Complaint volume
650 consumer-submitted complaints are matched to this model year. Treat the count as a research signal, then read the actual summaries for repeated symptoms.
Complaint records
2021 Tesla Model 3 Complaints
650 consumer-submitted complaints on record for the 2021 Tesla Model 3, grouped by component category.
650 Total complaints
45 Crash reports
5 Fire reports
16 Injury reports
Complaint data reflects consumer-submitted reports. A complaint is not proof
of a defect, recall, or manufacturer fault. Enriched severity fields come
from official bulk records when the complaint can be matched by ODI number.
Buyer interpretation
How to use these complaints before buying
Complaint records are most useful when they turn into inspection points, seller questions, and comparison checks against nearby model years.
Pattern to inspect
The most common categories are forward collision avoidance, service brakes,forward collision avoidance, vehicle speed control,forward collision avoidance. Use those categories as a test-drive checklist instead of judging the vehicle from the total count alone.
Severity flags
Enriched records include 45 crash reports, 5 fire reports, 16 injury reports, and 5 fatality reports. These fields come from complaint records and should be read in context.
Mileage clue
Mileage is available on 42 complaints, with an average reported failure mileage of 18,076 miles. Compare that with the mileage on the listing.
Questions to ask the seller
- Have you had any problems related to forward collision avoidance, service brakes,forward collision avoidance, vehicle speed control,forward collision avoidance?
- Can I see recent maintenance and repair records?
- Has the vehicle ever been towed, involved in a crash, or repaired for the same issue twice?
- Can we also check the recall record for this 2021 Tesla Model 3?
Used-car checklist
Use these complaints before the test drive.
Build a buyer checklist to turn these issues into questions and inspection points.
2021 Tesla Model 3
Build buyer checklist Compare with other years Sends year, make, and model to pre-fill your checklist.
How severe are the 2021 Tesla Model 3 complaints?
45 Crash
5 Fire
16 Injury
5 Fatality
38 Towed
18 Medical attention
What are the most common 2021 Tesla Model 3 complaint categories?
FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 199
SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 57
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 53
UNKNOWN OR OTHER 41
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 33
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM 21
VISIBILITY/WIPER 12
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL 11
SERVICE BRAKES 10
UNKNOWN OR OTHER,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 10
650 total complaints on record
Latest complaints
| Date | Component | Summary | Severity | Mileage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mar 2022 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL | I was driving on a divide highway at 70 mph in the HOV lane with cruise control activated, not auto steering, when the car abruptly slowed down. No car was visible in front of me. If someone was following closely behind me an accident could have occurred. I reported this to Tesla. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | This vehicle's basic "autopilot" and adaptive cruise control is dangerous. The vehicle is unable to pass a truck on the highway while either system is active without slamming on the brakes. This is major safety hazard on the highway as following cars do not expect any vehicle to slam on the brakes at highway speeds. Further, using the cruise control on two lane road is also dangerous. Any large vehicle in the opposite oncoming lane will cause the vehicle to slam on its brakes. These systems are essentially unusable and are very dangerous to use. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER | No specific incident, but potentially dangerous. Several of the font sizes used on the Touchscreen, but especially the ones displaying the time, the temperature, and the miles remaining on the charge, are very difficult, if not impossible, to read if you need reading glasses. This is especially true for seniors. In order to get that information, you need to either pull out and put on your reading glasses or move your face to the right and closer to the screen, both potentially dangerous if you’re moving, especially at high speeds. This problem has been complained about repeatedly online for several years, but so far no response from Tesla. I don’t think it would be difficult or expensive either to give owners the option to increase font size or to make a one time increase of, say, 30% or 60%. The change would make driving a lot safer for those of us are on the wrong end of 60. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Phantom braking occurs often when using traffic aware cruise control. I have not been able to determine a pattern, as the malfunction is not consistent. It can occur on a 2-lane road (with lines) as well as on a 6-line divided highway. I can tell the difference between phantom braking and the vehicle adjusting speed for an upcoming curve, as normal adjustment occurs in the same spot each time. Phantom braking is unpredictable, and may not occur in a location that it previously had. There are days it never happens, or sometimes once a day, or has occurred 5 times in an approx 6 mile trip. During a phantom braking event, the car unexpectedly applies the brakes hard. I react by pressing the accelerator, which usually results in a speed greater than the speed limit. I use the bug report feature each time it occurs, so Tesla would be able to view each event. As I'm sure you can tell from the VIN, this is a camera-only Tesla system. I do not have full self driving. