Tesla Model 3 Standard Range – 6 Year, 60,000 Mile Review

Support CleanTechnica’s work with a Substack subscription or on Stripe.

We’ve had a 2019 Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus (SR+) since August 2019. It feels like half that long, and I hope the car can go at least twice that long. I completely forgot to review the car for 6 years until Fritz Hassler published his report. Thanks Fritz. This review may be less interesting and eventful than his, since he has over 160,000 miles on his Model 3 and I have logged only 61,913 miles. But it is another long-term review to consider. Also honestly, almost nothing has changed since I reviewed the car 5 years ago.

Here are the main points that interest me, or that I think might interest people:

As far as I can tell, the car runs like new. I don’t drive it the same way anymore, but I can’t tell any difference in ride quality. Regarding the change in my driving style, I used to like to press the pedal hard when leaving a red light, or just at different times to increase acceleration, whereas now I like to drive nice and slow. Initially, after quickly burning my first set of tires I decided to stop using instant torque so much. But after a while, I lost interest in doing so. Now I prefer to take it easy. The white vegan leather seats have held up very well. We are starting to see some signs of cracking or wrinkling in the parts, but not to a significant degree at all. You basically have to look for them to get noticed. The white has held up great even though I rarely clean it. On the other hand, there are some small areas of fabric in the seats on the sides that look dirtier now. Newer versions of the Model 3 don’t have this fabric, perhaps for this reason. However, the new cheap and convenient versions of the Model 3 and Model Y seem to be bringing it back. The discoloration compared to white vegan leather is actually one of the things that bothers me the most, because not much has changed or looks old, but again it’s a very minor thing to look for. I also can’t tell the difference between what the seats looked like a year ago and now. There are some minor squeaks and rattles at times, but those have always been part of the ownership experience. As far as I can tell, nothing has changed in this regard. In terms of extent, honestly, I don’t really care how much it changes, so I think it’s disingenuous to do the math and write about it. It doesn’t matter, and many people think they need more scope than they do. Many people worry about the battery degrading too much. My driving and charging patterns have remained the same for years. I mostly supercharged (about 80-90%), since we got a lot of free supercharging miles from referrals (until they expire this month…). It’s much more convenient to charge at home, but once a week I take my girls snowboarding, and there’s a supercharger right next to it; I can otherwise supercharge about once a week while doing some grocery shopping at another nearby supercharging station.

I’m including photos of the white vegan leather seats below, but I have to say they make the seats look dirtier or less white than they are. Something about the shading doesn’t seem to work well – I tried a few places with different lighting. But I’m including it nonetheless.

Getting the white seats for a little extra money was one of the hardest decisions we made, but it was probably the best we had and I definitely wouldn’t change the black seats. White seats stay cooler and nicer in hot and sunny Florida.

In terms of maintenance and repair costs, I haven’t had any new costs since the 5 year review last year except that I got a nail in a tire that simply couldn’t be patched or plugged, so I had to get a new tire. So, regardless, the costs remain at $3,199.59. Over 6 years and 3 months, that’s $42.66 per month.

So, this is my 6 year review of the car. You can read more details in my 5-year review, or other long-term review articles, but that’s the gist of the story. I still love driving a car and I love the simplicity of a car’s interior. I don’t like the brand image anymore, due to Elon Musk’s descent into far-right politics that has harmed millions of people, but at least I bought the car long before COVID-19 and before all this stuff happened.