Musk Says ‘No’ to a Report That Tesla Opens Optimus Reservations in December

Elon Musk has poured cold water on a report that Tesla will open customer reservations for its Optimus humanoid robot in early December. Asked on X on Friday whether “Optimus ordering” was coming in December, he replied with one word: “No.”

The report came from The San Francisco Standard, which published it at midday Pacific time on Friday, Oct. 30. Citing Modar Alaoui, a robotics investor at ALM Ventures, it said Tesla planned to put consumers on an Optimus waiting list for the first time, timed to the Humanoids Summit that Alaoui runs in San Mateo, California, on Dec. 1–2, or the days right after it.

Robert Scoble shared the story and asked whether ordering was really coming in December (he also jokingly asked the @Bot account to watch for it and order him one). Musk answered under that post at 3:08 PM PT, according to TeslaNorth. That’s 6:08 PM ET on Friday, or 7:08 AM JST on Saturday, Oct. 31. The Standard updated its article to note that Musk “appeared to deny any December waitlist plans.” Tesla didn’t respond to the paper’s request for comment.

What the report actually said

Strip out the date and the Standard’s piece still has useful detail, all of it from Alaoui. He said most Optimus robots will be sold to companies, with a small number set aside for consumers. The first shipments are expected to be the Optimus V3, because the earlier generation was mainly a prototype. Buyers should budget $20,000 or more (about ¥3.15 million), and robots likely wouldn’t ship for about another year. It’s unclear whether a reservation would need a deposit.

The partnership part checks out. The Humanoids Summit website says the event “partners with Tesla to bring Optimus,” and Alaoui told the Standard that Tesla plans to demo Optimus V3 and show its self-driving cars there. So a Tesla Optimus appearance in San Mateo in early December looks solid. A reservation page on the same week is what Musk shot down.

One wrinkle is worth flagging. Scoble’s post mixed a straight question with a joke about a bot ordering a robot. TeslaNorth reads Musk’s “No” as a reply to that post, not as a full statement on when orders will open. Fair enough. Musk didn’t say what the real timing is, and Tesla hasn’t posted an order page or a consumer sales date anywhere.

What Tesla has said on the record

The official timeline is less exciting than a December waitlist, and probably more honest. On Tesla’s October earnings call, Musk said Optimus still has open problems in AI, electromechanical design and run time. “I do expect these issues to be solved around the end of next year,” he said, “so that’s the time to expect when we’re delivering Optimus to companies outside of Tesla.” That’s companies, not households.

Production has started, though. Tesla’s Q3 update said production-quality Optimus units are coming off high-volume lines in Fremont, and CFO Vaibhav Taneja said Tesla is already building a larger Optimus factory in Austin, TeslaNorth noted. The Standard adds that the Fremont line is expected to reach 20,000 robots a week by roughly the end of 2027. Tesla made room for it in January, when Musk said the Model S and Model X would end production and their part of the Fremont plant would be converted to build Optimus.

Waitlists in this industry don’t mean much yet. 1X opened reservations for its $20,000 robot last year and, per the Standard, hasn’t delivered any. Tesla’s own Roadster list is nearly a decade old.

The EVX Take

The December date is off, but the bigger picture holds. Tesla is building Optimus at scale and selling to businesses first, and that’s the version that matters most for Japan. Japanese manufacturers and logistics firms are short of workers, and Japanese players are already preparing for humanoids, from Kawasaki’s Kaleido program to KDDI’s ¥30 billion ELYZA Robotics venture that plans to deploy more than 1,000 robots. Tesla hasn’t said a word about selling Optimus in Japan. The closest Asian showcase is next week, when Tesla brings its latest gold Optimus to its own zone at the China International Import Expo in Shanghai (Nov. 5–10), according to China Securities Journal and an exhibitor preview reposted on the official CIIE site. For a business buyer in Japan, the date that matters is Musk’s own: deliveries to outside companies around the end of 2027.

Watch San Mateo on Dec. 1. If Optimus V3 shows up and nobody can reserve one, Musk’s one-word answer will have aged just fine.

Sources: Elon Musk on X, Robert Scoble on X, The San Francisco Standard, TeslaNorth, Humanoids Summit, China Securities Journal, CIIE.

— The EVX News team

Featured image: A Tesla Bot (Optimus) on display at the Tesla store in Westfield Century City, Los Angeles, September 2024. Photo: Alexis Doine / Wikimedia Commons (CC0, cropped).