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | I was driving on interstate 8 from Tucson to San Diego. In a matter of 2 hours my Tesla activated the brakes on its own 5 times, sometimes in a rapid series of 2 to 3 times, causing me to lurch while going 75 mph so I immediately disengaged the adaptive cruise control. I was on a 2 lane divided highway with no cars in front of me, see picture attached. Since taking possession of my new 2021 model 3 in November 2021, it has happened about 11 times. I just had my wife research it. I will not be using this feature. A semi truck behind me almost swerved off the road because of my braking. This is unacceptable that Elon Musk is not recalling vehicles. His arrogance is going to kill people for this clear safety issue. Please take over and do the recall. They sold me this car knowing this was an hazard since June 2021. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Was driving and automatic braking system engaged when there was no impeding incident. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER | on 3/9, the car lost heat (no heat at all, blowing cold air) and it was giving error message that the climate was unavailable. It created a driving hassle since the windshield was frosted. I took the car in to the Tesla service center on 3/10. They returned the car to me on 3/16, mentioning they replace the heat pump. on 3/17, the car starts giving error message saying the climate control is unavailable. I told the car in back to the same Tesla service center in Springfield NJ. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | TIRES | Pirelli PZero 235/35/R20 tires on the entire car, was driving when front left tire blew out after 4500 miles, had the car towed back to Tesla dealer and tire replaced. Now after 2 months, rear left tire has bubble on the sidewall after only 5400 miles with no indication of previous damage. I believe this to be a defective tire and an immense safety hazard. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | We just took our first road trip from Minneapolis to Denver in our 2021 Model 3 and experienced about 14 phantom braking events in about 900 miles. Two happened at night and the rest in broad daylight with perfect visibility on the Interstate. There was nothing I saw in or by the road that would explain any camera confusion. In all but two events, there were no other cars within 100 yards. In the first 200 miles we had 2 minor braking events and one severe one (hard breaking that required steady accelerator pressure to regain and maintain speed). There were no events in the next 300 miles. Then we had a moderate event which I immediately corrected. The next event was the most severe -- rapid deceleration followed by acceleration then deceleration, then a few seconds of speed fluctuation before I took full control (I purposely allowed this event to play out without intervention since there was no one around us and I wanted to see if it would correct itself--it didn't). Unfortunately, my wife hurt her neck in this one which resulted in neck pain and headaches for the rest of the day. Our dogs were in the back seat and were tossed around but OK. I then pulled over and rebooted the car. Within 5 minutes we had another moderate event. I pulled over again, cleaned the windshield, and reset/recalibrated the cameras. We understood this might take up to 100 miles, but in our case it only took about 5 miles. We tried the autopilot again and had a minor event within minutes and another minor event a few minutes later, and then a third a few minutes after that. I thought maybe the cameras didn't properly recalibrate since the process was so fast, so I pulled over and recalibrated again. As before, recal was done in a few miles. At this point my foot was hovering over the accelerator so I was able to intervene quickly to mitigate the severity. Over the next 20 miles there were 5 more events--a mixture of minor and moderate. We gave up and drove the last 100 miles manually. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Phantom braking, the vehicle will stop unexpectedly while using adaptive cruise control even if there are no vehicles or objects on the road for miles. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | I have a lot of unexpected braking problems for no reason | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When driving using either the "traffic aware cruise control" or "autopilot" (I do not have full self driving), the care frequently slams the brakes when there is no instance of an obstacle in-front of the vehicle. This has happened consistently and frequently causing instances with cars having to go to the shoulder to not rear end me. Most commonly this has occurred on rural 2 lane roads when a vehicle is coming from the other direction. As the vehicle from the other direction approaches the Tesla will suddenly emergency brake unexpectedly. This issue is even further exacerbated at night when this can happen with almost every passing vehicle. This issue has occurred enough times with either near rear end incidents or catching me so off guard I struggle to maintain my composure I often do not use the feature and am looking at getting rid of it due to being unusable even with the basic cruise feature. The date and speed below are the most recent but this has occurred many times in 2500 miles (easily 50 or more). | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When The auto pilot is activated I have experienced many times that the car randomly stops. This happened when I was on the highway and I was almost rear ended | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | The contact owns a 2021 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated while driving 65 MPH, he attempted to honk the horn to warn a vehicle that abruptly moved in front of his vehicle however, the horn failed to respond. The contact stated that the horn only responded when he applied more pressure to it. There were no warning lights illuminated. The vehicle was taken to the Tesla Service Center where the horn switch was adjusted; however, the failure reoccurred. A Tesla mobile technician arrived at the contact's residence and diagnosed that the steering wheel was not seated properly, and the steering wheel switch was securely adjusted; however, the failure persisted. The vehicle was taken to a second Tesla service center, Tesla (4180 El Camino Real, Palo Alto, CA 94306) where it was diagnosed that the horn retaining clip needed to be adjusted. The contact stated that the vehicle was repaired; however, the failure reoccurred. