Fresh off announcing the decision to pull safety monitors from “a few” Model Y robotaxis in Austin, Tesla (TSLA) late Thursday discontinued its Autopilot technology in the U.S. and Canada as the EV giant pushes for Full Self-Driving adoption among consumers. CEO Elon Musk hinted at an FSD price hike. Tesla stock fell early Friday.

The autosteer feature and “traffic aware cruise control,” the focus of the Autopilot technology, are no longer available on new Model 3 and Model Y vehicles in North America. The move came just hours after Musk confirmed that Tesla has pulled safety monitors from some robotaxis in Austin, Texas.

This appears to be the latest move to push consumers toward purchasing a supervised full self-driving, or FSD, subscription, or buying it outright for $8,000 before that option goes away after Feb. 14.

In response to Tesla’s decision to discontinue Autopilot, Musk said on X late Thursday that the $99 per month price for supervised FSD “will rise as FSD’s capabilities improve.”

“The massive value jump is when you can be on your phone or sleeping for the entire ride (unsupervised FSD),” Musk said.

Tesla Unsupervised Robotaxis?

On Thursday afternoon, brief videos were posted to X of a rider in a safety monitor-free Model Y robotaxi in Austin.

Musk then officially announced on X that the EV giant has removed some “safety monitors” from its Austin robotaxi ride-hailing service. Tesla’s AI team head Ashok Elluswamy also posted to X Thursday that robotaxi rides “without any safety monitors are now publicly available in Austin.”

Elluswamy added that there will be “a few unsupervised vehicles mixed in with the broader robotaxi fleet with safety monitors, and the ratio will increase over time.”

However, some videos appear to show a chase car behind the robotaxis. That could mean that Tesla is using safety monitors in those vehicles.

Morgan Stanley analyst Andrew Percoco wrote Thursday that Tesla’s removal of the safety monitor “marks a pivotal moment in proving out its vision-only approach to autonomy.”

“This milestone signals to the market that the company is comfortable with the safety standards of its offering and is ready to scale,” Percoco said.

The analyst added that “pulling the safety driver in a robust and reliable robotaxi fleet is a precursor to rolling out unsupervised FSD on passenger vehicles in the U.S.”

Tesla Stock Performance

TSLA stock declined 1% to 444.90 at Friday’s stock market open, after popping 4.15% to 449.36 on Thursday, retaking the 50-day moving average and the 21-day line in an emerging new base. That could offer an aggressive entry. However, Tesla earnings are due on Jan. 28.

Tesla reports fourth-quarter earnings and revenue on Jan. 28. Analyst consensus has Tesla EPS falling 38% to 45 cents with revenue declining 3.7% to $24.76 billion, according to FactSet.

 

Meanwhile, ride-hailing stocks Uber Technologies (UBER) and Lyft (LYFT) declined around 2% and 1.6%, respectively, on Thursday following the Tesla robotaxi announcement. They rose a fraction early Friday.

Tesla stock on Tuesday hit its worst level since late November, but rebounded 2.9% in the following session.

On Wednesday, Lemonade (LMND) announced the launch of Lemonade Autonomous Car insurance, a product designed for self-driving cars, starting with Tesla’s FSD. The new offering cuts per-mile insurance rates for FSD-engaged driving by approximately 50%, reflecting the idea of reduced risk during autonomous operation. The launch is the result of a technical collaboration with Tesla, giving Lemonade access to vehicle data that was previously unavailable.

The product will begin rolling out in Arizona on Jan. 26 and in Oregon a month later.

TSLA shares lagged the broader stock market for a good part of 2025, but rallied strongly to end the year up slightly more than 11%.

Tesla stock has a 65 Composite Rating out of a best-possible 99. The stock also has an 84 Relative Strength Rating and a 46 EPS Rating.