attempt to cross the gorge in a steam rocket.
Musk positioned the Roadster as a true flagship car for Tesla, saying at one point that he was “not sure if it would move the needle massively from a revenue perspective.” But he has already said that “safety is not the main objective” of the new Roadster.
“If you’re buying a Ferrari, safety is not the number one goal. I say if safety is your number one goal, don’t buy the Roadster,” he said in a podcast earlier this year. Tesla “would aspire to not kill anyone in this car,” he said.
“This is the culmination of the incredible work of engineers at Tesla and SpaceX working closely together to create something you haven’t seen in any movie, better than any James Bond car,” Musk said at the event. “I’ve never seen anything like this. You know, when I suggested this to the team, I was like, ‘Am I crazy?’
Musk previously claimed that the car “will be very different from what has been previously shown” and promised that the demo would be “the most exciting demo, working or not, ever produced.”
The design changes were notable. The car, presented in pure white, now has a more angular design reminiscent of a Lamborghini or the famous Lotus Esprit used by the character James Bond in The Spy Who Loved Me — a car that Musk owns and was on display at the event.
In another post, Tesla said the design was inspired by the SR-71 reconnaissance aircraft and the F-35 fighter jet.
“Our design language has evolved since the last reveal: from S3XY to Cybertruck, Cybercab and Optimus,” the company wrote.
Tesla held the event almost nine years to the day after the company first revealed the second-generation Roadster, a modernized version of its very first car. Unveiled as a surprise at the end of the Tesla Semi unveiling in 2017, the facelifted Roadster was supposed to be delivered in just a few years. Tesla allowed its customers to make a $50,000 deposit to reserve the car. Some even paid $250,000 to reserve one of the 1,000 “Founders Series” versions.
Musk first talked about adding boosters to the car in 2018. “The SpaceX options package for the new Tesla Roadster will include approximately 10 small rocket boosters arranged seamlessly around the car,” he wrote on Twitter that year. “These rocket engines greatly improve acceleration, top speed, braking and cornering. Maybe they will even allow a Tesla to fly…”
But the Roadster project took a back seat. In 2018, Tesla endured what Musk eventually dubbed “production hell” with the Model 3 sedan. The company then moved on to other projects like the Model Y SUV, which became the world’s best-selling vehicle, and the Cybertruck, which was a commercial failure by Tesla’s own standards. Along the way, Musk delayed the new Roadster to 2020, 2021, 2023 and 2024.
As time passed after the launch of these new vehicles, Musk started talking about the second generation Roadster again. Late last year, he said on Joe Rogan’s podcast that he wanted to reveal it by the end of 2025. A week later, at the shareholder meeting at which he received a $1 trillion pay package, he delayed it until April 1, 2026. Musk said holding an April Fool’s joke would give him “some deniability” if Tesla delayed again the event.
“I could say I was joking,” he said at the time. Tesla ended up delaying the reveal again. The organization attempted to hold the event on October 1, but bad weather forced another delay.
These repeated delays have led to a number of high-profile customers speaking out over the years, including YouTuber Marques Brownlee and OpenAI director Sam Altman.
“They just got on stage and said this newly designed 4,000+ pound car can flip and go at half the speed of sound (380+mph) and will ship in 2028,” Brownlee posted Thursday. “It’s a prank, isn’t it?”
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