Quarterly sales top analyst forecast as shares rise nearly 4%
Tesla’s global sales fell in the third quarter, reversing two quarters of growth in the first half of the year. The company said Friday it sold 486,532 electric vehicles worldwide from July through September, down 2% from the same period last year. The result beat the analyst consensus of 461,000, according to FactSet, and Tesla’s stock rose nearly 4% in early trading Friday.
Tesla also reported 9.6% growth in its energy business, a figure that measures how much battery energy the company deployed in the quarter. Tesla will report its full third-quarter earnings on Oct. 21.
Most of the vehicles sold were the Model Y and Model 3, which start between $37,000 and $40,000. The automaker has discontinued its luxury Model S and Model X vehicles, which it sold for around $100,000. Sales from remaining inventory of those cars, together with its stainless-steel Cybertruck pickup, added up to 8,295 deliveries in the third quarter, less than 2% of Tesla’s total sales.
The sales decline comes amid a wider downturn in the U.S. electric-vehicle market, where most other automakers have reported sharp sales declines for their electric models this year. In August, Tesla reclaimed its hold on the U.S. market, selling more than half of all EVs sold in the country.
Tesla’s U.S. sales in the first eight months of the year were down 16.2% compared with the same period of 2025, according to data from Motor Intelligence — a milder decline than the overall U.S. electric-vehicle market, which fell 30.4% over the same period.
Auto sales still drive the company’s finances, accounting for 70% of Tesla’s revenue in the first half of the year, with energy and regulatory credits, among other services, making up the rest.
Chief Executive Elon Musk must sell more vehicles as part of a $1 trillion pay package approved by Tesla shareholders in November, which requires him to hit a series of financial and operational milestones over the next decade.
Musk has said the company is pivoting its business away from vehicle sales to focus on robotaxis and humanoid robots, neither of which is currently for sale.
In September, Tesla rolled out the Cybercab, a dedicated robotaxi with no steering wheel or pedals. The vehicle is available for rides through the Tesla Robotaxi ride-hailing app in Austin, Texas, where Tesla is headquartered. The company aims to sell Cybercabs to individuals for $30,000 by the end of the year, though some analysts have questioned that timeline because of regulatory and technological hurdles, and Tesla has not given specifics on timing.
On Oct. 15, Tesla is scheduled to demonstrate its new Roadster, a reissued version of its original sports car that the company has previously said will start at $200,000. Musk has said the Roadster will be its last new vehicle with controls for human drivers. Some Tesla fans have waited years for the vehicle after putting down five- and six-figure deposits when it was first announced in 2017.
Some analysts and investors expect Musk to merge Tesla with SpaceX, further consolidating his empire after taking the rocket company public in June in the largest IPO of all time.
Earlier this year, Tesla and SpaceX announced plans for Terafab, a new AI chip-research and -manufacturing project in partnership with Intel. The companies have said the project is necessary to supply the new generation of robots at Tesla, as well as orbital data centers for SpaceX.