A pair of engineers began Tesla to prove the viability of electric vehicles

By designing a $35,000 car, Tesla sought to bring EVs into the mainstream

Despite production delays, factory struggles, and skepticism from established carmakers, Tesla reached its goal of making 5,000 Model 3s per week. This achievement marked a turning point, proving that electric vehicles could be scalable to meet increasing demand.

Tesla's first successful AC prototype used a metal shoe polish tin for a rotor

After leaving his position working with Thomas Edison, Tesla partnered with George Westinghouse to promote alternating current systems as a more viable, scalable solution to electricity transmission.

Explore a gallery of electric vehicles from before 1920

In 1884, Thomas Parker invented the first practical electric car in London. By the turn of the century, early EVs were seen on the streets of Washington, DC. Automaker promotional materials included photographs of cars on mountain roads and other terrains.

Elon Musk joined Tesla in 2004, investing $30M and becoming chair

The company went public in 2010, raising $226 million in its IPO just two years after beginning production on its first car. Tesla's first Supercharger stations were launched in 2012 with six locations in California.

California startup Rivian has attracted disillusioned Tesla owners

Some electric vehicle buyers frustrated by Elon Musk's antics have been won over by the adventure-focused company, which has received a $5B investment from the Volkswagen Group to develop crossover and hatchback models with solid-state batteries.

Tesla open-sourced all its patents to speed up industry adoption of electric vehicles

The company employed a disruptive strategy to transform the transportation market, but early struggles, including leadership shifts and near bankruptcy in 2008, threatened its efforts to bring electric vehicles to the mainstream.

Over-the-air updates, pioneered by Tesla, have become the industry standard

Tesla's innovative direct-to-consumer sales model and online ordering system changed car-buying, and the Model S, which had a 200-mile range, forced other automakers to enhance their EV offerings and rethink vehicle design.

Tesla plans to eliminate the use of rare earth elements in future vehicles

At a 2023 Investor Day event, Elon Musk outlined steps to focus Tesla's efforts on climate action rather than new vehicle models. Musk estimates the transition to carbon-free, sustainable energy will cost $10T.

Take a drone tour of a Tesla factory

The first of Tesla's large-scale European manufacturing plants for its electric vehicles was opened in Berlin in 2022. It—along with other facilities in Nevada, New York, Texas, and Shanghai—collectively manufactures solar panels, batteries, and other energy collection and storage products.

In 2018, SpaceX launched a Tesla Roadster into heliocentric orbit for publicity

As of February 2023, the vehicle and its mannequin driver—dubbed "Starman"—have completed three and a quarter revolutions around the sun. One paper estimated that the car has a 22% chance of crashing into Earth within the next 15 million years.

When Tesla died in 1943, the FBI seized his property for national security

Although Nikola Tesla had become increasingly eccentric in his later years, the US government wanted to ensure plans for a possible secret weapon didn’t fall into enemy hands during World War II.

Audi spent over three years developing engine sounds for its electric vehicles

Unlike the sounds made by combustion engines in gas-powered vehicles, electric cars produce no motor sounds. The company's acoustics team worked with composer Rudolf Helpmier to craft an electric-inspired revving sound for its R8 e-tron supercar.

J.P. Morgan provided Nikola Tesla with funding for the Wardenclyffe Tower

The structure was part of a project to transmit electricity and communication signals wirelessly across the globe. Shortly after construction began, Guglielmo Marconi beat Tesla to the punch and transmitted a trans-Atlantic signal, preventing Tesla from getting additional funding to finish his project.

Explore the human and environmental resources needed to make an electric vehicle

The minerals needed to build batteries for electric vehicles are expensive and often take a human toll paid by the communities where they are mined. This interactive article details what minerals make up an electric vehicle battery, where they come from, and dangers posed by the mining process.

The first lithium-ion battery was invented at ExxonMobil

Initially a side project that became a priority due to the 1973 oil crisis, the battery's flammability risks and manufacturing challenges, along with the waning crisis, led the company to shut down its battery program. Other researchers would gradually improve upon published prototype designs in the next decade.

One of Henry Ford's early vehicle prototypes broke an all-time speed record and got him the money to start Ford Motor Company

In 1904, Henry Ford raced the "999" across a frozen lake and reached an average speed of more than 90 miles per hour, beating the then-record for fastest land speed. Ford's success attracted the eyes of the earliest investors in the Henry Ford Company, Ford's company before he started Ford Motor Company.

Learn about the relationship between Thomas Edison and Henry Ford

Despite their 16-year age difference, legendary inventor Thomas Edison and Henry Ford developed a close relationship after meeting at a convention in New York. The two—alongside environmentalist John Burroughs and Harvey Firestone, the founder of Firestone Tire—were known as the "Four Vagabonds" and were famous for their long roadtrips, which were often highly publicized.

Self-driving formula cars race in the Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League

The league and high-speed versions of traditional cars help to showcase the capabilities of driverless vehicles and the reliability of their AI systems. Leonardo da Vinci first imagined the idea for such machines in the 16th century.

