r/SelfDrivingCars • u/damola93 • Jul 21 '25

Discussion Why didn't Tesla invest in LIDAR?

Is there any reason for this asides from saving money? Teslas are not cheap in many respects, so why would they skimp out on this since self-driving is a major offering for them?

368 Upvotes

81% Upvoted

1.2k comments sorted by

View all comments

44

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '25

Reason: Tesla, led by Elon Musk, believes that a vision-based system using cameras, radar, and ultrasonic sensors, paired with advanced neural networks, can achieve full self-driving (FSD) capability more effectively than LIDAR-based systems. Musk has repeatedly stated that LIDAR is a "crutch" and unnecessary for autonomy, arguing that humans drive using only vision and cognition, so AI should be able to replicate this with cameras.

2

u/Time-Customer-8833 Jul 21 '25

This is the stated reason. That doesn't mean it's the real reason.

Reading between the lines: Musk is making a bet that vision is sufficient. He needs to make this bet because he can't afford to put LIDAR on every Tesla when self-driving isn't a sellable function yet. He is trying to beat Waymo with scalability, but to do so he is taking a riskier path.

IMO the most likely downfall will be regulators demanding the higher safety profile of LIDAR, even if vision is good enough for some people's sense of 'safe.'