Tesla Is Killing The Model S. But Its Legacy Is Everywhere

• Tesla is pulling the plug on the Model S after a continuous 14-year production run.
• The Model S changed not only what car buyers expect from an EV, but from any new car.
• This video looks at how Tesla incrementally improved the Model S over time, eschewing typical carmaker model lifecycle renewal.

The Tesla Model S is nearing the end of production after 14 years, but it’s a lot more than just an old luxury sedan running on batteries. Most automakers would have replaced it with three or four all-new generations by now, but Tesla instead kept chiseling away at the same car, changing its hardware, software, and manufacturing philosophy while keeping the basic silhouette familiar.

The Model S was the first true long-distance EV, with an 85-kilowatt-hour battery pack and an EPA range of up to 265 miles. In 2012, that was more than twice the range of the Honda Fit EV, rated at 123 miles, and way beyond what the Nissan Leaf could manage with its 73-mile rating.

Public charging technically existed, but it wasn’t enough for true long-distance travel. If you lived in California, there were already over 1,500 charging points in January 2012, with over 6,000 chargers online nationwide, according to the Department of Energy. This helped increase Tesla’s popularity in the state early on, before Tesla began building its own Supercharger stations.

But charging was still a gamble, and most chargers were 240-volt units that required plugging in overnight to gain any kind of meaningful range. Jason Cammisa has one such story about the first time he drove a Model S, when he had to phone around before he found a hotel that would allow him to charge the sedan. His latest video on Hagerty looks back at the significance of the Model S and explains why and how Tesla kept it on sale for so many years.

The Model S you can buy today is very different from the model from 14 years ago. They may have the same basic body shell structure, but the battery, electronics, drive units, interior, and safety kit are all different and far more advanced.

Tesla didn’t keep the Model S alive through traditional facelifts (although it was restyled twice). It was treated as more of an ongoing project that kept getting new and better hardware. The manufacturer also reduced the number of parts from around 5,000 in the original to roughly 3,000 in the latest iteration, simplifying the car considerably. Cammisa says that only around 3% of the original car is shared between the initial and latest Model S.

The Model S was never perfect, and even after so many updates, it still isn’t. But it proved something that was still new in the industry at the time, that an EV didn’t have to be a compliance car. It could be fast, desirable, spacious, software-driven, and genuinely different from everything around it.

What makes the Model S significant is the multiple trends and innovations it started, such as flush door handles, giant touchscreens, and over-the-air updates, which signaled an imminent shift in the car industry. It changed not only what buyers expected from an electric car, but from any new car. Tesla may be ready to move on from the Model S (and it could finally build the cheap model everybody is asking for), but the industry it forced into motion still hasn’t fully caught up.