Tesla has quietly pulled the ability to directly order its massive Megapack battery storage units right off its website. The Megapacks, which were previously available with a hefty minimum order of 5 units (around $10 million), have vanished from Tesla’s online configurator.
April 4, Elon announced the pricing tweak in a X tweet, noting that the $10,000 (or 0.5%) cut to Megapack sticker prices stems from production rate increases and cost optimizations. “Demand for stationary batteries is super high,” Musk added, signaling that the price adjustment is Tesla’s way of trying to stay ahead of surging order volumes for the utility-grade batteries.
So what gives? Unfortunately, the reason behind this move remains unclear. It’s possible Tesla is shifting to an inquiries-only system for commercial/utility-scale energy storage projects, accepting orders through a more hands-on process instead of web checkout.
Another theory is that the company could be limiting Megapack availability to extremely large-volume orders given the seemingly high demand and previously lengthy wait times. As recently as 2022, customers were facing up to 2 years of lead time for Megapack deliveries before that stretched down to around 9 months earlier this year.
Or maybe there are some bigger product updates in the works that Tesla wants to keep under wraps for now? Your guess is as good as mine at this point. The company hasn’t provided any official reasoning.
One thing’s for sure – if you were hoping to tack a few hundred megawatt-hours of energy storage onto your next Tesla order, you’ll have to go through the “Contact Us” rabbit hole for now instead of easily checking out online. Whether it’s a temporary pause or a longer-term shift in ordering remains to be seen.