Complaint volume
1068 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
2023 Tesla Model Y Complaints
1068 consumer-submitted complaints on record for the 2023 Tesla Model Y, grouped by component category.
1068 Total complaints
137 Crash reports
3 Fire reports
45 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, steering, 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 137 crash reports, 3 fire reports, 45 injury reports, and 1 fatality report. These fields come from complaint records and should be read in context.
Mileage clue
Mileage is available on 74 complaints, with an average reported failure mileage of 13,628 miles. Compare that with the mileage on the listing.
Questions to ask the seller
- Have you had any problems related to forward collision avoidance, steering, 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 2023 Tesla Model Y?
Used-car checklist
Use these complaints before the test drive.
Build a buyer checklist to turn these issues into questions and inspection points.
2023 Tesla Model Y
Build buyer checklist Compare with other years Sends year, make, and model to pre-fill your checklist.
How severe are the 2023 Tesla Model Y complaints?
137 Crash
3 Fire
45 Injury
1 Fatality
92 Towed
34 Medical attention
What are the most common 2023 Tesla Model Y complaint categories?
FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 184
STEERING 97
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 65
UNKNOWN OR OTHER 60
SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 54
SUSPENSION 53
VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE 36
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM 34
VISIBILITY/WIPER 32
SEAT BELTS 26
1,068 total complaints on record
Latest complaints
| Date | Component | Summary | Severity | Mileage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 2024 | VISIBILITY/WIPER | The "auto" setting of the windshield wipers does not work 90% of the time. It cannot sense rain properly. My grandmother's 2002 Lexus had better rain-sensing wipers than my 2023 Tesla. This is extremely hazardous in the sense that at medium speeds, when water from rain does NOT quickly evacuate the windshield, it causes a massive block to the view of all patrons in the car. Do you think it is important for the driver to see the road in front of them? It is also very dangerous because when this does not work, the quickest way to change the setting is to tap the end of the left stalk with your left hand, and then QUICKLY use your right hand to select the desired wiper speed on the car's screen. This is a dangerous task to have to do quickly when you cannot see what is in front of you. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2024 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM | The contact owns a 2023 Tesla Model Y. The contact stated while driving 5 MPH and coming to a stop, the vehicle went into park unintendedly. The "Vehicle Automatically Parked to Prevent Roll Away" and "Automatic Emergency Braking Is Unavailable" messages were displayed. The contact was able to quickly veer to the right lane, where the vehicle stalled and remained for half an hour, nearly causing a crash. Additionally, Police officers arrived at the scene and shielded the vehicle from a potential crash. The manufacturer was contacted but was unable to correct the failure remotely. The vehicle was towed to the Tesla Service Center, where it was diagnosed that the driver’s side body controller module had failed and needed to be replaced. The vehicle was repaired. The contact stated that while driving with his daughter in a car seat in the rear seat and coming to a complete stop two days later, the vehicle stalled. The message "Automatic Emergency Braking Unavailable" was displayed. The vehicle was towed to another Tesla Service Center (3371 Brunswick Pike #100, Lawrence Township, NJ 08648), where the vehicle was being diagnosed. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was notified of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 2,506. | Crash: No Fire: No Towed | 2,506 |
| May 2024 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER | 2 close to collision out of 7 use of FSD free trail period. The vehicle signal for turn and went straight to hit curb. The vehicle during left turns at signals while on left most land jumps to right most left turn lanes while other vehicles are in it turning. Here is link i posted on x , https://x.com/PAVANGINJUPALLI/status/1776618585105842340 | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2024 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER | Tesla has a joke feature where a song starts playing that is a parody of Saturday Night Live skit "I need more cowbell". What causes this to be played is pushing down on the right steering wheel stalk 4 times sequentially. Nothing will silence this, however. Not even turning the volume of the car off. It causes a constant, loud, and visual distraction. And it prompts distraction for drivers to try and silence it. I have nearly been in multiple accidents trying to silence it. there should be NO car audio that is played that cannot be silenced by turning the volume off. This is common sense. Any other reasoning is inviting distraction. Not withstanding that Tesla has made doing simple tasks like turning the volume down or air conditioning up MORE attention requiring than cars of the last 50 years. This is a clear and demonstrable safety hazard with, as I would imagine, criminal liability for Tesla. Please recall all Tesla cars until they eliminate this clear and present distraction. