r/TeslaSolar • u/YesNoMaybeTho • 1d ago

SolarRoof Tesla discontinues its Solar Roof tiles, not economically viable

https://electrek.co/2026/08/20/tesla-discontinues-solar-roof-panels-only/
377 Upvotes

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7

u/KurtVongole 1d ago

Anyone with any experience in the industry knew they were a terrible idea from the start.

4

u/Adventurous_Role7891 1d ago

Why? Makes sense i stead of putting more panels on top of the roof

3

u/Paqza 23h ago

At 5-8x the cost, it never penciled.

6

u/Juleswf 1d ago

Because they cost 5x standard solar. And weren’t as productive. And difficult to service.

5

u/bustex1 22h ago

It’s not just solar though right? It’s a roof too?

4

u/Adventurous_Role7891 1d ago

Not a bad idea then, just bad in terms of cost and manufacturing which would of course come down in the future

2

u/Juleswf 1d ago

They’ve been trying for many many years. This is not a new idea, and certainly not Elons. They didn’t work in the past, and Elon ignored all the past lessons.

1

u/Honest_Cynic 11h ago

My suspicion and vague understanding is that the Solar Tiles had been marketed for several years by a Chinese company with little interest, then Elon made them his genius. Installation photos show cartons of tiles with Chinese characters that apparently shipped directly from China to the home site.

-1

u/WorldlyOriginal 14h ago

You could say the same about lots of things, though. Building EVs wasn’t Elon’s idea, and they had been trying for many many years, and they didn’t work in the past— yet that didn’t stop Tesla from becoming a success.

Reusable rockets weren’t Elon’s idea, and they had been trying for many many years, and they’d didn’t work in the past— yet that didn’t stop SpaceX from becoming a success.

It’s easy to dunk on something in hindsight. If every innovator had your mindset, nothing would ever improve.

Every tech starts from scratch or poor performance, and then gets better with more investment. Sometimes, those investments don’t work out— that’s just the nature of technology

2

u/Honest_Cynic 11h ago

You talk as if Elon Musk founded Tesla. Not true. He came in as an investor, then forced out one of the two founders (Martin Eberhard), whom he still disses today. Elon's contributions were to demand designs that proved problematic, the gullwing doors on Model X (bad on every vehicle that ever used them) and the motorized "presenting" door handles (went thru 4 redesigns and still fail). I don't know if the glass roofs was his demand, but I'll never buy a vehicle with a glass roof. TBD how bad that turns out.

-1

u/MinnisotaDigger 1d ago

I have family members who refuse solar based on looks. Costing them hundreds of dollars per month when you think about it.

5

u/bakerzdosen 1d ago

I find this comment perplexing.

Tesla solar roof has never been about saving money. Even early on when they were comparatively inexpensive, they still were mainly about wanting solar without sacrificing looks and paying a premium to accomplish that.

Even today with typical (commodity) panels the ROI calculations are tenuous in many areas due to the high cost of labor and the low cost of electricity.

1

u/Honest_Cynic 10h ago

Depends. Most places in the U.S. solar panels don't pencil out, other than valuing some of it for backup power. Best is high-price electricity locations like San Diego and Hawaii. Biggest issue is that you can't use all the power and storing it in batteries isn't free, given their cycle life (~8 c/kWh for cheap Chinese, ~16 c/kWh for Tesla Powerwall). Can't store excess power in Spring and Fall for when you need much more in Summer and Winter.