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Tesla FSD hits major speedbump with EU regulators

By Tony Owusu TheStreet

Updated May 5, 2026 7:46 PM

Last month, Tesla took the first step towards getting Full Self-Driving (Supervised) approved across the European Union, following the Netherlands' approval of its use on its streets.

Getting a foot in the door was supposed to be the hardest part of the process, because once one of the economic bloc's members approves the technology, they can sponsor legislation to make that acceptance uniform across the 27 member countries.

But Tesla FSD isn't going to get rubberstamped approval in Europe, as emails show skepticism from some European regulators. According to the emails, regulators from the Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Norway have raised concerns about the system's tendency to speed, whether it is safe to use on icy roads, and drivers' ability to circumvent features designed to prevent cell-phone use, Reuters reported.

The EU committee heard on Tuesday from Dutch officials about their decision to approve FSD's use in their country and why the rest of the EU should as well. For FSD to be approved, committee members representing 55% of member states and 65% of their populations must vote in favor of the measure.

Tesla FSD has proven popular in the Netherlands, with Tesla owners surpassing 10 million kilometers (6.2 million miles) driven using the system less than a month after its approval.

Photo by Alexander Shapovalov on Getty Images

Tesla receives Dutch approval for FSD technology

Tesla FSD (Supervised) was approved for use by Dutch regulators in April after 18 months of testing and more than 1.6 million kilometers driven on EU roads.

But the European version of FSD is not the same software U.S. drivers use. The RDW's statement confirming its approval states that the software versions and functionalities in the U.S. and Europe "are therefore not comparable one-to-one."

Some of those differences include stricter hands-on steering-wheel requirements in Europe, more limited driving mode profiles, and stricter eye-tracking requirements, among others, according to Teslerati.

Tesla performance benchmarks for Elon Musk $1 trillion pay package:

20 million Tesla vehicles delivered
10 million active FSD subscriptions
1 million bots delivered
1 million Robotaxis in commercial operation
$400 billion of Adjusted EBITDA over four separate quarters

Tesla is the most popular electric vehicle maker in the Netherlands, with about 100,000 Model 3s and Model Ys combined that would be eligible for FSD software, Reuters noted.

The approval paves the way for Tesla's ultimate goal of having the technology become legal across Europe, as the company needed at least one European Union member state to approve it before it could be tested and approved by the entire bloc.

Last year, Tesla gave its social media followers a call to action, encouraging them to inundate the Dutch transit authority, Rijksdienst voor het Wegverkeer (RDW), with messages to approve Full Self-Driving testing.

The electric vehicle maker explained that it has been trying to ship supervised Full Self-Driving tech to Europe for 12 months, and the best path forward for the company is through the Netherlands.

Tesla faces pushback, lawsuits over previous FSD claims

On X (formerly Twitter) these days, much of the conversation about Tesla Full Self-Driving (Supervised) is positive. CEO Elon Musk, who also owns the social media platform, sometimes reposts videos of customers happy with Tesla FSD, and much (though not all) of the conversation around FSD lauds the technology.

But on other social media platforms, a growing number of discontented Tesla owners express frustration over a range of issues. Some drivers have organized to file a class-action lawsuit on behalf of 3,000 people in California who are being left out of the company's latest FSD upgrade.'

In 2016, according to the lawsuit, Tesla said that all new cars built from then on would have the hardware required for full self-driving capabilities, with Musk claiming that by the end of 2017, a Tesla could drive itself from Los Angeles to New York City.

Tesla has broken that promise multiple times since 2017, as the more sophisticated FSD technology required hardware updates to the company's computers and cameras, which it began offering in 2020 and 2021.

Some customers who paid the $8,000 fee for lifetime access were upgraded for free, while others who paid the monthly subscription price paid $1,000 for the 2020/2021 upgrade.

But then Tesla upgraded the hardware again in 2023, for a fourth time, and started selling new cars with its latest chip, meaning those who had been either upgraded for free or paid to upgrade just a couple of years prior were once again running on outdated equipment.

Tesla FSD was approved for use in the Netherlands earlier this month, but only the version running on the latest hardware. So Tesla owners there who purchased their vehicles before 2023 are out of luck.

More Automotive:

"Why did I buy it? Because I believed they would make it happen," one Dutch Tesla owner who paid €68,000 in 2019 for a Model 3 Performance, and an additional €6,400 for the upgraded Full Self-Driving capability, told the Wall Street Journal. "I just didn't think it would take them seven years, and still they wouldn't deliver."

He's organizing European Tesla owners into another lawsuit, and a similar class action suit is making its way through the Australian federal court, accusing the company of selling vehicles "incapable of supporting fully autonomous or close to autonomous driving," based on the hardware that was purchased years ago.

During Tesla's earnings call in January 2025, Musk told investors that the company would have to upgrade the computer for customers who bought the lifetime FSD package.

"That is the honest answer and that's going to be painful and difficult. But we'll get it done," Musk said at the time, according to the Journal. "Now, I'm kind of glad that not that many people bought the FSD package."

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This story was originally published May 5, 2026 at 7:33 PM.