2019 Tesla Model 3: brakes engage by themselves (phantom braking)

Filed May 5, 2025 · Acceleration, Brakes · OH

Phantom braking (as it's referred to by experts) happened to me twice on the highway using Traffic-Aware-Cruise-Control. Very scary. I was on cruise control going 60 mph when suddenly my car braked suddenly and inappropriately, losing at least 20 mph in a split second before I was able to slam on the accelerator and prevent an accident (rear-end collision). This happened TWICE in the course of 5 minutes on the same highway! There was no obstruction in the road, no cars moving into my lane, nothing but normal road conditions, when it occurred. From my research, this is a huge problem with Tesla vehicles that thousands of individuals are loudly complaining about online and now in court cases in the country. I see there are thousands of reports to your organization about this, but it says you have only complaints from 2021 and later years. However, I have a 2019 and it's happening to me. And it's happening to every single model year out there, just from researching and talking to Tesla owners. This is a major safety hazard, plain and simple. I was inches of being in a rear-end collision, and drivers behind me are extremely upset and vengeful on the road after an incident like this (understandably!). Because of this I fear for my safety and well-being on the road using Tesla's cruise control features. Very disappointing. Above for the ADAS option, I wasn't able to select 2 options, but "automatic emergency braking" is also applicable here as that is what happened. Somehow Teslas are falsely activating emergency braking during cruise control!

Filed Feb 24, 2024 · Brakes, Driver assistance · CA

I was driving on the road at night a few days ago and there was a car that was pulled over on the side of the road with hazard lights flashing. The Tesla slowed down and applied the brakes very hard. The Tesla also applied the brakes for no reason. It was on adaptive cruise control, and all of a sudden it would hit the brakes really hard and I would have to take it off the adaptive cruise control because I did not want to get into an accident. The system automatically applied the brakes in both cases which I would call it, “The “phantom braking”. The car had done this before but not to this extent on adaptive cruise control. This only happened when it was on cruise control. I have been very hesitant on putting it on adaptive cruise control because it acts up at times.

Filed Oct 23, 2023 · Brakes, Driver assistance · NY

The vehicle will randomly start emergency braking for no reason once so ever when using teslas full self driving. This is extremely dangerous as it can happen at any moment while the autopilot feature is in use. In my most recent instance autopilot was set to 70 mph, and with no vehicles are traffic control devices present what is known as “phantom braking” started to occur. Which requires me to quickly reassume control of the vehicle and bring it back up to speed.

Filed Sep 16, 2023 · Brakes, Driver assistance · CA

The car is plagued by "phantom braking." It occurs when I am on the freeway - the car suddenly brakes and/or decelerates. (Sometimes it is a sudden braking and sometimes the cruise control just turns off.) This is very unsafe - I am fortunate that it has occurred when there is no car close behind me. I feel it happen and put my foot on the accelerator as soon as I can. It's happened as many as 3-4 times during a long (@500 miles) drive, and other times only once. It occurs in various kinds of weather and I have never been able to figure out why it happens. It has happened when there are no cars in front of or next to my car. I believe this problem has been reported many times before. I do not know what system or part is responsible for this. I have had the car since 2019 and this has been happening as long as I can remember. I have never received any kind of a warning or signal that the car would brake. NOTE: B/c the problem is ongoing, I did not put in an approximate date below.

Filed Jul 27, 2023 · Acceleration, Brakes · NM

I have a 2019 Model 3 and yesterday, while making a left turn and applying pressure to the brake, receiving feedback from the brake, my car lurched forward for about half a second. I thought I may have been rear ended, but no one was behind me. This has happened on the freeway before as well. I'll be accelerating at a totally even place and BAM, I'll jolt forward out of nowhere. On the rare occasions that I use the car's "autopilot" feature, I will also encounter phantom braking, but that's easily avoided by not using the feature, which I haven't since first encountering the problem. I haven't suffered any damages from this, but if my car is able to do this, that's extremely alarming. What if this tripped while I was parking?

Filed Jul 19, 2023 · Driver assistance · AZ

Traveling west in I8 between Gila Bend and San Diego I experienced over 20 automatic hard braking events while using TACC. The road was clear, there were no vehicles in front of me within 400 yards. It appeared to be correlated with heat mirages on the road surface ahead though some may have been caused by differences in asphalt color in sections. The hard braking occurred at highway speeds of 70-75mph and dropped my speed rapidly, if a car or truck had been following me closely it could have result in an accident. The remedy is to press the accelerator to resume speed. Training drivers to hit the accelerator in response to phantom braking events is also dangerous as the automatic braking might be overridden automatically by a driver when there really is an event that calls for emergency braking. When the false positives out number to true positives by 100's to 1 it trains drivers to automatically respond to hard emergency braking by mashing the accelerator.

Filed Jul 3, 2023 · Driver assistance · NV

Frequent phantom braking. If someone is following closely they may rear end us.

Filed Jun 10, 2023 · Driver assistance · AZ

Driving on a clear, sunny day in Arizona on interstate 8 at highway speed with the Tesla AutoPilot engaged. There were no vehicles in front of me and no obstructions in the road when the car did heavy braking (aka phantom braking) for no known reason. I immediately had to override the braking with pressing on the accelerator. This occurred multiple times on the same road. If a vehicle had been traveling behind me when this happened, it would be highly likely that a collision would occur because of the random nature of the extreme braking. I did not use the adaptive cruise feature the rest of the trip in fear that a collision would occur. No warning messages were/are present. The Model 3 I drive is equipped with sensors on the front bumper that (I believe) Tesla has deactivated to use vision-only instead. I drove for years using the non-vision (sensor) method without experiencing phantom braking, so this experience is new to me.

Filed Jun 1, 2023 · Acceleration, Brakes · CA · 1 injury

Multiple extreme braking so much where today actually hurt my neck it stopped so abruptly up a hill miscalculating that a walker was about to be hit by my car, the man was nowhere near being hit and the auto braking skid to a halt whipping my head forward and my sweatshirt choked my Adams Apple area. It was extremely abrupt, scared me, the walker and nearly caused a rear end collision with the car behind me. This has happened a lot in the past 3 months yet I’ve had the car for over 4 years so I am assuming something is wrong with the software updates - it’s super scary not to have control of your own car. Also, I can opt out of auto braking on my car yet that’s not what I’m reporting, I’m reporting the fact that it’s phantom braking miscalculating street situations and causing dangers to me, my passengers and others like I’ve described above. Also noticed recently, when I hit the gas, it’s often the car doesn’t “go” it pauses and then may go with similar miscalculation of street situations like pedestrians on a adjacent sidewalk or motorcycles in between cars yet literally the Tesla won’t let me move…this isn’t safe.

Filed May 24, 2023 · Driver assistance · 50,000 miles · CA

The contact owns a 2019 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated that while utilizing the ADAS features including the Adaptive Cruise Control, the vehicle unexpectedly braked. The contact stated that on another occasion while the accelerator pedal was depressed, the vehicle experienced phantom braking. Due to the failure, the vehicle abruptly stopped and caused the contacts wife’s seat belt to retract very tight. The contact stated that he disengaged the features including the Adaptive Cruise Control to operate the vehicle. The vehicle was taken to the dealer where it remained. No warning lights were illuminated. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 50,000.

Filed May 13, 2023 · Acceleration, Brakes · OR

I live in a very rural area with very little traffic on two-lane country roads. When my cruise control is active, my Tesla sometimes brakes for no reason. A couple of days ago it violently braked from 70 mph to 50 mph for absolutely no reason. On that particular trip of 30 miles or so it "phantom braked" four times. I have had this car for almost 4 years and this problem appears to be getting worse.

Filed May 8, 2023 · Driver assistance · CA

While driving in Cruise Control at the Speed Limit at 65 mph with both hands on the wheel and my foot near the brake (on the 395 Freeway in CA on 5/5/23) and no vehicles in front of me, the car suddenly braked hard (the brake pedal fell to the floor under my foot without my foot making any contact with the pedal) and stopped, thus causing the driver/passenger and all contents to shift forward violently. Luckily, there was no one behind the car, no loss of control of the car, no collisions, and no injuries of the driver/passenger as we were both wearing our seat belts. There was a large 16-wheel truck approaching from about 100 feet away on the other side of the road that passed by without any adverse events. It was the second time that this phantom braking had happened on that same road this year. That other time was in Feb 2023.