2021 Tesla Model Y complaints

The adaptive cruise control feature frequently hits the brakes despite no obstacles in the road. Major triggers seem to be: Oncoming cars on an undivided highway at night. Oncoming 18-wheelers on an undivided highway at any time in day. Going over the top of a hill. Small bumps in the road at night. A large vehicle with blinking red hazard lights in view. (This will slam on the brakes and set the speed limit to 50 as it seems to think it's an emergency vehicle) Blinking red traffic lights. Sometimes HOV lane entrances will use a blinking red light to show that the lane is closed, and the car will slam on the brakes thinking it's an emergency vehicle. There's a risk of rear-end collisions caused by the sudden decelerations. Most of these events happened on highways with low traffic. No warning lights or messages were displayed before the events.

The car ‘phantom’ brakes all the time. It is so bad that I cannot use the cruise control. I’ve had several instances where vehicles following me almost hit the back of my car because my car braked so hard.

While I’m adaptive cruise control or Autopilot the vehicle has phantom braking which occurs. Vehicle will slam on the brakes for no apparent reason.

Phantom braking. I have had numerous incidents of phantom braking, and can reproduce the problem at will on a particular stretch of road. It happens regularly on city streets, occasionally on Interstate highways. It is sufficiently unreliable as to be worthless. I reported the problem to Tesla online in a service request, and was told that the problem will be or has been solved with software.

While using the adaptive cruise control on the highway, the car abruptly slowed down from approximately 70 mph to less than 55 within a few seconds before I was able to push the gas petal and reaccelerate. This has happened 3 other times in the last several weeks and I am now afraid to use the cruise control. Whereas no accident occurred, if it happened when another car was following me closely, it could have easily resulted in a crash. Each time this has happened, there were no other cars nearby so I don’t know what the car ‘saw’ and was reacting to. The date entered below for the incident is the most recent occurrence.

When car was in "traffic aware cruise control" on open highway it has multiple times unexpectedly braked hard when there were no vehicles or objects in front of it. Once there was a car behind me so I had to accelerate hard to avoid being rear ended. Once it may have been reacting to an oncoming truck in the opposite lane.

My wife and I were driving south on Interstate-93 in NH on Superbowl Sunday. Traffic was heavy and we were traveling about 65 mph when our 2021 Model Y Tesla started beeping and the following message came on the screen - “PULL OVER SAFELY, Vehicle shutting down”. My wife was driving and had just enough time to cross over three lanes to get into the breakdown lane before the car came to a sudden stop. The car did not want to restart. We called the Tesla service center and they were about to order a tow truck but we asked if there was a ‘ctrl/alt/del’ type option. She had us select Safety>Power Off. When our Tesla came back on everything was seemingly normal so the service center said ‘this is very rare’ and that it should be okay to drive. We drove another few miles down 93 and luckily took an early exit ramp because the car shut down again at the bottom of the ramp. My wife and I restarted the car again and managed to limp home in some sort of “Power reduced” mode (i.e. painfully little acceleration). This was potentially a very dangerous situation! Luckily we were able to safely get into the breakdown lane but there wasn’t much time to spare.

My Tesla Model Y has terrible Phantom Braking problems. The AutoPilot features on the Tesla is extremely dangerous. Phantom Braking can happened anytime whenever AutoPilot feature is used, it just suddenly slow the vehicle without warning, there’s no other vehicle in front of me. The problem occurred more on a less busy freeway/ highway, sometimes it’s totally useless because the the feature is too dangerous. On a two lane highway, when more car detect a larger vehicle on the opposite lane, it started slowing down, sometimes that’s very dangerous because cars behind me almost hit my car. Tesla’s AutoPilot is extremely dangerous, they should recall the car and fix the problem.

When using autosteer or adaptive cruise on I5, our car performed a phantom brake that cause the truck behind us to nearly flip over in order to miss hitting us. We were not in the lane by the divider, there were wide open lanes in front of us to the left and right by half a football field and no overpasses at the time. We slowed from 69 to about 39 before I could correct the braking. This happens so often we do not feel safe using the cruise control at all.

