Tesla Optimus: what the record shows, and what you can buy

You cannot buy a Tesla Optimus. There is no price, no order page and no delivery date. We hold four Optimus records, one for each body Tesla has shown since 2021, and every one of them is marked “not for sale”. Of the 182 humanoids in our database, 44 can be ordered today. None of them is an Optimus.

That is the answer. What follows is the record behind it.

Four bodies in five years

Generation	First shown	Status	Shown doing	Teleoperation	For sale
Bumblebee	30 September 2022	Retired	Walked a short distance on stage, moved boxes in a video	Unknown	No
Gen 1	30 September 2022, walked March 2023	Retired	Sorting blocks and yoga poses, in Tesla videos	Partial	No
Gen 2	12 December 2023	Pilot	Cell sorting in a Tesla factory, drinks at an event, popcorn at a diner	Yes	No
V3	No reveal date in our record	Prototype	Renderings, 6 November 2025	Unknown	No

The programme began on 19 August 2021 at Tesla’s AI Day, when Musk announced a 173 cm, 57 kg general-purpose humanoid built on the car autonomy stack. The thing on stage was a dancer in a suit. Thirteen months later, on 30 September 2022, Tesla walked out Bumblebee, a development mule built in about six months from off-the-shelf actuators. A second, sleeker body was carried out the same day: Optimus Gen 1, the first Tesla-designed version, with 28 actuators, an 11 DoF tendon-driven hand, a 2.3 kWh battery and a stated 20 kg payload. The 2021 concept was to weigh 57 kg; Gen 1 came in at about 73 kg. It first walked untethered in videos in March 2023.

Gen 2 followed on 12 December 2023: about 10 kg lighter, 30 percent faster on foot, with an actuated neck, force and torque sensing in the feet and tactile sensing on all fingers. V3 is the version Tesla describes as production-intent, with a 22 DoF hand driven from actuators in the forearm. Our record has no reveal date for it. Musk said repeatedly that it would be unveiled in early 2026; what the record holds is renderings shown to shareholders on 6 November 2025.

Who was holding the controls

Our teleoperation field exists because a demo is not proof. For Optimus it reads unknown, partial, yes, unknown, in that order.

Bumblebee: unknown. Nobody has established how much of the 2022 stage walk was assisted.

Gen 1: partial. Training used human teleoperation and motion capture, and the 2023 videos of block sorting and yoga were mostly scripted or teleop-assisted. No independent deployment was ever reported.

Gen 2: yes. At the We, Robot event in Los Angeles on 10 October 2024, Optimus units walked among guests, poured drinks and played games. Tesla staff confirmed the robots were remotely assisted by humans. The 2024 battery-cell sorting footage from a Tesla factory is Tesla’s own; independent confirmation of autonomous production work is limited. We log that deployment’s autonomy as “mixed”.

V3: unknown, because there is nothing to assess yet.

This is not unusual: 90 of our 182 records carry “partial” and 27 carry “yes”. It matters here because Optimus is the machine people look up most, and the footage they find is the footage least likely to show what it does unassisted.

What Tesla has said about the price

Every Optimus price figure in our record is a target stated by Musk, not a list price.

• 30 September 2022, AI Day: the target price is under $20,000.
• Gen 1 record: a long-term price of $20,000 to $30,000.
• V3 record: $20,000 to $30,000 at volume.

The target has moved once already, from under $20,000 to a $20,000 to $30,000 band, and it has never been attached to an order form. Our buy record for V3 reads: channel not for sale, lead time no consumer order path.

On timing, the record holds these statements: a production line at Fremont planned for 2026; volume production targeted for later in the decade; external sales possibly from 2027; a long-term ambition of one million units a year. On 6 November 2025 Tesla shareholders approved a pay package for Musk with milestones that include delivering one million Optimus robots. A target written into a contract is more than a stage remark. It is still not a delivery.

Where it works, and why that counts for less here

We log 52 deployments across the database. Optimus has two, and the customer in both is Tesla.

The first is internal: battery cell handling and sorting at Fremont and Gigafactory Texas since May 2024, when Tesla showed two units handling cells. Musk said in 2024 that Tesla expected over 1,000 units working in its factories during 2025. No count has been confirmed or audited. The second is the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles, where one robot served popcorn at the opening in July 2025. Whether it kept doing so is unclear.

A deployment inside the maker’s own building is evidence that the machine can be switched on. It is not evidence that a customer would pay for it, keep it running and renew. That is why this site weights it lower, and why the Optimus verdict reads “best for: nobody. There is nothing to buy.”

One more entry: Milan Kovac, who led the programme from the start, left Tesla on 6 June 2025. Ashok Elluswamy of Autopilot took over.

What would change the answer

If you are deciding whether to wait for Optimus, four things have to appear in the record first. A V3 reveal with a physical machine, not renderings. A published price from Tesla, not a target quoted by its chief executive. An order page, or a named external customer. And a teleoperation field that reads “no” for at least one documented task. Until then the honest listing is the one we have: four generations, five years, nothing for sale.