BYD Just Buried Tesla
BYD Just Buried Tesla
Tesla has officially lost its technology lead.
There have been many “Tesla killer” cars over the years, yet none have challenged Tesla’s market dominance. But that is about the change. Earlier this year, BYD overtook Tesla as the best-selling EV maker. It’s no wonder their brilliant EVs go toe-to-toe with Tesla. However, BYD has just announced an update to their incredible Model 3 competitor, the Seal. While these updates might seem slight on the surface, they actually blow Tesla out of the water and signal that BYD will bury Tesla in years to come.
So, what updates has the Seal got? Well, it has switched from a 400V architecture to an 800V one, which has dramatically slashed its charge time. The Seal uses LFP cells, which charge slower than the typical Lithium-ion cells, hence why the current version charges from 10% to 80% in 37 minutes, or about 10 minutes slower than the equivalent Tesla. However, cells’ charging speed is limited by the amount of current they can take, so increasing the voltage is a smart way to make the pack charge more quickly. As such, the new Seal charges from 10% to 80% in only 25 minutes, the exact same as the Model 3.
However, this upgrade hasn’t increased the price. The top-of-the-range new Seal will cost the equivalent of $33,460 in China, with the base model costing the equivalent of $24,500. That top trim model is incredible too. Its dual-motor AWD powertrain delivers 523 horsepower and a 0–60 mph time of 3.1 seconds! But even with this performance, it has a CLTC range of 404 miles (roughly 320 miles WLTP).
Yet, this tippy top of the Seal line is only a thousand dollars more expensive than a base Model 3 in China. This Model 3 takes nearly twice as long to reach 60 mph and has a significantly shorter range of 377 miles CLTC than the top-spec Seal. While its 10% to 80% charge time is the same as the Seal’s, as the Seal has more range per change, it actually means that in terms of miles added per hour of charging, the Seal is faster.
Based on these specs alone, buying a Tesla Model 3 over a BYD Seal in China makes zero sense. This will also soon be true in other locations that don’t incur insane import tariffs, like Africa, Australia, South America, Asia or the EU (where BYD is building several factories to avoid importing cars).
But the Seal also got another update. LIDAR!
LIDAR, which stands for Light Detection and Ranging, uses a laser to create a 3D point cloud map of the world around it. Such a high-fidelity sensor has been seen as crucial for self-driving cars for well over a decade now. However, Musk has shunned them, claiming they are too expensive and cumbersome to be used in a consumer vehicle. He also said that since humans can drive on only visual information, so too can a self-driving car, hence why, since 2021, Tesla cars only use camera sensors to inform their self-driving AI.
As I have covered a million times by now, Tesla’s visual-only approach is deeply flawed. It has no redundancy in place to double-check errors. If the computer vision misinterprets what it is seeing or the self-driving AI makes an error, there is no other system to check against and ensure safe passage. But, cars that have a suite of sensors like radar, ultrasonic sensors and LIDAR, which is the most reliable of them all, have these other systems to check against and ignore anomalous readings and errors in the self-driving AI.
This is why Tesla’s FSD is so far from fully autonomous and, by many reports, a deeply unsafe piece of software/hardware. This is deeply concerning, as Tesla is currently pivoting its entire business mode onto automation and robotaxis.
This is also why the Seal being updated with LIDAR and its suite of cameras, radar and ultrasonic sensors is huge new. This indicates that BYD is looking to develop its DiPilor 300 self-driving software into an FSD competitor that is actually based on practical, predictable, and ethical engineering.
As such, the new Seal will likely be just as, if not, a far more capable self-driving car than the Tesla.
It’s no wonder Uber ordered BYD EVs instead of Teslas. They are now better in every measurable way and are laying the foundations that will enable them to leave Tesla in the dust.
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Sources: Notebook Check, Autocar, EV Database