Complaint volume
741 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
2022 Tesla Model 3 Complaints
741 consumer-submitted complaints on record for the 2022 Tesla Model 3, grouped by component category.
741 Total complaints
51 Crash reports
3 Fire reports
26 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, vehicle speed control,forward collision avoidance, service brakes,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 51 crash reports, 3 fire reports, 26 injury reports, and 1 fatality report. These fields come from complaint records and should be read in context.
Mileage clue
Mileage is available on 55 complaints, with an average reported failure mileage of 13,827 miles. Compare that with the mileage on the listing.
Questions to ask the seller
- Have you had any problems related to forward collision avoidance, vehicle speed control,forward collision avoidance, service brakes,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 2022 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.
2022 Tesla Model 3
Build buyer checklist Compare with other years Sends year, make, and model to pre-fill your checklist.
How severe are the 2022 Tesla Model 3 complaints?
51 Crash
3 Fire
26 Injury
1 Fatality
32 Towed
21 Medical attention
What are the most common 2022 Tesla Model 3 complaint categories?
FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 261
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 75
SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 72
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 48
UNKNOWN OR OTHER 34
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM 14
UNKNOWN OR OTHER,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 14
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL 14
FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE,LANE DEPARTURE 12
SERVICE BRAKES 11
741 total complaints on record
Latest complaints
| Date | Component | Summary | Severity | Mileage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jun 2023 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | "Phantom braking:" Vehicle has braked Multiple times on the freeway while using adaptive cruise control, when no objects were In the vehicle's path. Typically occurs when driving on curved section of freeway at speeds above 50 mph. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | My car engaged the automatic emergency braking (AEB) when the car in front of me lightly tapped on their brakes-- When the AEB engaged, my car come to a complete stop... I tried to accelerate to prevent being rear ended, but my accelerator was disabled and I had no control of my car... Nearly causing me to get rear ended and probably causing a 5+ car collision. MANY Tesla drivers have experienced this, and it is absolutely TERRIFYING and NEEDS SERIOUS attention because lives are absolutely endangered due to this, and Tesla will not take responsibility, nor have they acknowledged the problem, at all. I've had this happen several times in the last week and I am just waiting to get in an accident at this point. This is unacceptable. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | While in cruise control the vehicle initiates braking rapidly for no reason. This happens at high speeds 55, 65 and 70 mph on clear roads. No vehicles in front of or coming from the other direction. There may be vehicles behind at times. It doesn’t happen all the time but happens enough to be a concern. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | On multiple occasions (100+) during a 4,000 mile road trip, (May 7-26, 2023) this vehicle slammed on its brakes while driving down the highway while using the adaptive cruise control feature. Speed reduction was up to 25 MPH from highway speeds of 65 - 80 MPH. This braking was quite dramatic, just short of locking the brakes up. Traffic conditions varied from very light (no vehicles in sight) to moderate traffic (vehicles in front, in rear and/or to the side). Weather was mostly clear, roads were mostly in good shape, there were no animals, people or other non-vehicle obstacles noted. Several instances were lodged in the vehicles "bug report" functionality, but not all, so Tesla should have a pretty good record of the status of the vehicle when several instances occurred. On more than one occasion we were very close to being rear ended because of this phantom braking. In contact with a Tesla Service Center, we were told this is a known issue but no fix had been found. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | During a 30 mile trip on a two lane highway I activated the cruise control. A number of times the car made significant slow downs. They seamed to be associated with oncoming trafic. I then shut off the cruise control. Later on when I could see there where no oncoming cars I again set the cruise control for 65 MPH. After only about 15 seconds the car made a rapid deceleation. The deceleration was rapid enough to cause an ice chest sitting on the passangers side of the front floorboard to roll over. I shut of the cruise control and did not use it again for the remainder of the trip | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES | In about a dozen incidences with my 12,000 mile model 3 the breaks come on unexpectedly. In one case i was on I-70 being followed by an 18 wheel truck / trailer when the phantom breaking occurred. Except for the attention of the truck driver and him slamming on his breaks to avoid rear ending me, I wouldn’t be here. I’ve opened 2 service complaints with Tesla and their response is that it is a learned correction for the car - Well it isn’t working. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | AIR BAGS | My 2022 Tesla Model 3 was hit on a highway from behind the car with 100 mph , the car spun multiple times and hit the guard rail. The Car Rear and front side was heavily damaged due to the impact but the Air bags were not deployed. The Car is declared total loss. The car is less than a year old and does not have any issues. Police report says that the Car Air bags are not deployed. There are no warning sign or any failures before the crash. I want to bring this incident ( Tesla AirBags for Model 3) to you attention as this is a Safety and risk to other drivers driving the same car.Also, i do have the Crash report if required. | Crash: Yes Fire: No Towed | Unknown |
