Technology: Is Tesla autopilot worth the price?

Note: The following article was written by Hasan Shahrestani Year 8

Tesla autopilot is one of the most well known features of Tesla. It’s designed to help driving become easier by steering, stopping and accelerating. The autopilot isn't self driving though, it helps you with the majority of the journey, but you still have to pay attention and be ready to take control if the car malfunctions. However these features come with a cost. 

To make this safe, Tesla has added many safety measures. For example there are cameras within the car that check whether you are paying attention and if not, it will remind you to keep your eyes on the road. This keeps you safe by making sure you are paying attention and can intervene in cases of emergency.

To get by this though, in China, they are manufacturing small stick-on doll heads to place in front of the in-cabin monitoring camera. The doll tricks the camera into thinking that it is actually the driver with its eyes on the road, making the car not remind the real driver to pay attention. This shows that no matter how good technology is, we still find a way around it.

Tesla autopilot isn't flawless, though. People have reported that when the car is on autopilot it can sometimes stop randomly. This is known as ‘phantom braking’. Even though the autopilot is controlling the majority of the car by itself, the driver will still take full legal responsibility for any incidents and must be ready to take control of the car if something goes wrong. Also the autopilot doesn’t replace the driver, the driver still needs to keep their hands ready to take control at all times.

All of this isn't cheap though. Every new Tesla includes the standard autopilot features, and if you want some of the more advanced features like ‘Full Self Driving’ you’d have to pay extra. In some places like the U.S. you would have to pay subscriptions if you wanted to access Tesla's newest features, and this can make a Tesla significantly more expensive.

However, some people think that the high price and extra cost is worth it, the autopilot can make long drives easy, maintain a safe distance from the other cars, and can overall make driving more enjoyable. Tesla also regularly updates the car meaning the owner would rarely have to worry about visiting a garage.

In conclusion, I think that buying a Tesla can be a good investment, because of its regular updates and high-end technology, depending on how often you make long journeys and even how often you even drive your car. I even think that paying for the extra features could be worth it because they free up a lot more of your time. However, if you don’t regularly use your car I don’t think that buying a Tesla because of the autopilot is worth the price. Overall I would personally wait for the technology to evolve and become faster and cheaper, then I would think that Tesla autopilot is worth the price.