Franz says the Roadster is coming "very soon," and the reveal may include a hover

Updated 2026-08-17.

When the man who designed the car starts talking, the car is close. Tesla design chief Franz von Holzhausen appeared on Jay Leno's Garage on August 10 and was asked the question every reservation holder has been asking for 9 years: when do we see the Roadster? His answer, per Not a Tesla App's coverage: "Very soon. Very soon." When Leno pressed on the timeline, Franz didn't dodge the number, replying "just shy of ten years."

Executives at Tesla don't do accidental interviews. Franz choosing a nationally watched car show to say "very soon" twice, weeks after reports put the reveal in August, reads like a company clearing its throat before an announcement. Electrek and Drive Tesla both flagged the same thing: this is the most senior on-record Roadster comment Tesla has offered all year.

The Information: late August, and it flies

The second shoe dropped this week. Per a new report from The Information covered by Teslarati, Tesla is planning the unveil for later in August, and the demo everyone has whispered about is real: the car is expected to demonstrate leaving the ground. Not a render, not a wind-tunnel claim. A hover, live, in front of an audience.

We covered the mechanics behind that claim when the August reveal window first firmed up: the SpaceX package, known internally as A71, uses cold-gas thrusters developed with SpaceX to add downforce, acceleration, or, pointed the right way, lift. What's new is the reporting that Tesla intends to show the party trick at the reveal itself rather than saving it for a later demo day.

And in case anyone thought the flying talk was a misread, Elon Musk spent the same week saying it plainly. Asked about the technology, Musk said flying cars are coming to market, per Teslarati's report. He's been hinting at this since 2017, when he promised the new Roadster would do things no production car has done. The hints have stopped being hints.

Ten years is a strange, wonderful number

The original next-gen Roadster prototype broke cover in November 2017, which means the reveal lands just shy of the 10-year mark Franz acknowledged on Leno's couch. It's fair to call that a long wait; early reservation holders put down $50,000 deposits when the iPhone X was new.

But look at what Tesla did with the decade. The company that teased the Roadster in 2017 was fighting for survival on Model 3 production. The company revealing it in 2026 builds millions of cars a year, runs a robotaxi network, and shares an engineering campus with a rocket company. The Roadster stopped being a car Tesla needed to sell and became a car Tesla gets to make. That's the version you want: a halo car built from strength, with a physics experiment bolted to the bottom.

A skeptic will note that "very soon" has been said before, and dates have slipped more times than anyone at Tesla would like to count. True. The difference this time is convergence: the design chief on camera, a specific reported window, a reported demo format, and the CEO talking about flight in the present tense. That's not a company managing expectations downward.

Pick your Roadster color now

Here's a prediction that costs nothing: whatever color the reveal car wears will be sold out of the collective imagination within a week. The original Roadster made red the default Tesla fantasy color for a generation. If the new one shows up in some deep metallic blue or a bare-metal look, that becomes the poster on a million walls by Labor Day.

You don't have to wait for a poster. Your own Tesla's screen can wear any color, gradient, or full design you can dream up, today. Our Tesla wrap color guide breaks down which tones work on which body lines, from subtle two-tones to full chrome. Build yours in the studio, or open the Garage and orbit your car like it's on the reveal stage. When the Roadster finally hovers, you'll want your daily driver dressed for the occasion.

Tesla took 10 years to stick the landing on this one; your reveal-day look takes about 10 minutes, so open the studio and have it ready before the livestream.