The Tesla Model 3 may very well be the most important car of our time. With its
release, the Model 3 ushers in a new era of affordability around electric
vehicles accompanied with the sales and scale never seen before for an EV
after only one for over six months it's time to dive deep and take a look and if
the Model 3 has lived up to the hype we'll look at which core features have
been the most important what issues we've had thus far and what could be
improved with the car the first thing I got my Model 3 all I could think about
doing was throwing up to actually become a Tesla owner was surreal what was I
going to wreck the car would it live up to the hype a million things were going
through my head when I was actually signing the paperwork for my Model 3
which took like five minutes by the way in stark contrast to the normal
experience at a car dealership my first day of ownership was more about the car
and not about the paperwork most of the time I spent at the Tesla store was on
an overview of the car and an overview of its features looking back on the
first day of ownership now I was right to be nervous and filled with excitement
this car has matched and exceeded all of my expectations and to say the Model 3
is a great car is an understatement in my book it is the best car you can get
for its price range. So what makes the Model 3 so good? Let's dive in. First the
looks this car simply looks stunning the design language is clearly Tesla and it
turns people's heads everywhere you go they've done a good job making a
great-looking electric car which is something almost no other car
manufacturer has been able to do at scale up until this point it doesn't
look like a weird mobile and it also doesn't look like an ordinary car which
let's be honest if you're going to try to get people to switch to driving an
electric car you actually need to make that car look like something that people
will actually desire Tesla gets this and has exceeded at this with their design
language the grille this front angry headlights sharper lines that run
the length of the car towards the hips all work in tandem to
make the model three look aggressive but not too aggressive the interior is just
as stunning as the exterior and also turns a few heads with how sparse clean
and simple it looks it's also quite practical I love the storage space and
the phone dock as well as the USB ports up front going to the model threes into
your ear from any other car that has a ton of buttons and gauges it's like
going from a phone with a physical keyboard to an iPhone and once you go to
this experience you're never going to want to go back now when the model 3 was
first announced having one screen in the center of the dash without anything
behind the steering wheel caused a bit of an uproar in the Tesla community and
in the media questions arose like how we ever see the speed and is that even safe
so after six months of owning the car was all of that discussion and concern
valid no it wasn't not having a screen or gauge in front of you is actually
pretty free Tesla was able to make the steering wheel smaller allowing for
better grip and ergonomics thanks to its nifty vent design technology you can
actually push air through the steering wheel at your face which on a hot summer
day has been a very welcomed feature looking over at the top left corner of
the display to read the speed only took me a few hours to get used to and now
that I'm used to it I can't say it's any different than just reading the speed
from behind the steering wheel plus Tesla gives you a speed chime that you
can set in the car as well and it's something that I actually use a lot you
can set the car to give you a chime when you hit a certain number over the
current speed limit some people would probably find this chime annoying but I
highly recommend setting it when you first get the car if you're not used to
how a Tesla accelerates I found it hard to figure out how fast the car was going
when I first got it without looking at the speedometer so the chime certainly
helps ergonomics is something Tesla thought a
lot about with the Model threes interior design and honestly I think overall it's
better than the interior design of the Tesla Model S
the cupholders are where they should be there are pockets and the door coat
hooks the arm rests on the console and the doors are very comfortable and my
arms never get sore the seats are also one of the most comfortable seats I've
ever sat in in a car I've taken the car on six-hour road trips and never felt
sore which is something I personally have never experienced before riding in
a motor vehicle another nice thing about the interior especially on long road
trips is the premium sound system it's crisp it has a nice base and it's one of
the best sound systems of any car that I've ever experienced and it's become
one of my absolute favorite features of this car maintenance of the interior has
been pretty minimal thankfully since everything in the model 3 is pretty easy
to clean the seats are very durable since they're made out of a vegan
leather the only area of the car that is not very easy to clean is that piano
black finish on the center console even if you take a ton of precautions and try
not to get any scratches you're just gonna end up seeing micro scratches on
that thing almost no matter what you do even if you use microfiber cloth it's
almost inevitable that you will see some scratching on that material now on to
driving the Tesla Model 3 after six months the thing I still can't get over
is the electric torque this thing produces its quick and the non
performance version for me has been plenty fast in day to day situations
where I'm not trying to impress my friends it's basically like Elon said in
the past it's like owning your own personal rollercoaster and even after
six months of ownership I still feel good every time I punch it what powers
that great instant acceleration of course is the model threes electric
motors and battery having an electric car over the past six months has taught
me a lot and I found that I actually enjoy having an electric car more than I
thought I would I start off every morning with the equivalent of a full
tank of gas and I don't have to go to gas stations anymore which I don't miss
at all especially in situations where people are freaking out over an inch
I mean hurricane like they did this past summer and all the gas stations in the
area started running out of gas I didn't have to panic at all with the model 3
