- The automaker’s Q1 sales fell 14.3 percent from the last quarter of 2025.
- Tesla was left with a surplus of over 50,300 vehicles sitting in inventory.
- Shares dropped more than 4 percent after the company’s delivery report.
Tesla sold significantly fewer vehicles in the first quarter of this year than it did in Q4 2025, joining several other car manufacturers in reporting declines through the first three months of the year. Tesla’s poor production and delivery figures triggered a more than 4 percent fall in shares.
Read: Tesla’s Sales Collapsed By Nearly 90% In The Land Of EVs
Last quarter, Tesla sold 358,023 vehicles worldwide. This represents a 14.3 percent decrease from the 418,227 models it sold in Q4 2025, but it is a 6 percent rise over Q1 last year. As sales plummeted, the difference between the number of vehicles built by Tesla and the number sold grew to its widest gap in four years.
Tesla wrapped up the quarter with 408,386 vehicles built, leaving a surplus of 50,363 units sitting in inventory. Data cited by Business Insider shows that it’s the largest gap between production and deliveries the company has ever recorded, which is surprising for a company that has typically kept supply and demand tightly aligned. The closest parallel dates back to the same period in 2024, when production outpaced deliveries by around 46,500 vehicles.
According to Morningstar analyst Seth Goldstein, there are two key reasons to explain why sales fell.
“Tesla’s first-quarter deliveries reflect the U.S. tax credit expiration as well as FSD not yet being approved in the EU,” he told Reuters. “These factors will likely continue to weigh on deliveries until Tesla gets EU approval and until we enter the fourth quarter in the U.S.”
Lower Than Analyst Expectations
The carmaker began to temper expectations for the first quarter last week, publishing a delivery consensus based on estimates from more than a dozen analysts. This suggests Tesla would end the quarter with 365,645 deliveries, but it fell short of that. The analysts also predicted Tesla would deploy 14.4 GWh worth of energy storage, but it actually delivered just 8.8 GWh of energy storage products.
As we’ve come to expect, the Model 3 and Model Y account for the bulk of the company’s sales, with 341,893 finding new homes. The remaining 16,130 vehicles delivered included a mix of the Cybertruck, Semi and the now-discontinued Model S and Model X.
