Tesla Refunds Deposits as Cybertruck Production for Australia and New Zealand Is Halted
Reservation holders in both countries began receiving cancellation emails on 23 October, with refunds promised within 30 days.
By Bianca Shevchenko ·
Tesla has cancelled the Cybertruck for Australia and New Zealand, ending reservation waits that began in November 2019. Customers who put down a A$150 deposit started receiving emails on 23 October stating their orders are void and payments will be returned. The company said refunds will be processed within 30 days.
The email told customers that "plans to produce Cybertruck for Australia and New Zealand have been discontinued" and that Tesla is "unable to fulfil your reservation and it will be cancelled." Reservation holders who instead buy a new Model 3 or Model Y will receive a free one-year subscription to FSD (Supervised). The emails went out one day after Tesla reported third-quarter 2026 earnings.
A 2020 crowdsourced survey of reservations ranked Australia third behind the United States and Canada, at about 3% of all Cybertruck reservations, though Tesla never released regional figures. Crowdsourced tracking put total reservations near 2 million by 2023. Tesla closed the Australian reservation page in May 2022 and replaced it with a "Get updates" button without refunding deposits at the time.
The Cybertruck is built only in left-hand drive, while Australia, New Zealand, the UK and Japan require right-hand drive. Australia also requires certification under its own design rules. Tesla's international rollout has been limited to left-hand-drive countries, with deliveries beginning in South Korea late last year and in the UAE in January; configurators have since appeared in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan and Israel. The truck remains unavailable in the EU, largely over pedestrian safety concerns.
Tesla delivered 8,295 "Other Models" in the third quarter of 2026, a category now made up almost entirely of the Cybertruck since Model S and Model X production ended. Estimates put quarterly Cybertruck sales at 7,000 to 8,000 units, or roughly 30,000 a year, against a production line built for 250,000 units annually. Australia and New Zealand together have about 33 million people.
Source: Electrek