Wipers have frozen down in place. Car is garaged and the buildup was from the road and not parked accumulation. New car <7k miles. Phantom breaking on the autopilot system where it will slam on the breaks always at some points on a commute and when driving in some conditions such as oncoming opposite side of road traffic at night with headlights on. The car will momentarily and to an extreme degree sometimes slam on the breaks.

The car randomly brakes hard when the cruise control is on. It’s intolerable on roads with a lot of tree shadows or even clouds.

These issues occur w/ no warning, occur randomly, in all conditions. Issue 1. Vehicle randomly slams on the brakes with no obstructions or vehicles in front. This occurs at highway speeds as well as neighborhood speeds. I'm worried about being rear-ended. This occurs daily. Issue 2. Vehicle thinks oncoming traffic is in same lane and attempts to emergency stop. Issue 3. Upon changing lanes, using auto lane change, vehicle serves back I to lane for no reason.

Phantom braking has occurred multiple times randomly when autopilot and cruise control are activated.

On multiple occasions the car triggers emergency braking when no obstacle is in front of the car, often at high speeds. The car is not equipped with radar, and relies entirely on camera-based adaptive cruise control. this is a safety risk and possible rear end collision cause. Due to the lack of radar, the vehicle also accelerates to desired speed slowly when using adaptive cruise control while on interstate. Often times resulting in traveling under the speed limit for an extended amount of time, causing a safety hazard.

While using adaptive cruise control on I-25 making round trips between Albuquerque and Ft Collins, I have experienced numerous (dozens) phantom braking events. They are so frequent that I have stopped using adaptive cruise control. Almost all of these events occur when there is no traffic and no discernible reason for braking. In many cases, my first response is to look in the rearview mirror since I'm worried that if someone is behind me it would cause an accident since the stop is very unexpected. To date, there has not been a close call. The stopping varies between slight hesitations causing 1-2 MPH decrease to dramatic decreases of over 20 MPH. I have made numerous 'bug reports' using my voice in the car immediately after many of the events. I also scheduled a service call but was told that they examined the software and could find no problem. There is no warning of an impending braking event.

We have had multiple incidents from July through Dec 2021when the vehicle is operating in cruise control and brakes hard for no good reason. Most of these are on highway 86 between Tucson and Sells. For some of those incidents there was an oncoming school bus, which may have been the visual trigger. For others we do not know the cause.

Car slams on brakes at inappropriate times. Ex: 1. When a car makes a left turn across my travel lane several blocks away. 2. When a vehicle moves into my travel lane, going the same direction, several blocks in front of me. 3. For no reason I can discern. Cars behind me often honk. Could easily rear end me. Thankfully hasn't happened. You are welcome to inspect it. Don't think service center has tried to replicate the braking. No accident so not reports. Just very scary, thankfully. No warning lamps, etc. Anticipating question about dates, happens randomly, but pretty frequently. At least weekly. Speed also variable. Sometimes 35, sometimes 70, and in-between

Multiple phantom braking incidents using cruise control on 2 lane roads when there is no hazard

Car braked for now reason when the entire roads in front was clear and there was a car behind me. It was a hard brake which scared me and my family. That was very very close to being in an accident. Need compensation from Tesla for going through such an incident after paying so much money for the car.

On a cross-country trip from Washington, DC to Oklahoma City on Feb 5th and 6th (Saturday and Sunday) I tried to use the "adaptive cruise control" for the first time. Terrifying. The car would be driving along at 80mph, and then it would suddenly slam on the brakes, seemingly without provocation... with a 30-35mph sudden deceleration (absolutely nobody/nothing in either of the lanes in front of me). This was not while using the "full self-driving" feature, as I did not pay the extra $10k for this functionality, only the adaptive cruise control. Another very disturbing thing was that when the adaptive cruise control was enabled, it would not allow me to turn off the windshield wipers... and every so often the wipers would just start frantically wiping despite only a small bit of rain hitting the windshield (again, disturbing, as it is very startling when it happens out of nowhere). Needless to say, after this happened 5 or 6 different times over these two days, I turned off adaptive cruise control and kept it off. Tried to contact Tesla service, but they kept dodging the issue so I stopped trying.

