Tesla has stopped rewarding US owners for referring new car buyers and replaced the program with one that pays them for signing up subscribers to its Full Self-Driving (Supervised) software.
Tesla’s Refer and Earn page now lists solar panels as the only product that earns buyer and referrer benefits. The Model 3, Model Y and Cybertruck remain eligible only for loyalty benefits for repeat buyers.
Under the new program, owners share a link that gives another Tesla owner a one-month FSD (Supervised) trial. If the recipient subscribes during the trial, the referrer earns a free month of FSD, or a $99 credit if they bought the software outright, according to a new support page.
“Refer friends & family to gift them a month of FSD Supervised,” Tesla North America wrote on X on Thursday evening. “Once they subscribe, you’ll receive a free month in return (or $99 in Tesla Credits if bought outright),” it said, adding that the offer is available in the US.
Until Thursday, an owner whose referral link was used to buy a Model 3, Model Y or eligible Cybertruck received a $250 Tesla Credit, and the buyer got three months of FSD. Solar referrals paid $250 to the referrer and $400 off to the buyer.
Tesla’s announcement did not mention the end of vehicle referrals. The vehicle program let referrers earn benefits up to 10 times per calendar year, according to Tesla’s terms.
How the FSD Rewards Work
The reward depends on how the referrer pays for FSD. Subscribers receive one month of free FSD (Supervised). Owners who bought the software outright receive a $99 Tesla Credit toward eligible purchases instead, according to the support page.
The credit matches the monthly subscription price. FSD (Supervised) “is available as a monthly subscription of $99,” Tesla says on its subscriptions page.
Each referrer can earn benefits up to 12 times per calendar year, Tesla said. That caps the reward at a year of free FSD for subscribers, or $1,188 in credits for owners who bought it outright, by EV’s calculation.
The program’s terms, shared by Mahkus, add two further limits. Referrers can have at most 12 referral trials redeemed per calendar year and can earn at most 48 rewards over the life of their account.
“Each referral trial redeemed counts toward the annual trial limit, whether or not the Eligible Referee subscribes,” the terms say. A trial that does not convert still uses up one of the 12 slots.
The benefit shows as “pending” in the Tesla app until it is granted, and expires 12 months after the grant date. Tesla Credits cannot be redeemed for cash or transferred. They can be spent on Supercharging, new vehicles, energy products, service bills, Tesla Shop items, Tesla Insurance payments and upgrades, including subscriptions, the company said.
Owners share the link from the “Refer and Earn” menu in the Tesla app, which needs to be on version 4.62.0 or later. The in-app screen tells owners the program is “limited to 12 Full Self-Driving (Supervised) referrals per calendar year.”
Who Qualifies
The program targets Tesla owners who do not use FSD today rather than new car buyers.
To refer someone, an owner or lessee must be paying for an FSD subscription or have bought FSD outright. The terms say that includes owners who got FSD with a vehicle “via an applicable package (e.g., Luxe / Tech packages).”Owners who have FSD “through a one-year grant” cannot refer anyone or receive a referral link, Tesla said.
To receive the one-month trial, a person must own a registered Tesla with hardware compatible with FSD (Supervised). They must not have paid for an FSD subscription in the past 12 months, and must never have bought FSD outright, according to the support page.
Owners who received an FSD trial after taking delivery of a new Tesla are ineligible for a referral link until at least 12 months after that trial ends.
Code Pointed to the Launch
Not a Tesla App reported earlier this week that version 4.62.0 of the Tesla app contained code for an FSD referral program that would reward owners with free FSD time.
The program follows a separate push to get more drivers to try the software. Car-sharing platform Turo said on October 26 that it would let US travelers book Teslas with FSD (Supervised) activated, and that eligible hosts could receive a free one-month FSD trial.
A Subscription Business
The referral program targets a business that Tesla has moved entirely to subscriptions in the US. “Tesla will stop selling FSD after Feb 14,” Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk wrote on X on January 14. “FSD will only be available as a monthly subscription thereafter.” He also said that month that the subscription price would rise as the software’s capabilities improve.
That shift is why the program treats outright buyers separately. They bought FSD before the cutoff and cannot be given a free month of something they already own.
Active FSD subscriptions, a figure that includes legacy outright purchases, rose 67% from a year earlier to 1.74 million at the end of the third quarter, Tesla said on October 21. That was an 18% increase from the second quarter and the most net new subscriptions in a quarter, the company said.
The figure counts upfront payments and monthly subscriptions and “excludes free trials,” in line with Musk’s 2025 CEO Performance Award, according to Tesla’s third-quarter update. The award includes a milestone of 10 million active FSD subscriptions, so referral trials add to that count only when recipients start paying.
Tesla has delivered 10.2 million vehicles in total. It said more than 75% of its new North American deliveries in the third quarter included FSD, up nearly 20 percentage points from the second quarter.
What Analysts Said
Analysts tracked by Price Target, EV‘s sister publication that archives Wall Street analyst research on the EV, AI and semiconductor industries, singled out the FSD numbers after the results.
UBS cited “strong uptake on FSD in NA (75% of NA deliveries took FSD, +20pp q/q)” when it raised its price target to $425. TD Cowen, which rates the stock ‘Buy’ with a $460 target, pointed to “Record NA FSD attach rates at >75%, up from >55% in Q2” in its note.
Goldman Sachs, which rates Tesla ‘Neutral’ with a $360 target, noted that FSD “is now on >75% of new vehicle deliveries in North America” in its note. Barclays cited “a sharp increase in FSD uptake” when it upgraded the stock to ‘Overweight’ with a $450 target on October 26, a move that lifted the shares.
Tesla did not say how many owners are eligible for the trial or how many it expects to convert. It has not confirmed whether the program will expand beyond the US.
