Mileage when the problem started
Owner reports
Selected complaints filed with NHTSA by 2016 Tesla Model X owners, lightly cleaned up (personal details are redacted by NHTSA).
On Tuesday September 13th 2022 morning around 10.55am EST, I had entered the Hindu temple of Florida premises driving my TESLA model X. I slowly progressed towards the parking spot and made a slow right turn to park the car. At that time the Tesla suddenly accelerated at full speed, took off like a rocket, jumped the curb, knocked down a sign post and jumped into the ditch which leads into a pond. The car veered to the right, jumped out of the ditch back toward the parking spots, hit two vehicles ( a Honda CRV and a Lexus) with a significant force and hit a tree with a big impact and finally stopped. Surprisingly airbags did not deploy. I was wearing the seat belt and was the only one inside the vehicle. Fortunately with gods grace I escaped with minimal injuries. I get nightmares every day since then thinking about how close to death I was. …
Two issues that are concerning and I have told Tesla: 1. The car will be on cruise control and I will be relaxed and all of a sudden it will just brake for no reason. Praise God I am aware of it now and prepared so I have to compensate, but it is very dangerous and made the cruise control useless. While it was under warrantee I request it be fixed, but they said there was no way to do that. 2. The car's back up screen is compromised and has a distortion on the bottom that was caused by a download. I requested four separate times a service requests to fix it while it was under warrantee, but they were unable to repair it. The first time they said I needed to wait for a download, then the second time they said it was a hacker, third time they replaced a chip, and the four time they told me to repair it I need to upgrade my entertainment package for $1500 so I cancelled the appointment. …
I was driving the vehical when something went wrong. The vehicle showed a warning stating "ABS disabled". I was worried by this, when I saw further warnings appear including "Safety restraint system issue" "Power braking assist reduced" and something about steering. The dashboard also showed "Park Brake fault" and a red icon with a seatbelt and another with an airbag. Alarmed, I pulled to the side of the road. I then discovered that I could not use the parking brake or turn on the flashers. There is no manual parking brake, and the car thought it was still driving. I was facing downhill and the only way to keep the car from rolling was to keep my foot on the brake. I had to call 911 and could only safely exit the vehicle, after they had ensured it would not roll. Again, I could not exit the vehicle, or even put on flashers to warn traffic. …
The car started giving error messages of systems failing one after another on the highway. It slowed down instantly as if someone pressed the brakes and I could not accelerate. Obviously I did not press the brakes. There were a lot of vehicles behind me and this could have easily caused an accident putting a lot of people at risk. I had to get off the highway asap and get the car towed. The error messages included charge port disabled, automatic emergency braking is disabled, power reduced, traction control disabled, stability control disabled, cruise control disabled, power reduced. Tesla diagnosed and confirmed this being an issue with the onboard charger being faulty and replaced that with charge port itself for a total of $3727.60. They refused to cover any part of this which I think should have been taken care of by the company.
I was turning left to northbound from westbound and as I was trying to accelerate to turn, my Tesla wouldn't go past 11 mph. I stepped on the accelerator with all my might, but it wouldn't go past 11 mph. On my dash, the alert said: "obstruction detected- speed will be reduced." This is very concerning because the car was slowing down and obstructing the southbound lanes. This is very dangerous and could've caused a car crash. I could've easily gotten T-boned. After I made my slow turn, the car got back to normal and accelerated normally.
I own a 2016 Tesla Model X P100D equipped with the Large Drive Unit (LDU). The component that fails is the rotor coolant seal in the rear drive unit motor. Coolant leaks internally into the motor and inverter, causing bearing wear, corrosion, isolation faults, and eventual complete drive unit failure. The affected drive units are still installed and available for inspection upon request. This defect puts my safety and the safety of others at risk because it can cause sudden loss of propulsion (especially at highway speeds), power reduction, or total drivetrain shutdown, potentially leading to a crash. Coolant in high-voltage areas also raises electrical fault/fire risks. The problem is widely reproduced and confirmed: Tesla service centers are familiar with it and replace failed units with updated "-U" revisions that include a coolant bypass. …
While visiting a funeral home in melrose, ma., I needed to back into a spot to be able to take part in the funeral procession. I pulled out of the spot I was in and proceeded to put the car in reverse to back into the same parking spot. At the same moment that I started to back in the car surged and made an ARC in the parking lot only stopping after I hit a parked car with such force that it caused two more cars to be hit by the impact. I attempted to stop the car by stepping on the break which had no effect and even though I wasn't hurt, my arms ached for days because I was trying to control the wheel to no avail. I have a clean driving record and was in reverse at the time which meant I had my foot on the gas to back in slowly. I have requested that Tesla check the the computer to see if I am of fault or not and they have refused. …
An accident occurred in my Tesla Model x 90d that was due to the fault of the car. We have owned the car for 3+ years. What occurred today in the car is something that has never happened before. The car was functioning perfectly fine during my whole 20 minute commute. As I pulled into my office's parking lot, the car seemed fine. However, as I was finishing parking the car in the parking space, the car unexpectedly started accelerating at a frightening speed. More clearly put I was almost done parking and my foot was partially on and off the brake. While my foot was slightly off the brake the car accelerated so fast that it ran over a curb and climbed a grass slope and ran over and tore down a small tree. The car accelerated so quickly that it ran over the tree before I could even react. After this experience I no longer feel that it is safe to drive a Tesla. …
Takata recall I drove my Tesla Model x 2016 today to work and when I was about to park the car in the parking lot (around 6 miles per hour May be) it suddenly accelerated and hit the concrete wall and bounced back around 8 feet. Since it was for parking I can surely say that I did not accelerate the car. The steering air bags and knee air bags came off and also the passenger side knee air bags came off as well. I searched online and there seems to be a class action suite on this issue but Tesla is not accepting it as the glitch in their software or some other component. I felt like the accelerator got pressed the way when the car was in cruise mode. Unless I wanted to hit the wall intentionally there was no need for me to press the accelerator to speed from almost zero to whatever the high speed it attained at the time of hitting the wall.
Sudden unintended acceleration. The car suddenly accelerated instead of stopping when I applied the brakes while pulling into a parking space. I was going approximately 5 MPH. Instead of stopping, the car jumped a concrete parking block, went over a curb, climbed an embankment, and struck a tree before it came to a stop. The car suffered damage to the front driver's side wheel well and the undercarriage. The driver was not injured and the airbags did not deploy. Video surveillance captured the incident in its entirety. Photos of the scene and the resulting damage to the car are also attached. This incident occurred during a routine trip that I drive about 4 times each week. Weather, traffic, and road conditions were not a factor in this incident. The car does not contain any aftermarket equipment.
NHTSA investigations
Sudden Unintended Acceleration
The Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) received a petition requesting that ODI reevaluate its decision to deny DP20-001 on the basis that intermittent high electrical current demands on the vehicles' 12VDC systems may have caused some or all of the incidents examined by ODI in DP20-001. The petitioner bases this information on a review of open-source research and the DP20-001 denial.
Acceleration complaints in other Model X years
Frequently asked questions
How common are acceleration problems on the 2016 Tesla Model X?
NHTSA has 35 complaints about the speed control & acceleration of the 2016 Tesla Model X, 8% of the model year's 450 complaints.
Is there a recall for 2016 Tesla Model X acceleration problems?
No. NHTSA lists no speed control & acceleration recall for the 2016 Tesla Model X, though it has 12 recalls for other components. If the problem is widespread, a repair may still be covered by an extended warranty or a manufacturer service bulletin — ask a dealer.
At what mileage do 2016 Tesla Model X acceleration problems start?
Half of the complaints with a recorded mileage happened before about 2,000 miles, and 84% before 25,000 miles.
Is it dangerous?
Owners linked 19 crashes, 0 fires and 5 injuries to speed control & acceleration problems on this model year. If you notice symptoms, have the car checked before driving further.
Source: U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) — owner complaints through October 20, 2026, recalls and defect investigations; fuel economy from the EPA. Complaints are unverified reports and are not proof of a defect. How we rate model years.