Phantom braking. Vehicle slams the brakes on as soon as it sees an approaching vehicle in the opposite lane. Cruise control is unusable on two lane roads.

When driving with the cruise control on, the car suddenly and rapidly brakes for no apparent reason. Nothing in front of the car. Problem has happened multiple times. Very hard Braking that if someone was behind us it would likely have caused an accident. We no longer use the cruise control because we are afraid of it causing an accident.

Multiple Emergency braking events basically everytime a semi passed during auto pilot and some phantom braking when only using traffic aware cruise control... Lucky to not get rear ended

This issue has happened numerous times since I’ve taken possession of the car. The vehicle perceives a potential collision when no such potential collision exists. The car will suddenly brake while traveling down the interstate at high speeds (maximum speed limit). Fortunately, no one has been so close behind me that this has resulted in an accident, but it is only a matter of time. I took it in to a Tesla dealership this week to have it looked at. Despite the adjustments made at the dealership, it happened again on my drive home from the dealership. I feel this automatic breaking system is unsafe. It also breaks suddenly at sharp turns or curves in the road, even at low speeds. It doesn’t anticipate the turn and thinks the driver is heading straight into an obstruction. Part of the issue is learning to think like a computer and learning to anticipate what the computer thinks is happening as opposed to what the human driver thinks is happening. It requires constant vigilance.

I have had over 18 occurrences of phantom braking while on cruise control; rapid deceleration without warning. I reacted by accelerating with the brake pedal. I reported this twice to the service adviser. One response was I needed to return with a date and time when it occurs again. When I did this, they could not find it in the computer record. They explained this occurs because cruise control is part of the self drive software and that is only in beta stage.

The Tesla Model Y had a software update at 12:05 am on Feb 13, 2022, which was complete. I drove the car to local YMCA at around 8:15 am on Sunday Feb 13, 2022, for my swim exercise and drove it home at around 9:30 am. I planned to park it by backing up to my driveway so that I can charge it. I positioned my car, with the front facing my neighbor's house. My foot was on brake and my right hand was moving the Drive Stalk towards R for reverse. The car all of the sudden flew forward on its own! It was only stopped after it hit my neighbor's house, making a big hole into her house, and causing severe damages to it outside and inside (smashed furniture and falling glassware), as well as to her landscaping. When this happened, my foot was still on the brake but pushing brake did stop the car. Additionally, hitting a tree also did not stop the car. Only the house and its strong frame stopped the car. The front of the car was totally damaged, including pieces falling out of the car and a big piece under the car falling down. Please come by immediately to take photos and examine damage. I called 911 immediately. The police and emergency trucks came. Since no one seemed to be visibly hurt (I had a whiplash and headache due to impact but was more was scared and shocked), the emergency medical crew left. The police said they are not making a report because the accident happened in private driveway and no crime was involved. I called Liberty Mutual to file a claim and was directed to fil

At 55 MPH on clear day, with visible lines the car automatically braked when an on coming truck passed nearby causing near rear end collision. I have two good videos of this if you wish to see actual conditions. Dealer acknowledged problem but said there was no fix and I should turn off automatic braking.

While driving my Tesla Model Y with Cruise Control activated, the vehicle would inexplicably brake/decelerate rapidly without any vehicle traffic in front of the car. It would occur at its worst while changing lanes, as I approached another vehicle from behind and attempted to change lanes to overtake. I would either be mostly in the other lane, or had already successfully changed lanes, when the vehicle inexplicably braked/decelerated. It was alarming, frustrating, and infuriating as it seemed clearly unjustified. This occurred while on the interstate, which was extremely dangerous given the speed traveling at as well as the number of vehicles that typically travel on the interstate. I have not used the feature since, and have even attempted to try and disable the feature while still being able to utilize some sort of basic cruise control feature, to no avail.

