Tesla’s Giga Texas has reached a major production milestone, announcing today it has built its 500,000 vehicles. The milestone was shared by Tesla’s official Manufacturing account on X, with a photo of the milestone vehicle, a white Model Y, surrounded by some of the employees that helped build it.
Opened to first customer deliveries at the “Cyber Rodeo” event on April 7, 2022, Giga Texas has added capacity in waves, moving from early Model Y output to dual-product manufacturing with Cybertruck. Hitting 500,000 roughly three and a half years after those first handovers highlights steady progress through hiring, tooling changes, and supply-chain challenges.
Congratulations to the Giga Texas team for building 500k vehicles pic.twitter.com/5CIJz5C58b
— Tesla Manufacturing (@gigafactories) October 15, 2025
The Road to 500k in Austin
Austin’s ramp has been marked by several public milestones. Tesla celebrated its first 10,000 Model Ys from the plant in September 2022, then pushed weekly output to 3,000 by December that year and 5,000 per week by May 2023 as additional lines and shifts came online. At the same time, Tesla’s 4680 cell operation at the site notched 10 million cells produced by mid-2023, supporting structural-pack Model Y variants, which are no longer produced at the factory.
Cybertruck deliveries then began at Giga Texas on November 30, 2023, adding a second vehicle line and new manufacturing steps like stainless-steel body forming.
This spring, Tesla confirmed Giga Texas had reached 400,000 vehicles produced, meaning the plant built its most recent 100,000 units between April and mid-October, or around 15,000 vehicles per month.
How Giga Texas’ Ramp Compares
Against Tesla’s other new-generation factories, Austin’s timeline compares favourably, though not the fastest. Giga Berlin, which delivered its first cars on March 22, 2022, announced its 500,000th Model Y on March 31, 2025—just about three years from start of deliveries. Austin’s roughly 3.5-year timeline to reach 500,000 is slightly longer, reflecting its dual vehicle program complexity (Model Y and Cybertruck).
Giga Shanghai however set the modern Tesla pace: it reached its one-millionth car on August 13, 2022, less than three years after first customer deliveries in December 2019. While Shanghai’s exact half-million date wasn’t publicly highlighted, the million-car milestone (and the facility’s role as a global export hub) highlights how quickly that site hit scale relative to both Austin and Berlin. Since then, the factory has now produced well over 3 million vehicles.
What’s Next for Giga Texas
Giga Texas is expected to play a central role in Tesla’s next-generation vehicle roadmap. The factory has already been designated as the home for production of Tesla’s upcoming robotaxi, based on the company’s “next-gen” platform. This purpose-built autonomous vehicle will feature a radically simplified design and a lower cost structure enabled by Tesla’s unboxed manufacturing process, which aims to reduce production time and footprint by as much as 40%.
As Tesla continues to refine its product lineup and prepare the facility for new platforms, Giga Texas is poised to become one of the most important and versatile factories in Tesla’s global network.
