Tesla just cut the cash you need to drive away in a Model 3 or Model Y in China by half. A new financing offer called “Te Congrong” (特从容), which started Friday, Oct. 30, drops the minimum down payment on 0% five-year loans to 39,900 yuan (about $5,980), down from 79,900 yuan (about $12,000). The 6-seat Model Y L now starts at 59,900 yuan (about $8,970) down, down from 99,900 yuan (about $15,000). Orders have to be placed by Nov. 30.
Tesla China posted the plan on its official channels and website on Friday morning, and Chinese outlets including the Daily Economic News (via 21jingji.com), Xinhuanghe and EET China, plus CnEVPost in English, carried the full terms. They match on every figure below.
Two ways to pay, both at 0%
The first option is a balloon loan. Buyers pay the 39,900-yuan down payment, 60 low monthly installments, and a fixed 39,900-yuan final payment at the end. Tesla’s own examples:
- Model 3 Rear-Wheel Drive (235,500 yuan, about $35,300): 39,900 down, about 2,429 yuan (about $360) a month, after a 10,000-yuan (about $1,500) limited-time discount.
- Model Y Rear-Wheel Drive (263,500 yuan, about $39,500): 39,900 down, about 2,995 yuan (about $450) a month, after a 4,000-yuan (about $600) discount.
- Model Y L (339,000 yuan, about $50,800): 59,900 down, about 3,920 yuan (about $590) a month, also with a 4,000-yuan discount.
The second option is a plain five-year, 0% loan with no balloon. Same down payments, higher installments: about 3,094 yuan (about $460) a month for the Model 3 RWD, 3,660 yuan (about $550) for the Model Y RWD and 4,585 yuan (about $690) for the Model Y L. Both plans cover the Rear-Wheel Drive, Long Range RWD and Long Range AWD versions of the Model 3 and Model Y. All loans need lender approval.
We checked the math
A balloon plan with a tiny monthly payment can hide interest. This one doesn’t. Add up Tesla’s Model Y RWD example: 39,900 down, plus 60 payments of 2,995, plus the 39,900 balloon, comes to exactly 259,500 yuan (about $38,900). That’s the 263,500-yuan price minus the 4,000-yuan discount, to the yuan. The Model Y L example lands exactly on 335,000 yuan, and the Model 3 example is within 40 yuan of its discounted 225,500-yuan price (rounding in the “about 2,429” figure). Xinhuanghe ran the same check on the Model 3 and got the same answer. So the 0% is real. What Tesla is really doing is moving money from the start of the loan to the end.
The fine print cuts both ways
This isn’t a straight price cut, and for some buyers it’s slightly worse than last month’s deal. According to the Daily Economic News, the Model 3’s cash discount rose by 5,000 yuan to 10,000 yuan, but an 8,000-yuan (about $1,200) Model 3 insurance subsidy ended on Oct. 29 and didn’t come back. The Model 3 Performance also isn’t on the new discount list. On the Model Y, the discount shrank from 7,000 yuan to 4,000. The paint-option offer, worth up to 8,000 yuan, stays.
The reason for the push is in the sales numbers. Tesla sold 64,837 cars at retail in China in September, down 9.35% from a year earlier and the fourth straight monthly drop, according to China Passenger Car Association data compiled by CnEVPost. Nine-month retail sales are down 11.93% at 381,088. At the same time, Giga Shanghai’s exports jumped 108.44% to 361,972 cars. The whole Chinese market is soft too: NEV retail sales fell 13% in Oct. 1–25. Rivals such as BYD are leaning on exports to grow profits as well.
October gives Tesla an easy comparison. Its China retail sales in October 2025 were just 26,006, so any decent month will show year-on-year growth. November is the harder test: 73,145 cars a year ago.
EVX take
China and Japan are getting very different Tesla deals this fall, and it shows how Tesla tunes incentives to each market. In China, it’s financing: a low upfront cost and 0% for five years, aimed at buyers whose main obstacle is cash on hand. In Japan, it’s cash. The charging support program takes ¥264,000 (about $1,670) off the new Model 3 and ¥88,000 (about $560) off the Model Y, and the national CEV subsidy adds ¥1.27 million (about $8,040) for cars registered by Dec. 31. That subsidy falls to ¥762,000 (about $4,830) from January, so Japan’s real deadline is the registration date, not an order window. Tesla Japan last ran a 0% loan offer from January to March this year, so a financing push here after the subsidy cut wouldn’t be surprising. The bigger point for Japanese buyers is supply. Japan’s Model 3 and Model Y come from Shanghai, and while sales at home shrink, the factory is shipping more than twice as many cars abroad as it did a year ago. Export markets like Japan are where that extra output goes.
Sources: Tesla China, 21jingji / Daily Economic News, Xinhuanghe (plan details), Xinhuanghe (comparison with the previous offer), EET China, CnEVPost, Tesla Japan press release (Oct. 23), Tesla Japan 0% campaign release (Jan. 3), Next Generation Vehicle Promotion Center (CEV subsidy amounts).
— The EVX News team
Featured image: A Tesla Model Y on a street in Shanghai. Photo: S5A-0043 / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0, license plate blurred).
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