Tesla has been known to recall vehicles for various reasons, but this is the first time we've heard of one car getting recalled over a font – let alone 2.19M of them. Apparently the size of its brake system warnings are too small, to the point that they've fallen foul of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards guidelines.
As a result, Tesla has recalled every car it currently has on the road. The 'recall' is actually just a simple over-the-air update, but it's not a great look for Tesla. As the recall notice says, "Warning lights with a smaller font size can make critical safety information on the instrument panel difficult to read, increasing the risk of a crash." (Looking for some nice, big typefaces? Check out our roundup of the best free fonts.)
This isn't even the first time Tesla's on-screen warnings have required an update – back in December, the company was forced to push out an update to fix problems with its Autopilot software, increasing to "prominence and scope" of its controls.
“On affected vehicles, the letter font size of the Brake, Park, and Antilock brake system (ABS) visual warning indicators is smaller than 3.2 mm (1/8 inch), as prescribed in FMVSS Nos. 105 and 135,” the recall notice reads.
Elon Musk himself has taken to Twitter (sorry, X) to expressed his ire at the term "recall" being used to describe an OTA update. But there's a literal recall notice filed by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), so, yeah. Recall.
So when I saw this change in 2023.44.30.13, I thought it's no big deal, but apparently it is.(and if you are lucky and Twitter fixed display of these transparent background images, you could even spot the differences, may be) pic.twitter.com/0fek6OR1BhFebruary 2, 2024
From the Cybertruck's rear end to the spoon nobody asked for, Tesla has been finding all sorts of weird and wonderful reasons to get roasted lately. But the real question is when the Telsa logo itself is going to get recalled for resembling an IUD.