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| May 2024 | STEERING,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES | I am reaching out on behalf of my wife who met with accident on 3/24/2024.She was driving Tesla Y model and this accident occurred due to System failure of Vehicle , brakes and Steering wheel get locked and she was not able to do anything and car hit the couple of trees on other side of parking lot . She was not using Autopilot feature and it vehicle didn't stop after applying the brake instead of stopping , its get accelerated and steering was also locked. | Crash: Yes Fire: No Injuries: 1 Towed Medical attention | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | VISIBILITY/WIPER,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Auto steer in city which is the free software unnecessarily distracts with warnings, so much that I was almost in an accident 3 times. This doesn’t happen with full self service driving in the exact same scenario because it’s a paid service, essentially forcing owners to subscribe and pay for full self service driving. Furthermore, if you don’t react to unnecessary and distractive warnings you get a warning that auto steer (which is paid for as part of the car purchase) will be disabled. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | STRUCTURE | Sudden unintended acceleration on my new Tesla Y- occurred while backing slowly out of the garage. Suddenly, there was a lurch forward that hit the side of the garage. Repair to Tesla @ $8,000 and repair to garage @ $300. Tesla told me that their ivestigation did not disclose any mechanical issues but the manager refused to send me that evaluation. Fortunately, no injuries | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | During a 2,300 miles recent trip in Texas, the vast majority of the speed limit signs were not seen by my 2023 Tesla Model Y autosteer/autopilot (not FSD). This created issues with the autopilot/autosteer as it was not usable in several instances and can create safety issues like distractions, etc... I had the latest software revision. The key point is that this is not happening at all in Colorado where I live. Tesla support responded that I needed my cameras recalibrated which is a totally illogical response as it is not happening in CO. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | When using Auto Pilot/Traffic Aware Adaptive Cruise Control at highway speeds (55 to 75mph), vehicle will on occasion, slam on the brakes and steer to the right for no apparent reason. When this has happened in the past, we would press on accelerator peddle, to quickly recover from the braking to prevent a rear end collision and continue down the road. This last time (April 12, 2024) however, pressing the accelerator peddle made no difference until Auto Pilot was disengaged. Fortunately we were in the right most lane and was able to pull off to the side of the road to prevent a rear end collision from a van that was behind us. There were no warnings or messages that were displayed to indicate what had cased the braking. I talked to my local Tesla service department approximately a year ago about this issue and said that Tesla is aware of the "Phantom Braking" problem, but were unsure if or when a fix would be in the works. We did capture the dash cam video of the last Phantom Braking incident, that shows a clear road, with no objects or shadows that may have triggered the event. The dash cam video is 38Mb in size, too large to upload. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | POWER TRAIN,ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL | Car warned that Drivability - Acceleration and top speed reduced/Performance may be restored on next drive but gave no opportunity for me to pull over safely. Felt like someone pulled the e-brake during regular driving speeds and prevented me from safely slowing down, steering or maneuvering the vehicle into a safe spot. This occurred during a rainy night with my wife and 3 daughters in the vehicle who were terrified and still afraid to drive in the vehicle. Tesla replaced the front drive inverter and about a month later the same issue happened again on a busy road around 1pm in the middle of traffic and this time the rear drive inverter had to be replaced. Myself nor my family have felt safe in the vehicle but feel stuck with it. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | SEATS | We had our 5 year old son buckled in his forward facing car seat in the back passenger seat. When I started to drive my car, the front passenger seat started to move back, reclined on its own and fully crushed my sons legs in the back seat (fully reclined back). My son started to scream in pain. After securing the seat forward, we noticed our umbrella fell from the front seat and landed where you control the seat alignment in front. We were shocked to see that a 1 lbs umbrella can be heavy enough to control the seat alignment. If I hadn't quickly reacted to the seat moving back, it would have caused a serious fatal injury to my son. I strongly urge the manufacturer to consider fail proof ways to prevent this from happening. | Crash: No Fire: No Injuries: 1 | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | VISIBILITY/WIPER | My tesla is supposed to have "automatic" wipers that go on by themselves to keep the windshield clear so one can drive in rain. Manual wiper speed control is difficult because the driver has to look at center screen and use menus to select a speed. There is no intermittent wipers control; the lowest speed setting is too fast for light range. Only one pass operation is possible without using the center console while driving which is dangerous. The automatic wipers are very erratic, sometimes running faster than needed or coming on when it's not raining to other times hardly coming on at all making it very difficult to see and making driving very accident prone. The poor operation can, of course, adversely affect the proper operation of the automatic driving capability too since that depends on vision by cameras through windshield. Other owners I know voice the same concerns. This issue is a big problem anytime it rains and even worse back last winter when it snowed. I've only had my car 3 months. I have talked to a few other owners who indicate this problem didn't exist as much 6 months or a year ago indicating it could be a problem caused by a recent car software update or a change in the equipment used for wiper control in my Tesla Y. I'm not sure if the problem applies to other models (ie S, X, 3). | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | I was driving our Tesla Model Y and, when attempting to use the windshield wiper, full self driving was enabled. The feature was never enabled my by