I have owned two Tesla Model Y's, this one from 2021 and a 2022 version as well. Both vehicles have exhibited the type of "phantom braking" that I have now seen described by several other owners. When attempting to use either the full Autopilot system (which includes both adaptive cruise control and lane keeping assist), or when using just the adaptive cruise control (without lane keeping), the vehicle would brake suddenly and forcefully. This appears to be in response to a threat perceived by the car, but it would happen on totally clear roads, in great weather, without some of the typical false indicators experienced by "vision" based systems. It's noteworthy that both of my cars used the vision-only system, as this vehicle was one of the first ones that Tesla produced that did not include a radar-based system. I experienced phantom braking so often with this car that I was completely unable to use cruise control. On a ~1,000 mile road trip through Wyoming and South Dakota (with minimal traffic in clear conditions on well-marked roads), I experienced over 100 phantom braking incidents in 4 days of highway driving. After that trip, I never used cruise control again regularly, but I would occasionally attempt to see if it fixed itself, and every time I would turn it on, I would have a phantom braking incident within minutes. I was able to capture a few videos of this behavior that I can send, as well, but I apparently can't do that as part of this form so please let me know h

My 2021 Tesla Model Y has two problems related to braking: (1) frequent unexpected and unnecessary slowdowns while driving on Autopilot adaptive cruise control. The vehicle seems to believe something is in the road but it is not the case. This has been called "phantom braking" by many online reports. I experience this on nearly every drive where adaptive cruise control is engaged. (2) On one occasion the car locked up its brakes and began swerving to the left for no reason whatsoever. An alarm appeared on the screen and audible tones and a video was automatically saved. The event lasted only a second but would surely have caused a collision if another car was following me. The event occurred as I passed an oncoming truck on a two lane highway at night in good visibility. I was driving manually. Adaptive cruise control and auto steering were *not* engaged at the time. The extreme braking event was caused by the Adaptive Emergency Braking (AEB) system.

Numerous times in the last 6 to 7 months, while driving my tesla on the freeway in auto pilot mode, auto pilot will just turn off and the car will abruptly slow down. Without reason, auto pilot turns off. And because of the settings on my car, this causes the car to quickly slow down. I rarely use auto pilot because I am afraid it will happen again and I’ll be rear ended.

After hearing of the "phantom braking" problem with the 2021 Tesla Model Y I thought I'd add my observations. My car has rapidly, unexpectedly, and without other warning decelerated several times but always when the forward sensors apparently picked up a car crossing in front of me. Normally, I'd appreciate the help but it has happened several times when the crossing car was well in front of me and there was no cause for alarm from me and no way a tailing car should expect such a dramatic braking action. Tesla should certainly be asked to review this system and modify the braking action so that it is more gradual for distant cars or preceded by a moderate sound alert for concerning but not immediately threatening front-crossing cars. I should also note that the warning sound seems to go off at appropriate times as I approach stopped cars and it doesn't brake inappropriately when I approach stopped cars. The only problem I've noticed is cars crossing in front of me, mostly from my left to right, when I'm still comfortably distant from that car. Hope this helps.

I have already reported this to TESLA and they did nothing for the following except to ask for a "time stamp". As I'm driving in Auto or Full self drive mode the car will suddenly brake as though there is something on the road in front of the car and at the time there is nothing present on the road or coming out into traffic. The car will make an alarm noise (internally) as though I did something wrong and as I said will decrease in speed dramatically and scare the driver behind me if there is a driver present.

While driving with cruise control engaged my car has now on several occasion suddenly and without warning applied the brakes on its own when there was no reason for the brakes to have been applied. Sometimes it has done it when a truck is approaching in the opposite direction, but sometimes it does it for no reason at all. Recently it did it with such severity that it was clear to me that if a car had been behind me I would have been hit from behind. Also, it was startling to the point where I could have lost control of my vehicle.

