Tesla parental controls keep teenage lead feet in check

Because trusting your kid with 300 horsepower should come with a curfew

If you owned a Tesla, would you let your kid drive it? The electric vehicle marque seems to think you might with the addition of "Parental Controls" in a July update.

Obviously, we're talking about licensed teens of legal driving age, though two underage girls were reportedly caught in the backseat and passenger seat of a Model Y a few years ago, claiming that the car was "self-driving."

Come 2024, Teslas still do not possess such a feature, despite boss Elon Musk's boundless optimism.

The 2024.26 update was covered by Not A Tesla App, which tracks Tesla software changes. Among infotainment and general tweaks, the release notes state:

You can now enable Parental Controls with a PIN on your vehicle. Set a maximum speed limit and limit acceleration to Chill. Turn on safety features, such as Speed Limit Warning, Automatic Emergency Braking, and Forward Collision Warning. Configure Night Curfew to receive notifications through your Tesla mobile app when the vehicle is driven past curfew.

Enable Parental Controls from the vehicle or the Tesla mobile app. Navigate to Controls > Safety > Parental Controls. Follow the instructions on screen and provide a PIN. Drivers can't disable the controls or change the settings without re-entering the PIN.

Night Curfew in particular could have possibly prevented those teens from sneaking out for a joyride, and would be useful if junior is grounded.

Chill mode, according to Tesla, "limits acceleration for a smooth and gentle ride," as opposed to features like Ludicrous mode available on some models, which "increases peak torque by approximately 60 percent."

The company already introduced Speed Limit Mode following the death of 18-year-olds Barrett Riley and Edgar Monserratt Martinez in 2018. The pair crashed doing 116 mph (186 kph) in a 30 mph (40 kph) zone, according to the NTSB.

With the update only six days old, it is not yet available to the general public, according to Tessie, but seems a good idea when the leading cause of unintentional death for 15- to 24-year-olds in the US is traffic accidents.

As for this non-Tesla household of modest ways and means, we struggle to see our offspring behind the wheel of anything more glamorous than a 2000s Ford Fiesta when they come of age. On reflection, though, that now sounds like a deathtrap compared to a Muskmobile. ®