which was great the only downside I found with owning an electric car of the
past six months is with road trips no matter how you look at it typically it
will take you longer to drive an electric car on a trip than a gas car
because of the limits on the cars range as well as the time it takes to charge
now there are some ways you can mitigate that extra time on road trips and
something that I did on the several road trips I took this year with my model 3
was to plan my charging stops during meals so that way by the time I was
finished eating the car was charged up and ready to go either to the next super
charging spot or to my end destination the upside still vastly outweigh any of
the negatives that you may experience when going on a road trip you're still
getting that instant torque comfortable interior and drive and that awesome
software that comes on the model 3 is screen the software on the model 3 is
amazing and it's been so interesting to have a car that just like my cell phone
receives regular software updates and these are just little small improvements
or bug fixes sometimes these software updates are
major features that are released to the car or major overhauls to the cars UI in
my experience I've gotten several new features since taking delivery including
a new version of autopilot with 360 degree view on the center display of the
cars around the model 3 blind spot visualization on the center screen a
dash cam feature Auto high beams and better regenerative braking intensity
the software is snappy and responsive the navigation is hands-down one of the
most useful things I've come to love about my model 3 it's easy to navigate
anywhere you just swipe down on the navigation bar to either go home or go
to work the live traffic built in is a godsend the live traffic is also built
into the navigation which will route you on the fastest route which in my testing
has been equal to the experience I get with Google Maps routing safety is
another area where the model 3 has held up over the past six months it's been
given one of the highest safety ratings ever given to a vehicle here in the US
by our government and I've already had some experience with its safety features
including the forward collision warning which has saved me from accidentally
running into a car once I've also experienced the side collision avoidance
system and it does work as advertised I had a truck coming in to my lane all of
the sudden and before I had time to react my Tesla moved into the other lane
avoiding the truck while still sounding and alert now let's move on to
reliability I put out a video early on into my ownership of the Model 3 and it
proved to be a bit controversial with all of the issues I ran into most of
them were minor issues the charge port door sensor wasn't working correctly so
the entire charge port door assembly was replaced the driver's side windshield
wiper was loose and scraped the underside of the hood and caused a chunk
of the wiper blade to fall off as well as the hood wasn't aligned properly
Tesla fixed all of these issues early on however when they realign the hood they
did scratch the paint in several areas of the car causing the car Daffy to go
to a body shop for repair and lead paint when the car came back from the body
shop the steering wheel had scratches on it so that that also had to be replaced
the only other issues I've had that have been more recent are that the center
armrest squeaks when you pull it up and the rubber part above the wood panel on
the dash is actually discolored a metal piece fell out of the charge port door
it appears that the adhesive Tesla used for this metal piece just doesn't hold
up well in colder climates now while these issues do sound like a lot and
chirp it has been a longest list at least to me it just doesn't feel like
that big of a deal I have felt very taken care of by Tesla they've done
everything they've can and done all the right things to fix the car the total
time my car's been in the shop has been about two to three weeks which may sound
like a long time for a lot of people out there but do keep in mind that what all
my car was in the shop I was given a Tesla Model S loaner
which made it very hard to complain about the time that my car spent in the
shop because I was just whizzing around town you know going ludicrous speed and
just having fun while on the subject of things that didn't go correctly with my
Model 3 let's talk about some of the things that I think could be improved
with the car the largest area in the Tesla Model 3 and all Tesla's for that
matter that needs to be improved is the music streaming service availability
currently all the cars come free with Slacker which has been fine but it's
just not a great experience because Slacker is more like pandora than
Spotify when you ask slacker to play a specific song it's going to start a
radio station of that song rather than just playing the song outright like you
would expect on most major other music streaming services
another area of improvement Tesla could focus on with the model 3 is the
windshield wipers the auto wiper mode has been inconsistent though it has
gotten better in the past few months it still doesn't work well at night though
which makes sense given the Tesla's using the auto pilot cameras to sense
rain well the aerodynamics of the car are extraordinary one consequence of
that is dirt seems to collect at the back of the car a lot more than anywhere
else which makes sense given how water comes down the back glass and drips down
the lid and deposits dirt in that area here's a short list of some other
improvements I think could be made to the car as well a more scratch resistant
black finish on the console and a manual release for the two front doors that is
less accessible so passengers don't extinct if Lee pull it first before
pressing the button to try to get out of the car with all of these improvements
and minor issues I've had with my model 3 I'm still in love with this car and
don't regret my purchase for a second what Elon Franz JB and all the other
Tesla teams have done with this car is nothing short of extraordinary once you
get a model 3 you'll never want to drive any other car and that's certainly how I
still feel 6 months later thanks so much for watching this video
if you like this video please be sure to give us a thumbs up and subscribe to the
channel if you'd like to see more Tesla videos like this one thanks again for
watching for 6 Months Later Reviews, I'm Josh Teder.