husband or I through the touch screen on the car. We purposefully did not want to be helping to test this feature as we have a 2 year old and 2 month old that are often in the car with us (both of whom were in the car when this happened). This happened twice on my drive on the afternoon of [XXX]. I did not have a destination plugged into the map on the tesla and was navigating via google maps on my phone (which does seem to be required for this feature to be enabled according to Tesla's help video on youtube: [XXX] ). Both times, a pop up appeared on the tesla screen asking me to give feedback on the auto driving feature while I was driving. Both times, I was able to disable the feature after about 5 seconds by pressing the brake pedal. Upon returning home, my husband was able to go into the car's settings and return the car to "traffic-aware cruise control." He was able to confirm that "Full Self Driving (supervised)" had been selected despite neither of us enabling it. INFORMATION REDACTED PURSUANT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552(B)(6) | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | EXTERIOR LIGHTING | Turn signals fail to activate with short duration press of turn signal stick. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,UNKNOWN OR OTHER,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Car was being driven into a car wash. Driver went to put car into neutral and car lurched forward and crashed into car in front of it without gas pedal being engaged. Vehicle has not been inspected by manufacturer or others. No warning lamps or other messages. May have been related to recently installed full self driving software that was automatically installed but was not requested by vehicle owner. Vehicle owner did not intend to engage any sort of self driving or automatic acceleration systems. | Crash: Yes Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | VISIBILITY/WIPER,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Tesla recently rolled out an update that gives everyone in the US a trial of FSD. After this update I've had numerous situations where the car would panic and act like I was about to collide with a parked vehicle both while driving down a residential street in daytime and when coming around corners. This never happened in previous version. Also the auto windshield wipers no longer work when its raining but will turn on when its dry and cause dirt to smear on the window, mainly when the sun is facing the driver which makes it very dangerous. The last issue is pretty big, the car has been exhibiting severe phantom braking when on the highway using adaptive cruise control (FSD I guess now?) | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | AIR BAGS | Front passenger safety restraint system fault alarms comes intermittently | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | SUSPENSION | My model Y lower control arm bolt has become loose and disconnected. I noticed a rubbing sound on the front axle in a parking lot and fortunately discovered the source of the issue (disconnected suspension bolt) at home. I believe my vehicle should’ve been included in the recall below as the timeline lines up. My car was produced in the Austin factory and picked up in late November 2022. Can see in the attached photo the loose bolt and the suspension fork hitting the axel. [XXX] [XXX] As of today the car is sitting in the Tesla service center and they are arguing that repair is not covered because of the handwritten pen marks indicate third-party suspension work, but no suspension work has been done. The article citing the manual torque explains the factory markings. This bolt issue has resulted in fatalities at high speed. I’m lucky to have found it at home vs the highway. INFORMATION REDACTED PURSUANT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552(B)(6) | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,ENGINE,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Vehicle: Tesla Model Y Blue Purchased in Oct’ 23 Tesla setting: Regenerative braking (single pedal driving) Issue: Brake Pedal/Acceleration Pedal Malfunction I was pulling my car out from the parking lot to pick up my mom, from the hospital entrance. I just turned right and had to take an immediate left to leave out of the parking lot. The Tesla was driving at approximately 5 miles an hour at that point. I lifted my foot from the gas pedal for the car to stop with its regenerative braking. However, instead of coming to a stop, the Tesla started rapidly accelerating, with my foot not even on the pedal. When I slammed the brakes, the car was unresponsive and continued accelerating. I started honking madly to warn people that I had no control over the car I was driving. The vehicle continued accelerating over 100-150 meters in 4-5 seconds and banged a parked car (Lexus SUV) at the end of the parking lot. It continued accelerating while pushing Lexus over the curb, destroying road sign poles and landscaping shrubs; crossing the street, and the middle curb. At the end of the street was a tree and a ditch. Lexus couldn’t move any further and Tesla stopped. All airbags deployed. One of the emergency response detection systems called 911 immediately. The first thing the police asked me was if I pressed the emergency brake. I said the car doesn’t have one. I can’t even turn off the vehicle while it is moving. The parking button takes care of it. I used to love my Tesla but I can’t trust it anymore. What I want from them at this time is: Investigate all the incidents thoroughly instead of blaming these as a user error. a) Think about adding the redundancy system. Something mechanical where the driver reacts within a couple of seconds. Software bugs are hard and sometimes it is impossible to find the root cause. Logs may not contain everything that you need to debug the problem. Consider it as a P0 issue. b) Compensate for the damage and property loss. | Crash: Yes Fire: No Towed | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | UNKNOWN OR OTHER | I got a recall notice for NHTSA Recall No: 23V-035. I checked for the software update, but didn't see anything from Tesla prompting for the update. