Elon Musk says Tesla is discontinuing the Cybertruck — it didn't even last five years on the market. What went wrong?

The vehicle defied many of the boundaries that define a traditional pickup truck, and was divisive almost immediately, with some absolutely repelled by its hulking presence, apocalyptic appearance and high price tag.

The fact that Cybertrucks started hitting the roads just over a year after Musk had controversially purchased Twitter, renaming it X, and around the time the then-billionaire was forming a close but dramatic relationship with President Donald Trump, only added to its buzz.

Meagre sales preceded the move

As of mid-2026, headlines have declared the model a decided flop — the biggest of any car on a target-versus-sales basis, Bloomberg argued in July, quoting one researcher who predicted that the truck would likely end up “fading away” in the near future.

Deliveries only reached 16% of what was projected in the vehicle’s first full year on the market, with sales only dwindling markedly from there amid countless recalls, falling to a mere 7,133 units in the U.S. during the first five months of this year.

So, fade away it will, according to Musk, who informed his 241.4 million followers at 1:30 a.m. Eastern on Nov. 6 that “Tesla will be winding down production of the Cybertruck at Gigafactory Texas around the middle of next year to make room for increased Cybercab production.” The Gigafactory, for the uninitiated, was the only hub that produced the series.

Thousands of responses to the post poured in within hours, varying from customers celebrating the truck as “the best damn vehicle I’ve ever owned or driven” to detractors speculating that it will “go down as one of the worst automotive products in history.”

Though production of new Cybertrucks will grind to a halt in 2027, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO stated that “the Cybertruck fleet will be around for a long time.”

So what about the Cybercab?

The much-hyped self-driving Cybercab, much like the Cybertruck, pushes the envelope, though moreso in its technology than its aesthetics.

The two-seater cab is free of gas or brake pedals, a steering wheel, rear window or mirrors, and it uses cameras and AI — not LiDar, like comparable autonomous vehicles — to navigate.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is currently in the midst of investigating whether the EV meets federal standards following Cybercab’s September release.