Tesla halts Cybertruck production in Australia and New Zealand after years of deposits
Tesla has ended its plans to build the Cybertruck in Australia and New Zealand, leaving reservation holders waiting for years.
By Samir Nasser ·
For seven years, Australians waited for the Cybertruck, only to be told today that Tesla has cancelled the production of the electric pickup in their country and New Zealand. Reservation holders are getting emails informing them that their orders are no longer valid and that their deposits will be refunded. The emails, which began circulating on social media and Reddit, reveal that after careful consideration, Tesla has decided to discontinue plans to produce the Cybertruck for Australia and New Zealand. As a result, reservations will be cancelled, and customers will receive a full refund for any payments made, with refunds processed within 30 days. Tesla is also offering a free one-year subscription to FSD (Supervised) to reservation holders who opt to order a new Model 3 or Model Y instead.
Australians started putting down A$150 to reserve the electric pickup in November 2019. That’s almost seven years of waiting for a truck Tesla now says it won’t build for them. Tesla quietly closed the Australian reservation page in May 2022 and replaced it with a “Get updates” button. It didn’t refund anyone at the time. People who had already reserved just kept waiting.
The Cybertruck can’t justify the investment. Tesla’s few international Cybertruck launches all share one thing: they’re left-hand-drive markets. Deliveries started in South Korea late last year and in the UAE in January, followed by configurators in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, and Israel. The truck remains blocked in the EU, mainly for pedestrian safety reasons.
Electrek’s Take: This was the obvious outcome for a while, and Tesla should have said so years ago. A lot of Australian reservation holders likely already canceled their pre-orders. The Cybertruck that showed up in 2023 isn’t the one they reserved. It’s more expensive, has less range than promised, and its US sales have collapsed from about 39,000 in 2024 to a fraction of that today. Paying a premium for an import-ready version would have made it even worse value down under.
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Source: Electrek
