Blog

Nov 17, 2023

Tesla will now scan for potholes and detect rough road segments in 2022.20

Tesla will now leverage its fleet of vehicles to help locate rough road segments

Tesla will now leverage its fleet of vehicles to help locate rough road segments or non-paved roads.

Although the entire fleet will be contributing, the first vehicles to take advantage of this information will be Tesla's Model X and Model S vehicles with an adaptive air suspension.

These cars will soon be getting a smoother ride.

Many Tesla owners have requested that their vehicles learn and adapt to rough roads.

CEO Elon Musk has stated that adaptive air suspension will remain a luxury feature and will stay exclusive to the Model S and Model X, although it's possible other vehicles in the future can take advantage of knowing the location of rough road segments by either slowing down or avoiding potholes.

In November 2020, @JohnEG78 tweeted to Musk stating, "I would like voice commands for air suspension ride height."

Musk responded, "Ok. Overall air suspension height & dampening algorithm is getting a lot of attention. Will be linked to FSD, so [it] acts automatically."

Ok. Overall air suspension height & damping algorithm is getting a lot of attention. Will be linked to FSD, so acts automatically.

Update 2022.20 has just started going out to select vehicles and one of the key features in the update is "Tesla Adaptive Suspension."

This feature will let your Tesla with an adaptive suspension automatically lower or raise depending on the type of road. So if you're driving and encounter a gravel or dirt road your vehicle will now automatically adjust its suspension for a smoother ride.

As Tesla ramps up their FSD rollout, the amount of real-world data that Tesla has collected is most likely more than any other automotive company.

Tesla can use this data gathered by the Tesla fleet to automatically adjust the ride height.

If more data is needed or something is inaccurate, a button on the screen or voice command would be a nice addition to report it to Tesla, similar to Tesla's FSD Beta report button.

While we don't have pothole detection and avoidance just yet this could be the start of such a feature.

"Tesla Adaptive Suspension will now adjust ride height for an upcoming rough road section. This adjustment may occur at various locations, subject to availability, as the vehicle downloads rough road map data generated by Tesla cars. The instrument cluster will continue to indicate when the suspension is raised for comfort. To enable this feature, tap Controls > Suspension > Adaptive Suspension Damping, and select the Comfort or Auto setting."

While potholes may be more difficult for the vehicle to detect, having a built-in system similar to Waze where users can report where the pothole is could be useful. With Waze, users can report a number of issues on the road, including police presence, objects on the road, construction, accidents, and more.

If a pothole is repaired, Tesla could utilize indicators that compare the amount of times the pothole is being reported by the driver or vehicle to before it was repaired. If there are no reports of that pothole in the road anymore, Tesla's AI could mark that pothole as repaired and remove it from the notification system or adaptive air suspension.

Subscribe to our newsletter to be the first to know about Tesla's upcoming features and new software updates.