The driver assist feature was engaged, what TESLA calls FSD, full self-driving. This has happened multiple times where the car will slam on the brakes, even on the highway for obstacles not in the car's path. For example, a car is on the exit ramp and I am in the adjacent lane. The car on the exit ramp slows down to make its exit and the TESLA will slam on the brakes. The TESLA also has done this for cars making turns. It will not brake until the last second and then it slams on the brakes, even after the car in front of me has turned.

The contact owns a 2021Tesla Model Y. The contact stated that while driving at approximately 72 mph on autopilot when the vehicle suddenly activated the braking system. The contact took the vehicle off of autopilot mode causing the vehicle to function correctly. The contact had not informed the dealer. The vehicle had not been diagnosed or repaired. The manufacturer was not made aware. The approximate failure mileage was 7,000.

"phantom" braking occurred 2/17/22 ~ 630pm driving in parking lot, not in autopilot no people or other cars nearby went from 15mph to 0 instantly screen showed a person directly in front of car - no one there was foggy with light rain

After seeing news reports about the problems with Tesla "phantom braking", I realized this is not an issue localized with my vehicle. I also have this problem where the car will slam on the brakes when using the advanced cruise control system. It's jarring, to say the least. I reported the issue to Tesla a month after buying the car (10/21) and they instructed me to do a power cycle on the car but this has not helped. Incidenct occurance varies on the type of driving, but it's probably every 5 miles or so on a 2-lane road.

I am aware that NHTSA is investigating Tesla over the emergency braking issue when using its advanced features. When I have read articles about this they always reference auto pilot or full self driving. I wanted to make sure you knew that this issue also impacted adaptive cruise control. When I brought my Model Y home in August of last year I quickly learned I could not safely use the adaptive cruise control. I live in rural NE Iowa, and mainly drive on two lane roads. If I was on a downhill slope and meeting a vehicle with any kind of height to it the car would activate emergency braking, even though the other vehicle was completely in its own lane. It appears to me this issue has gotten better as updates have been issued the last six months and I have started to gingerly use cruise control again. It is common in the winter here to have tall piles of snow in parking lots. I also noticed on a sunny day I could drive right up to one of these piles when parking. It was striking that that huge pile of snow was invisible to the vehicle. Any other time I approach a barrier (e.g. pulling in to my garage) it gives all manner of warnings and a visual indication of how far you are from the wall. This issue would be much more dangerous if an analogous situation occurred using Autopilot or FSD. It is my understanding that for the 2021 Y Tesla went to just a camera based system (dropped LIDAR). I don’t know if that is what caused these problems or not. The car is a joy to drive. BUT, Te

Per previously reported cases, by Tesla Y suffers from “phantom braking” when I am using adaptive cruise control at highway speeds. In general it will decrease up to 20MPH very suddenly. This is always in response to a falsely detected hazard; it will sometimes do the same when passing a vehicle that has exited an off ramp and has break lights on but is no longer in my lane of traffic. in general i drive with maximum 5-6 car lengths in my adaptive cruise control and this should not be happening. This has been an intermittent but ongoing issue through 2021; have not experienced in 2022 but have not done a lot of high way driving. Scares the heck out of my passengers. Love the car but please fix the software or it will be my last Tesla.

I DO NOT DRIVE THIS CAR OFTEN, BUT WHEN I WENT ON A ROAD TRIP FOR TWO WEEKS OVER CHRISTMAS I NOTICED THAT THE CAR WHEN IT WAS IN CRUISE CONTROL WOULD PICK UP VEHICLES COMING TOWARD ME ON A TWO LANE ROAD AND SUDDENLY SLOW DOWN. IT GOT MUCH WORSE COMING HOME WHEN I WAS IN NEW MEXICO ON I25 GOING NORTH. IT WOULD SUDDENLY SLOW DOWN COMING UP TO A CREST OF A HILL WITH NO OTHER VEHICLE AROUND ME. IT ALSO PICKED UP SEMIS GOING SOUTH THAT WERE HUNDREDS OF YARDS AWAY FROM ME. IT HAPPENED NUMEROUS TIMES AND SCARED MY WIFE. WHEN I WAS HOME I SET UP AN APPOINTMENT WITH TESLA SERVICE. THEY LATER CANCELLED IT AS THEY DID NOT SEE IT AS A PROBLEM.