| May 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | While driving in cruise control, NOT AUTOPILOT, my car phantom braked. The road was clear, the weather was clear. I'm thankful there was not a car behind me. I was doing the speed limit at the time 70mph when the incident occurred. the date lised below is an approximate date. It has occurred several times. I drive 45 minutes to work Mon-Thurs and cruise control helps for the long drive | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Trip to California and back from AZ. Had several instances of severe braking. If I did not press the accelerator immediately, the car would slow down under what seemed like nearly maximal braking. No reason was apparent for this behavior. Some braking instances were on long straight stretches of I-40 with no other cars visible. This issue was only occurring if I had the cruise control engaged. Under normal daily driving without cruise control this issue of emergency braking does not occur. Each time this happens, it is totally unexpected and is extremely disturbing. I have stopped using the cruise control function on the vehicle out of fear of it causing an accident. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | CAR HAS PHANTOM STOPS ON CRUSE CONTROL THREE TIMES IN SIX MONTHS | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | While driving on the highway at highway speeds, our Tesla Model 3 frequently will perform a phantom braking action, presumably due to incorrectly sensing a collision. Thankfully, so far the traffic has been light on the freeways. Otherwise, this could’ve easily caused a wreck. This has happened to us approximately 20 times in the past two days. We ensured the sensors are free of any dirt. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | The contact owns a 2022 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated while driving approximately 80 MPH with the cruise control set at 80 MPH, the vehicle independently slowed to almost a complete stop. The contact stated that she pulled the vehicle off the highway. The contact stated no warning light was illuminated. The contact returned the vehicle to the highway and engaged the cruise control and set the control to 80 MPH; however, the vehicle failed accelerate to the designated speed. The contact stated that the inadvertent phantom braking failure recurred. The contact turned off the cruise control and continued her trip. The contact had taken the vehicle to a local dealer, where it was diagnosed, and she was advised that the manufacturer was aware of the failure but a remedy was not yet available. The vehicle had not been repaired. The manufacturer had not been informed of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 9,000. | Crash: No Fire: No | 9,000 |
| May 2023 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER,SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When we're traveling on the highway at 55 mph plus and have cruise control engaged, the car will unexpectedly and suddenly brake for no reason. The problem is happening more often. This has even happened when there are vehicles behind us, but thank God they were not following closely. We may end up with whiplash, or worse, being rearended. We have complained to Tesla at least 3 times since February 2022 about this problem. The first time, they changed the front camera and said they thought that might help. It didn't. The next time, the service dept. said that there was no fix for the problem, but Tesla was working on it. Most recently in April 2023, the service tech., said there was no fix and he did not expect that there would be one anytime soon. This is unacceptable. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When driving on a vacation and on a highway from Tucson, AZ to Laughton, Nev we experienced what is being called PHANTOM breaking traveling approximately 75 mph several times. Extremely lucky to have not been rear ended. It also has happened with the FSD Beta late last year when I leased the software for a month. Can supply dates. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Adaptive cruise control fails. Repeated phantom braking on the highway. Would cause severe high speed accidents if there was traffic, luckily there was not. Not yet. Not yet. No. First appeared on my first long (5+ hr) road trip and brakes were applied jarringly for no reason, braking from 80mph down to 55 before I could turn the cruise control off. Repeated this more than a dozen times on the highway. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Hello, I recently drove 600 miles and experienced numerous random, frightening and dangerous occurrences of "phantom braking" while in cruise control mode. The car suddenly slammed on the brakes (I could hear the tires screech) while the highway was almost always completely empty, and always completely devoid of any potential danger. In three occurrences, the car was confused by something physical (albeit posing no danger at all): it was confused a "divide highway" sign post at the beginning of a divided highway median, the distant back a truck, a least a quarter of a mile ahead, and an incoming truck a least a quarter of a mile ahead in a long curve. In all other occurrences -the vast majority of occurrences- whatever triggered "phantom braking" was nowhere to be seen (the highway in front of me was completely empty of any traffic or obstructions), and never materialized. My safety and the safety of drivers behind me (and potentially in other lanes in case of a pile-up) was compromised during every occurrences. I stopped using cruise control when a car or truck is behind me. I contacted Tesla Service. They did an over the air check and said that there was nothing wrong with the system, that each occurrence provided data to improve the Beta system (it would have been nice to be told when I purchase the car that my family and I were Beta testers of an automotive safety product), and that Tesla is "working on a firmware update". Not very reassuring, and most importantly, no fixes at all to address this dangerous safety issue. Tesla Service indicated that I do not need to bring my car in (since there is nothing wrong with the software and therefore no fix).There was no advance warning before occurrences of "phantom braking". Thank you. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | I was driving my car north on I15. Suddenly the car applied full breaks when there was no objects on the road. I could no longer control the car. Even when my foot was on the accelerator the car automatically depressed the break pedal. Luckily there was no vehicle behind me. I was also fortunate that we were going on a straight section of road. If this happened mid turn I would have completely lost control. These cars are a danger to society. It is impossible to drive them safely when they take control away from the driver. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | While driving across the Nevada and Utah deserts, while on cruise control, traveling at 80 MPH we experienced 7 phantom braking. There were no vehicles or obstructions in sight and it was on straight stretches of road. We are no longer using cruise control due to the danger of possibly causing an accident. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Driving on the freeway at night, cruise control was on and going 70 mph. There were no other cars around and the car started braking on me out of no where. My speed went from 70 mph down to almost 20 mph on the freeway. Luckily there was no one behind me otherwise it would have been a bad crash. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE,BACK OVER PREVENTION | I have had several incidents of my car rapidly decelerating when in assisted driving mode and I am driving on the highway. I am driving at 65 and all of the sudden it decelerates, making it extremely dangerous. There are no apparent barriers or nearby objects causing this to happen. I am very concerned this will result in a significant accident. I have filed this claim previously without anything happening. Additionally, I had a problem with my rear warning signal not going off when I was in a parking garage, causing me to back into a car. I filed a claim with Tesla and never heard back from them. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | While driving on the highway on a clear day using what I call cruise control that also adapts to the speed of vehicles in front of my vehicle, as well as to extreme weather conditions, with no other vehicles around me, the car randomly decided to apply the brakes without provocation which slowed the vehicle from the setting of 74 mph to 49 mph before I could react and correct the aberrant braking. This is the 4th time this has happened in this vehicle. Previous incidents occurred in heavier traffic, so I suspected the aberrant breaking was an overcorrection relative to the other vehicles around me. After this most recent occurrence, I am confident there was no other reason for the car to suddenly brake other than due to a fault with the car. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER | I love my Tesla but I hate the computer. It is dangerous! More accurate to say I hate the UNFRIENDLY user interface. I am surprised NHTSA OKed this computer interface. It needs a GOOGLE quality voice activation feature. The current one is deaf to most words normally used to drive a car. E.G., to turn the lights on while driving on a road where “LIGHTS ON” is required. I must hit a button to see all controls. Then I must hit the “LIGHTS” button. Then I must hit the “LIGHTS ON”. All this while having trouble reading the small print on the screen. The reading is difficult. All this while taking my eyes off the road to even see the screen. This is just one of very many examples. The actual use of the computer is VERY OFTEN more user UNfriendly and UNSAFE than the “LIGHTS” button. Dangerous, DANGEROUS. I almost killed another driver when my car was new because I was WORKING the computer and I ran a red light. Fortunately my car stopped because I hit the breaks or because the car was, in fact, SMART??????? I am surprised NHTSA OKed this computer interface. The computer is smart but using the interface is dangerous. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | EXTERIOR LIGHTING,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | The Tesla computer and especially the USER INTERFACE IS UNSAFE. More accurate to say I hate the UNFRIENDLY user interface. I am surprised NHTSA OKed this computer interface. It needs a GOOGLE quality voice activation feature. The current one is deaf to most words normally used to drive a car. E.G., to turn the lights on while driving on a road where “LIGHTS ON” is required. I must hit a button to see all controls. Then I must hit the “LIGHTS” button. Then I must hit the “LIGHTS ON”. All this while having trouble reading the small print on the screen. The reading is difficult. All this while taking my eyes off the road to even see the screen. This is just one of very many examples. The actual use of the computer is VERY OFTEN more user UNfriendly and UNSAFE than the “LIGHTS” button. Dangerous, DANGEROUS. I almost killed another driver when my car was new because I was WORKING the computer and I ran a read light. Fortunately my car stopped because I hit the breaks or because the car was, in fact, SMART??????? I am surprised NHTSA OKed this computer interface. The computer is smart but using the interface is dangerous. I want to bring this issue up to NHTSA, not to issue a recall, but to ADD on a user interface as good as GOOGLE? What is the chance that they will re-investigate a safety decision they have already made? Sincerely; [XXX] INFORMATION Redacted PURSUANT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552(B)(6). | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Our 2022 Tesla Model 3 has "phantom braked" three times on the highway. During each episode, the vehicle slowed from 75mph to 45mph in about half a second - with no vehicle or obstruction in front of us. This was a 4-lane highway all three times. If a car was behind us, it likely would have collided with us. No precipitation, the car was clean and cameras clear. I took the car to the Latham Service Center at 326 bOld Niskayuna Road near Albany, New York, to have the sensors and car checked. The tech took the car for a 10-minute drive, didn't experience phantom braking, and said that since he "could not duplicate the concern" no repairs were needed. After several messages expressing concern that this did indeed need to be fixed, neither the owners Scott and Carolyne nor the tech responded. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2023 | SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Nearly every time I use the "Traffic-Aware Cruise Control" on my Tesla, I experience a phantom braking event. Nearly all the time it is when the road is clear, in the daytime. I use this feature infrequently because I cannot rely on it at all and I'm concerned it will cause someone to hit my from behind. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |