Euro NCAP Downgrades Tesla’s Safety Score Over Misleading ‘Autopilot’ Branding

Tesla sure does love to make a lot of claims that, at minimum, exaggerate the truth. Not a wonder then that the company’s branding of its driver assistance system is also a little, shall we say, imaginative. That’s not going over well with the European New Car Assessment Programme, an independent safety ratings agency, which thinks Tesla are making the road less safe.

In its recently released report on assisted driving systems, Euro NCAP only gives the Tesla Model S a “Moderate” safety rating, tying it for lowest with the Volvo EX30. The agency does say that the Tesla is actually quite good at automatically avoiding collisions, so it’s not a complete disaster. The problem mainly has to do with what the American manufacturer has named the feature: Autopilot. According to Euro NCAP, that may lead drivers to assume that the system is quite a bit more robust than it is, potentially making them think they can take their hands off the wheel and eyes off the road. In the language of pure European bureaucratic fury, the name is “inappropriate.”

Autopilot, when enabled, essentially puts the car into automatic cruise control and lane assist. That’s it; no changing lanes, no navigating, nothing else. In fact, the car is supposed to make sure you’re keeping your hands on the wheel, but the Model S has rather spectacularly failed at that task in the past. By contrast, the feature’s namesake, an airplane autopilot system, takes over most of the actual flying in-between take-off and landing.

Over confidence in Autopilot’s can actually lead to crashes, some allegedly fatal. One man drove into a cop car while watching a movie (pro tip: Do not drive into a cop car while watching a movie). In 2024, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration determined that Autopilot was involved in over 200 crashes and 29 deaths in the U.S. That kind of danger on the road has already lead one Transportation Secretary, Pete Buttigieg, to warn about the feature’s misleading name. The entire country of Germany forced Tesla to change the name altogether (to Autodrive, which maybe isn’t much better). 

Euro NCAP has been annoyed with Autopilot for years now, and is finally signaling its displeasure loud and clear. While Euro NCAP thought the actual safety features of Autopilot were quite good, this is more a matter of driver expectation. What’s in a name? A lot of damage, it seems.