While driving on the interstate (divided) highway at 73 mph with adaptive cruise control engaged, the vehicle abruptly braked. There were no other vehicles or obstructions within 250' at the time of braking. No warning lights or messages appeared. To correct the situation, I immediately pressed the accelerator to increase speed. Conditions: daylight, dry road surface. If another vehicle was following close by this could have caused an accident. I've had the car about 7 months and this type of braking has occurred 7 times, all with no vehicles nearby. It has happened both in the daytime (6) and night (1) at similar speeds mention above. I brought car in for service at Tesla on two occasions for this problem and they could find no faults in the software or braking. Basically, I was told Tesla continues to update software.

Autopilot suddenly breaks to a dangerous levels while driving in the highway. Sometimes this happens with incoming cars/trucks on the other line. I have to manually take over control as I am worried I might be rear ended. These events are very likely to happen at least once on a given commute. This sudden braking also happens while going over a certain bridge. This has happened to all drivers in this car.

Phantom braking when using Tesla autopilot

This has happened multiple times. I am on the highway and have the cruise control set. The car suddenly decelerates but there is nothing in front to cause this. It is very jarring to me as the driver and to those behind me. When it happened during the day time I think it reacted to a shadow in the road from an overpass. It happened last night when it was dark. I had stopped using the cruise control because of the uncertainty, but decided to try it again on my trip yesterday. I received the car in September and I believe this has happened four times. I am reporting this now because I heard of the investigation. Now, I will keep closer track of the times, conditions and other facts. I have not reported it previously to Tesla, but will do so now. I looked on the Tesla forum and it is clearly a known issue.

The vehicle engages automatic emergency braking frequently and repeatedly without reason, especially on two lane highways with oncoming traffic. This occurs during the day and at night. The vehicle also engages phantom braking (without emergency braking notifications) during normal driving on freeways and highways. Video of this incident is also available.

North bound on interstate highway, my vehicle rapidly deaccelerated and then accelerated without warning

In 16 months I have experience 2 episodes of dramatic emergency braking while traveling at highway speed in the carpool lane adjacent to a concrete barrier wall estimated 5 feet high on the left side of the vehicle. The car decelerated from 65 mph to roughly 30 mph in roughly 2 to 2.5 seconds. Had someone been following at an unsafe distance an accident would have occurred. Thankfully it did not. I never experienced this in my previous Tesla Model S. Overall I love the vehicle, but these 2 incidents were disconcerting.

Several times (at least 4 times) on various trips, I was driving on the interstate going at least 70 mph and I had cruise control on. I DO NOT have autopilot. If the highway was blacktop and I approached a white concrete bridge deck, the car suddenly brakes. Also, twice I was next to a tractor trailer (I was in the left lane and the tractor trailer was in the middle lane to my right) and the car braked suddenly. I thought the car “anticipated” that the trailer was coming into my lane. Regarding the white concrete bridge deck, I wonder if the car “saw” a wall ahead and that is why it braked.

Hello, my Tesla Model Y frequently brakes unexpectedly causing me concern in traffic I could be rear-ended. This happens when engaged in FSD Beta software version 10.9 currently and has happened in all previous versions of the software as well. I have held a commercial drivers licnese and want everyone on the road to be safe as possible. The car brakes hard reducing speed 15mph in a second. The car has also attempted to take off from a red light when the first car at an intersection treating it as a stop sign when when several lights are present indicating a solid red and the screen in car shows me solid red as well. I have had to intervene many times to prevent accidents.