YouTuber Marques Brownlee reviews the Cybertruck

Influential technology reviewer Marques Brownlee—known online by his alias MKBHD—made a name for himself by offering in-depth reviews of gadgets like smartphones and laptops for his YouTube channel. Occasionally, he tackles bigger products. For instance, this nearly 30-minute deep dive into Tesla's Cybertruck, an all-electric pickup truck with a bulletproof exterior and futuristic design, which goes from zero to 60 mph—faster than a Corvette.

As of 2025, most EV batteries retain 95% or more of their range after three years

Data from over 30,000 electric vehicles shows that their batteries are lasting much longer than initially projected, which researchers suggest is due to improved battery management systems and real-world use often being less rigorous than high-performance testing. Cars with 150,000 miles or more that have not had a battery replacement retain at least 83% of their original range.

Tesla has incorporated several Easter eggs into its electric vehicles

After a customer complained that the car's sounds woke up his baby, Tesla implemented "Joe Mode," which quiets sounds, in his honor. Autopilot can be used to engage a depiction of Rainbow Road from Mario Kart on the navigation screen.

How Cadillac joined F1 as the first new team in a decade

The process was not an easy one: Despite growing American interest, thanks to Netflix's "Drive to Survive" and the 2025 film "F1," the 10 teams in the league were resistant to another team diluting the prize money. That changed when Cadillac agreed to pay $200M to become Formula 1's 11th team. This deep dive from ESPN's Nate Saunders details how the company made the deal happen.

How to make your own DIY ionic thruster

In the search for more efficient, sustainable types of propulsive thrust, scientists have dabbled in developing engines using ionic thrust, a type of propulsion using the attractive force of oppositely charged ions. First introduced by a Russian...

The public mostly doubted the Wrights’ flight claims for five years

Coverage of the pair’s success often described them as barely educated bike mechanics. They struggled to gain traction with the public. It took interest from French business leaders and the US Signal Corps to bring the pair into separate demonstrations of their planes.

The organizer of CES originated as the Radio Manufacturers Association in the 1920s

This centennial page explores the Consumer Technology Association’s 100-year history, from its founding in 1924 shortly after the invention of the radio, to its leadership of CES Las Vegas. Read through the history of the wireless age and how it gave birth to a growing consumer electronics movement.

SpaceX's S-1 or 'prospectus' revealed many previously unknown details about the company, including its unprofitability despite doing $18.7B in revenue in 2025, exactly how many voting shares Elon Musk will have in the company (roughly 85%), and more.

Sony set the standard for cylinder-shaped batteries when it repurposed manufacturing equipment used to make rolls of magnetic recording tape.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

Electrical grids worldwide must double their power delivery capacity by 2050 to meet surging demand from AI and electric vehicles.

Planeterrellas create artificial auroras that mimic the atmospheric displays of light by setting up an electric field between two metal balls in a jar filled with a small amount of air.

The history of many kitchen appliances involves unexpected discoveries and applications, including wartime radar turned hamster defroster and replacing an 'ice king' with heat-stealing boxes.

While the first exchange-traded fund (a 'basket' of different assets that can be bought and sold on a stock exchange) in the US only launched in 1993, the global ETF market has grown to more than $10T in the short time since.

Walt Disney's early film 'Alice's Wonderland' was a groundbreaking innovation in the silent film era

When a Paris department store hesitated to sell Estée Lauder's perfume, she 'accidentally' broke a bottle, causing the smell to spread throughout the store and shoppers to start asking to buy the scent.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.

After 25 people used virtual reality headsets to practice flying with virtual wings—flapping their arms—their visual cortex responded to the wings almost as if they were real arms, treating them as body parts.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Stanford built a Google Maps for the Roman Empire, revealing how much it cost to travel in the ancient world

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

In 1984, Operation Smash Hit intentionally crashed a 239-ton train into a nuclear waste canister at 100 miles per hour to prove the canister's safety, which remained completely intact and lost just 0.29 of its 100 pounds of pressure.

Frank Lloyd Wright's houses are historically hard to sell because they're old, subject to local landmark commissions, and often unfashionable

Pure water does not conduct electricity because this flow of energy requires the movement of charged particles, and water is a neutral molecule.

The first line of 'immortal' human cells, which can divide indefinitely and are used in scientific research, was nonconsensually taken from a Black woman.

Brian Wilson wrote the Beach Boys' 'Don't Worry Baby' for the Ronettes, but the legendary girl group rejected it.

After her fellow cult members tried to kill her with an LSD-infused hamburger, one member of the Manson Family, the murderous cult led by Charles Manson, decided to testify against the group's leader.

Trace how the Bill of Rights, inspired by centuries of political theory, took shape between 1774 and 1789.

Abraham Lincoln was almost assassinated weeks before his inauguration as he traveled from Illinois to DC through Baltimore in 1861; it took two independent claims for Lincoln to be convinced the threat was real

The price of gas is a composite made up of several different factors, with the federal gas tax making up less than 20% of what drivers pay at the pump.

An Ebola vaccine was developed during the 2018 west African Ebola outbreak, but the 2026 Ebola outbreak is with a different species of the virus, not the one that the vaccine is approved to treat.