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Apr 2024 | STEERING,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | You have no doubt heard the news that Tesla has deployed Full Self Driving to all its vehicles as a "free trial." My Tesla received this update in the past few days. Last night I was driving on an expressway and engaged what has up until now been traffic-aware cruise control by pressing down one time on the right stalk. I expected regular cruise control but the car started steering for me. Tesla has changed the default behavior of the cruise control activation (one single downward press on the stalk) to instead activate Autopilot. My attempt to regain control caused me to jerk the wheel side to side in a way that could have led to an accident had I been in heavier traffic. This was unexpected behavior from the vehicle and I find it unacceptable that Tesla has changed a default function in this manner. I had to hunt around on the screen to find the setting to change the behavior back to regular Traffic Aware Cruise Control from one downward press. Furthermore, on the same 20 mile trip I had three phantom braking incidents while the car was on Traffic Aware Cruise Control mode. This is more than typical and these events can be dangerous if they happen in traffic. Tesla should not be allowed to deploy changes, especially without notice, that modify basic functionality of a car in motion from what the driver has become accustomed to. | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2024 | ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,AIR BAGS,WHEELS | Tesla suddenly accelerated forward from a complete stop at very rapid pace and hit a wall | Crash: Yes Fire: No Towed | Unknown |
| Mar 2024 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | Forward collision with a deer. The deer jumped out in front of the vehicle, very close to the vehicle, at night. The vehicle failed to detect large object obstacle in front of it and apply emergency braking. | Crash: Yes Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2024 | VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | I want to report what I think is a very dangerous issue with my Tesla Model Y. We have experienced numerous times that the car brakes without warning. I have talked to Tesla about this "phantom braking", and they say it is "normal". The Traffic-Aware Cruise Control cannot be disabled to create a normal manual cruise control. I gave them a hypothetical situation where this could be life-threatening, but they dismissed it. Two weeks later, that very scenario happened, thankfully not ending in tragedy. I was driving at 65 mph on a wide, two lane paved highway (near Dove Creek, CO). A car going in the opposite direction was stopped on the shoulder on the other side of the highway. A large semi truck, also going in the opposite direction, pulled into my lane to pass the parked car on the side of the road. I saw what was happening, let off the accelerator, and steered over onto the paved shoulder (wide shoulder) to avoid the oncoming truck. My car's Traffic-Aware Cruise Control, using the car's cameras, interpreted the situation as an apparent collision danger and automatically braked hard. In this situation there was a large pickup doing what most pickup drivers do.... tailgating close behind me to get me to drive faster. Neither the driver of the pickup, nor me, were expecting my car to brake hard, as we had all assessed the situation correctly as not being dangerous. I responded as quickly as I could by pushing on the accelerator to cancel the cruise control, but the pickup almost rear ended me. At that speed, it could easily have turned into a fatal accident. Tesla says I can't disable the cameras, so I just don't use the cruise control now. I was told you can disable the "traffic-aware" part of cruise control on older model Teslas, but not 2023 and newer. Often the phantom braking occurs with no apparent reason (although the car's cameras and computer would probably disagree). Do many people have to be killed to take a safety hazard seriously? | Crash: No Fire: No | Unknown |
| Mar 2024 | FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE | I rear ended to another car when I blacked out for a few seconds in the city driving around 20 miles an hour. The AEB, based on TESLA manual and instructions should have kicked in, but it never did. After the accident, a friend of mine told me about AEB function and the fact that it works in those type of conditions, I tested the car in my driveway (I have a pretty long driveway to do this). AEB did not kick in until I turned off the function and I turned on the function again. Then, it kicked in immediately, and on the screen "A" showed, which means AEB kicked in. That was the first time AEB worked and that sign appeared on the screen. Later in the day, when I tested the car again under the exact same conditions,, AEB stopped functioning again like the way it has been since I bought the car. I read all the information/instructions regarding AEB. I understand that in certain conditions like, if the driver is accelerating or putting pressure on brake pedal or steering wheel, AEB does not kick in. I talked to another TESLA owner, he said his does not kick in either unless the car is on auto cruise or autopilot. Mine is the same. This is definitely malfunction. The issue is that the car, on the screen shows that AEB is always turned on, but it never kicks in and the car does not give any error regarding this issue. Again, I tested it after turning off and on AEB function, and I now know the difference. Under the same conditions of that testing, the AEB does not function at all. The accident I had was 100% preventable if AEB worked properly. TESLA Service Center has been dismissive. They send me snippets from the TESLA manual, which I already have and read many times. They say they cannot test it. All they can do is to check remotely to see if the function is on, but that's where the issue is. The function is always on, but it never kicks in. Again, It did work for me for a few minutes when I turned it off and on, but that was it. | Crash: Yes Fire: No | Unknown |