Model Y Refresh Not Coming in 2024
There will be no Model Y “Project Juniper” refresh in 2024, according to a recent internal email sent to employees.
The message was sent in response to feedback from customers that they are waiting to place orders for their new Model Y’s in anticipation of a design refresh similar to the Model 3’s recent Highland update.
The letter goes on to stress that “there’s no better time for customers to start driving the world’s best-selling vehicle.” and reminds employees of the $7,500 Federal Tax Credit, as well as some other incentives - one of which appears to be a temporary discount on the Model Y for the month of February, which takes the lease price for the electric crossover down to $379 per month with a down payment of $2,500 up front.
The problem is that a potential design update for the Model Y is a very attractive reason to hold off on buying one - the recent success of the Model 3 Highland has been a very successful example of that, as we said earlier.
But it’s not the only reason.
Back in March of last year, news outlet Reuters published an article filled with information on “Project Juniper” - a revamp of the Model Y very similar to the now well-known Project Highland. Anonymous sources close to the project told Reuters that the projected start date of production for this updated vehicle would be October 2024 - but didn’t give any specifics as to what would be changed.
Regardless, the Tesla community was all over this news - including us. But time passed, and 2023 ended up being dominated by big projects like the Cybertruck launch, GigaMexico getting delayed, and the Model 3 Highland getting released - so this is really the first substantial thing we’ve heard about Project Juniper since early 2023.
The question now is: was this email just trying to keep sales high while clearing out old inventory, or has Tesla actually pushed back the Project until a later date.
That’s hard to say for sure, there’s definitely incentive for Tesla to keep pushing the current Model Y in order to keep those numbers up - but it also wouldn’t be strange for them to be holding off on Juniper for now.
After all, the company seemed very excited about GigaMexico before construction preparation slowed down in response to the shaky economy late last year - and there have been several significant new projects started across the company’s facilities - not to mention the very beginnings of pre production for Tesla’s new $25k vehicle platform: Project Redwood.
With all that going on, it would make some sense for Tesla to prioritize these other things over a redesign of their best-performing car. But the email didn’t say it wasn’t happening anymore either, so we’ll just have to wait and see if Tesla adjusts their schedule again.