Tesla Inc.
Musk announced that Cybertruck production at Gigafactory Texas would wind down around mid-2027 to accommodate increased Cybercab output.
He did not say whether the pickup would be manufactured elsewhere or discontinued entirely.
Tesla shares rose about 2% in early Friday premarket trading after plunging 10.77% to $343.69 on Thursday amid a broader technology selloff.
From Big Promises to Falling Sales
When Elon Musk unveiled Cybertruck in 2019, Tesla promised a starting price of $39,900. Musk later envisioned producing between 250,000 and 500,000 trucks annually.
Neither ambition came close to materializing.
By 2023, Tesla had raised the cheapest planned version's price to $60,990, with deliveries not expected until 2025. The all-wheel-drive model started at $79,990.
Buyers proved much harder to find than Musk anticipated.
Cox Automotive estimates U.S. Cybertruck sales plunged 48% in 2025, from 38,965 to just 20,237 vehicles. Sales fell another 28% year over year in the first nine months of 2026, to 11,586.
Musk had acknowledged the vehicle's manufacturing difficulties back in 2023.
"We dug our own grave with the Cybertruck," he said, referring to the challenges of building its stainless-steel body.
Now Cybertruck's lead engineer, Wes Morrill, is describing the pickup as an "incredible technology development platform" whose innovations will live on through Cybercab.
Cybercab Is a Different Bet
Tesla began offering Cybercab rides in Austin in September, but production has already outpaced the company's ability to deploy the vehicles.
"We don't run every day because the line can run so fast," Tesla engineering chief Lars Moravy revealed last month. "Right now the manufacturing line's ahead."
Tesla has installed annual manufacturing capacity exceeding 125,000 Cybercabs, but CFO Vaibhav Taneja has identified regulatory approvals as a key challenge to expanding deployments.
Cybertruck missed its original advertised price by more than $21,000. Now Tesla faces another test of Musk's pricing ambitions.
Musk has said Tesla will sell Cybercab to consumers for under $30,000, and the company said in October it was targeting retail deliveries before year-end.
On Polymarket, the odds of Tesla selling a Cybercab to a retail customer for $30,000 or less by December 31 briefly surged from around 10% to 36%, before falling back to 23%.The contract excludes vehicles deployed into Tesla's own robotaxi fleet.
Despite Musk's push to expand Cybercab production, traders remain skeptical that Tesla can deliver one to a customer at its promised price this year.
