Tesla’s new Roadster seems to fly, flip and land in official demo videos

In plain terms, the videos show brief, controlled thruster-powered hops and a flip off a ramp, not sustained flight like an aircraft. Tesla’s new Roadster prototype drove up a towering curved ramp, hung upside down, then fired thrusters to flip and settle onto the pavement in a cloud of white smoke, according to Tesla’s own livestream and reports from Car and Driver and The Verge. Later in the show the car used its thrusters to jump over a truck and other vehicles, twisting in the air, Reuters reports, and TechCrunch lists the hopped lineup as a Cybercab, Cybertruck, Semi, Model Y and Model 3. Tesla VP of engineering Lars Moravy compared the flip to a skateboard trick, calling it “a kick flip,” The Verge reports. The event ran on Thursday evening, October 15, at a SpaceX test site in McGregor, Texas, per Reuters (The Verge says Waco, Texas); Tesla had billed the stream for 7:55 PM CDT (5:55 PM PT) on X.

Musk framed the flight as rocketry. “So it can basically fly like a rocket,” he said, according to The Verge, adding that the car “could do rolls.” He also said, “I’m not sure it’s necessarily legal in all jurisdictions,” the Guardian and Car and Driver report. Musk said the demo car ran autonomously or remotely “to make sure we don’t kill anyone,” per the Guardian; the Tesla livestream transcript has him calling it “technically autonomous for this demo.” Car and Driver notes that the stunt prototype wore Cybercab-style hubcaps while the on-stage car carried more detailed wheels, so the flying car and the showroom car seem to differ.

How the hops work, by Tesla’s account: an underbody fan suction system that Tesla says pulls up to 2 G holds the car to the inverted ramp, The Verge and Car and Driver report. Ten nozzles fed by two ultra-high-pressure air tanks with a combined 600 liters, holding about 250 kilograms of air, supply the thrust, The Verge reports; Moravy said the car can recharge the tank, per TechCrunch. Car and Driver says the SpaceX-supplied thrusters reportedly produce over 80 kilonewtons; this desk found no second source for that figure. Tesla wrote on X that “Every usable void in the car is packed with Carbon Fiber Overwrapped Pressure Vessels (COPVs),” TechCrunch reports. No outlet gave a measured height or hang time for the flights.

The hard numbers all come from Tesla and remain untested by any independent party. Acceleration: Tesla showed a first 0-60 mph run in a claimed one second and a second run in 0.81 seconds, The Verge reports (Car and Driver writes 0.8 second). Top speed: “over 230 mph,” Moravy said, per Reuters, while Musk said the team wants to “crack halfway to the speed of sound.” Range: over 300 miles on a charge, Reuters reports, less than half the 620 miles Tesla promised in 2017, per The Verge. Battery: Tesla gave no capacity; Autocar India says battery capacity, motor output and range “are yet to be revealed” in final form, which sits in tension with the 300-mile figure other outlets attribute to Tesla. Weight: Marques Brownlee described a “4000+ pound car” in a post TechCrunch quotes; Tesla published no curb weight that this desk found.

Price and trims: Tesla named no target price at the event, Reuters reports, though it quoted a $200,000 base price nearly a decade ago. Its reservation page asked a $50,000 deposit for the two-seat Performance version and $250,000 for the two-seat Thrust version, which adds rear thrusters for extra acceleration, Reuters and TechCrunch report. The Guardian printed the Performance deposit as £50,000, which conflicts with the dollar figure in Reuters and TechCrunch. A one-seat flying version called Rocket, with what Tesla calls a “full flight system,” stays invite-only, and Tesla says production begins in 2028. Tesla first showed the second-generation Roadster in 2017 with 2020 deliveries promised, Reuters notes.

Reaction split along familiar lines. “It was an engineering flex with no commercial value beyond embarrassing traditional car makers,” Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management said on X, Reuters reports. Morningstar analyst Seth Goldstein called the Roadster Tesla’s coming halo car, per the same report. Brownlee asked, “This is a prank, right?” according to TechCrunch. Tesla shares rose 5% in premarket trading Friday, Reuters says, ahead of third-quarter results due October 21.

Reading note: this desk wrote from Tesla’s official YouTube upload, Tesla posts on X, and outlet copies, not field reporting. It used a KSL reprint of the Reuters story because reuters.com did not load. It read Musk’s caption post on X on Oct. 17 but did not open Tesla’s reservation page directly. Every performance figure here comes from Tesla; no outlet reports an independent test.

Correction · Oct 16, 2026, 10:54 AM PT: An earlier version of this story credited the McGregor, Texas, location of the event to both Reuters and The Verge, and credited the over-300-mile range to Tesla’s Lars Moravy. Reuters places the event at a SpaceX test site in McGregor, Texas, while The Verge places it in Waco, Texas; this desk now credits each location to its outlet. Reuters credits Moravy with the top-speed line but reports the over-300-mile range in a separate sentence without naming a speaker, so this desk now credits the range to Reuters alone.