Tesla surprisingly increases range of the Model 3 with Mid-Range battery

A day after decreasing the Model 3’s base price by $2,000, Tesla is also surprisingly increasing the advertised range of the cheapest version of Model 3: the Model 3 with the new Mid-Range battery pack.

In October, Tesla surprised many with the launch of a new ‘Mid-Range’ battery pack for the Model 3.

Tesla says that the battery pack is the same as the Long Range pack, which was the only one in production for the Model 3, but it is equipped with fewer cells.

A source familiar with Tesla’s production of the new Mid-Range battery pack told Electrek that it has a capacity of 62 kWh.

The lower energy capacity results in a shorter range of 260 EPA estimated miles but Tesla was also able to lower the price of the vehicle to $46,000.

Yesterday, the company cut another $2,000 off the base price in order to compensate for the start of the federal tax credit phase-out in the US.

Now Tesla is also increasing the range of the latest version of the Model 3 to 264 miles (425 km) on a single charge according to its design studio:

Last month, the EPA released its official rating for the new version of the Model 3 with the Mid-Range battery pack and it confirmed the 260 miles of range that Tesla was advertising at the time.

It also surprisingly confirmed a lower efficiency than the other versions of the Model 3.

While Tesla updated the Model 3 design studio with the new range, the EPA’s website still shows a range of 260 miles and MPGe of 123. There’s no ‘2019’ version of the Model 3 Mid-Range listed on the site.

The automaker did ask to voluntarily lower the range 260 miles after getting 270.1 miles of city driving range and 247.6 miles of highway driving range in the original EPA test.

We contacted Tesla to ask if the new advertised range is due to a hardware or software change to the vehicle or if it’s a different way to calculate the range. We will update if we get an answer.

Electrek’s Take

Granted, we are not talking about a massive change here. It’s 4 more miles (or 6.4 km) on a single charge.

Yet, it’s weird that it’s coming a few months after the start of production of the new battery pack and after the EPA released the official rating.

Since Tesla hasn’t updated the range of the other versions of the Model 3, it doesn’t look like they updated anything to get more efficiency unless it has to do specifically with the Mid-Range battery pack.

I am curious to see if they recently changed something with the pack in order to advertise this new range.

What do you think? Let us know in the comment section below.