Musk: Robotaxi to Become Key Revenue Source by 2027, Optimus External Deliveries Expected by End of 2027
Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, provided updates on Robotaxi, Optimus humanoid robots, and FSD during the company's third-quarter earnings call on October 22, 2026. Musk said Robotaxi is planned to become a significant source of revenue and profit in 2027, with contributions beginning to emerge from the second quarter and potentially becoming a major business by Q3 or Q4.
Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla's head of autonomous driving, said the Robotaxi service is expected to launch in Dallas in November 2026, following its September launch in Austin. By the end of Q3, cumulative unsupervised miles driven by Robotaxi reached nearly 2 million, and the Cybercab fleet in Austin had expanded to 10 times its original size about a month after launch. CFO Vaibhav Taneja said the business could notably boost revenue and profit in 2027 as operations scale.
Regarding Optimus, Musk said Tesla has started early production preparations for a high-capacity line at its Fremont factory, but the robot still needs to address design, safety, durability, and AI capabilities for open-ended tasks. He expected these issues to be resolved by the end of 2027, after which external customer deliveries would begin. Musk noted that the current bottleneck is not data collection but the AI architecture. Tesla plans to produce roughly 10,000 to 20,000 robots first for large-scale autonomous training and is building the Optimus Academy.
On FSD, Musk called it a key factor driving Tesla vehicle demand. Tesla said over 75% of new vehicle deliveries in North America included FSD (supervised) subscriptions, with 1.74 million subscribers at quarter-end, up 67% year over year.
