Lars Moravy said it plainly. Tesla’s VP of Vehicle Engineering told the Ride the Lightning podcast he thinks “all the time” about dropping a third motor into the Model 3.
He was asked directly whether a tri-motor Model 3 could happen. He didn’t shoot it down.
Specifically, Moravy talked about taking the carbon-sleeved motors from the Model S Plaid and adapting them for the Model 3 platform. Those motors are the reason the Model S Plaid hits 60 mph in under 2 seconds. That’s the hardware he’s thinking about squeezing into a smaller car.
The current Model 3 Performance does 0-60 in 2.9 seconds with 510 horsepower, starting around $54,990. A Plaid version would likely push past 1,000 horsepower and into sub-2-second territory.
So why doesn’t it exist yet?
Moravy called it a “work for reward” situation. The engineering effort doesn’t justify the business case right now. Tesla’s current priorities are Optimus production, Robotaxi expansion, and the Roadster. The Roadster gets the best new motors first. That’s the line.
Once the Roadster reaches production, the door stays open for that technology to work its way down the lineup. Tesla has done this before. Plaid started as a Model S thing. Nothing says it stays there.
The gap between “a VP thinks about it” and “it ships” is real and often enormous. But Moravy used specific technical language, on record, at the VP level. That’s a different category than a rumor or a tweet.