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was notified of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 900. | Crash: No Fire: No | 900 |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | The automatic emergency brakes would go off while driving on autopilot at highway speed, when there is nothing in front of the car. The brakes are very unexpected and aggressive, potentially putting the car at risk of being rare ended. Tesla states that I should press on the accelerator to override the brakes, but most times the braking is so aggressive that the override isn’t affective. Moreover, my car would give false forward collision warning if the car in front of me slows down even a little bit, even when there is at least a 5 car distance from me to the car in front of me, and we are no where near colliding. Tesla would use these false forward collision warnings to drive down my “safety score” and raise the premium of the insurance they offer me. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Drivers side camera not working making cruise control (adaptive & regular) unavailable also left turn blind spot visualization not available. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | We were traveling at about 75 mph on Intestate 94 in Wisconsin (same speed as the other cars around us) using adaptive cruise control when our car suddenly hit the brakes, the display showed the speed limit sign of 70 MPH, but the display where it would have shown the max speed we set, instead showed maximum speed of 40 mph. I used the accelerator pedal to return the speed to that of the surrounding traffic without problems. During other parts of the journey cars came up close behind us as they wanted to go faster and had this happened then we would have been the lead car in a severe rear end collision. This happened several other times during the same two day road trip, including once about a minute before the incident described above, but none were this severe, perhaps "lightly" tapping the brakes even though there would not have been a need to. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | While using autopilot or cruise control on the highway, the vehicle frequently brakes for no reason and without warning. This occurs repeatedly throughout the drive. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | I was on I-470 east of I-25 going east. I was traveling at 83 MPH, therefore the car was not in Autopilot, only had cruise control on. I signaled a lane change, made the lane change, and then the car applied brakes hard, going from 83 MPH down to 66 MPH. This happened in front of a late-model full-size pickup truck. The driver of the truck was not happy and tailgated for about 2 miles. I reported this problem to Tesla. They first don't want to even allow a service visit on the issue. Second, they want to charge me over $80 for a service visit on a car that is under warranty. When we had FSD beta in January 2022, we didn't face these issues except once or twice. Tesla advisor even admitted to me that cars with FSD beta and cars with Autopilot have different navigation software. Therefore, Tesla has a fix for this issue. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | The contact owns a 2021 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated that while driving at various speeds with the cruise control activated, the vehicle would independently slow down without warning as vehicles on the opposite side of traffic would pass by his vehicle. The dealer nor the manufacturer had yet to be notified of the failure. The vehicle had yet to be repaired. The failure mileage was approximately 1,000. | Crash: No Fire: No | 1,000 |
| Mar 2022 | WHEELS | The tire fell off the car while driving. The lateral link bolts have come unfastened and cause the link to come out of place and consequently damage several suspension components. As the bolts unfastened, the wheel was separated from the car and fell off, causing the car to be undrivable. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When the cruise control is activated, phantom braking happens within about 20 seconds. Also, when autopilot is engaged, phantom braking also happens within about 20-30 seconds. The phantom braking happens when there are no obstacles in the road or other traffic. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When either in autopilot or in cruise control especially in long drive car perform phantom breaking creating a risk of rear-end collision with following vehicles. Car vision system at times recognize cars coming in the opposite way as imminent collision and performs emergency phantom breaks.03/ | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When the cruise control is set at a speed or the line centering cruise control is used the car will slam on it's brakes and go from the set 75 to between 50-60mph then back to the set speed. This happens almost every time I drive the car on the highway and a few times in town(35mph) it happens so often I stopped using cruise control because I am afraid of getting rear ended. I have been looking online and others are calling this phantom braking. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2022 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Three times, while using cruise control with autopilot, my Model 3 rapidly braked with no one in front of me while driving on the interstate at 70-75MPH. Luckily I was paying attention and quickly accelerated to avoid traffic following me from running into me. One of the times was a severe “brake check” on a following car. I don’t use the option in traffic anymore. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |