Tesla’s cheapest Model 3 delivery date has been pushed into 2027.

As of late August, delivery dates for the base Model 3 ($36,990) are showing January - March 2027. Tesla delivery dates of up to six months aren’t unheard of but monitoring of the order page for the last two months shows delivery dates getting pushed further out for some variants. The delivery date for the new long-wheelbase Model Y L Premium Launch Series was pushed out to December earlier this month.

Moreover, new Model 3 and Model Y inventory is gone. There has been no "new” Model 3 or Model Y on the company’s inventory page over the past several months. A few models will pop up occasionally, only to quickly disappear.

Post Federal Tax Credit Adjustments: Reaching Equilibrium

Tesla – like all U.S.-based EV manufacturers – is still experiencing fallout from the termination of the $7,500 federal tax credit in September of 2025. At that time, Tesla did a pull-forward push before the credit expired. In Q4, Tesla produced 422,652 Model 3/Y versus 406,585 deliveries, a gap of 16,067 units. And that got worse in Q1.

Q1 2026: Big gap – Tesla produced 394,611 Model 3/Y but delivered only 341,893 — a 52,718 unit gap, the widest production-delivery gap in four years.

Q2 2026 : Big reversal – Tesla produced 442,936 Model 3/Y vehicles and delivered 467,762, working down about 25,000 units of inventory. This thinned out inventory. And Tesla seems to be keeping, more or less, things in equilibrium since then.

After the first quarter, Tesla has kept inventory lean rather than rebuilding. With the tax credit gone, Tesla has little incentive to overproduce and sit on discounted inventory units, as happened in early 2025. At that time, Model Y inventory reached peak levels, driving discounts of up to $9,000.

Tesla Model 3 – How Popular?

Is the base Model 3 seeing a surge in popularity because of its low price? Cox Automotive showed 34,944 Model 3s delivered in Q2 of this year versus 48,803 in Q2 last year, a 28.4% drop. And the Q2 number is only a 10% increase over the 31,672 Model 3s delivered in Q1. Unless we’re seeing a sudden increase in demand for the low-cost Model 3 in the current quarter, it looks less like demand pull and more like intentional inventory discipline. The pricier Premium Model 3, starting at $42,490, is showing October-November for California, Tesla’s biggest market.

Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.