Tesla Self-Driving Actual Logged Miles 2016
Tesla tells two tales. As indicated by the marketing name “Autopilot”, to consumers it’s the story of “self-driving” vehicles. To regulators, it’s the story of driver assistance where the human driver must have two hands on the wheel at all times.
Thus, when Tesla claims it’s “Autopilot” has logged more than one billion miles, care must be taken to read the details.
The California DMV Disengagement Report indicates that Tesla self-driving vehicles have logged only 550 miles in 2016 with around 180 disengagements. So roughly one third of the time the driver must re-engage and take over the car. Certainly today by no means self-driving.
In contrast, BMW reported 638 autonomous miles with only 1 disengagement.
Google/Waymo reported 635,868 miles driven with 124 disengagements.