Feb 20, 2025 15:00:00

Tesla's Cybertruck receives top five-star crash safety rating from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

Tesla's

Cybertruck has been subject to five recalls in less than a year since its release due to issues with the accelerator pedal and rearview camera screen , but it has received the highest five-star crash safety rating from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

Vehicle Detail Search - 2025 TESLA CYBERTRUCK (ALL VARIANTS) PU/CC AWD | NHTSA
https://www.nhtsa.gov/vehicle/2025/TESLA/CYBERTRUCK%252520(ALL%252520VARIANTS)/PU%25252FCC/AWD

The Cybertruck is the latest Tesla to score a 5-star crash rating | The Verge
https://www.theverge.com/news/615262/the-cybertruck-is-latest-tesla-to-score-a-5-star-crash-rating

Tesla's pickup truck Cybertruck, which began delivery on November 30, 2023 , received a perfect five-star rating (out of five) in the NHTSA crashworthiness rating. NHTSA's crashworthiness rating has three categories: 'frontal collision,' 'side collision,' and 'rollover,' and each category evaluates safety during a collision separately. Cybertruck received five stars in the overall rating of these three categories.

In the 'head-on collision' test, a frontal collision between two vehicles is simulated to evaluate the safety of the front barrier that protects the driver and passenger seats. In the test, the vehicle is driven at 35 miles per hour (about 56 km) and crashes head-on into a flat, hard barrier. The photo taken during the head-on collision test is shown below, and the driver's seat received the highest rating of five stars, while the passenger seat received a four-star rating, one star lower.

According to NHTSA, the driver's center airbag deployed during the test, but the driver's and passenger's knee airbags did not deploy. Tesla responded by saying, 'The knee airbags are not designed to deploy in the 'specific test.''

For side collisions, we conduct two experiments: the side pole star test and the side barrier test.

The 'side pole star test' simulates the safety of a vehicle colliding with a tree or utility pole, in which a fixed pole moving at 20 miles per hour strikes the test vehicle at a 75-degree angle. The Cybertruck also received a five-star rating in this test.

In the 'side barrier test,' a non-rigid barrier moving at 38.5 mph is slammed into the driver's side door of the test vehicle to simulate the safety of a two-vehicle intersection collision. The Cybertruck received a five-star rating in this test.

The 'rollover' test, which tests a vehicle's resistance to rolling over, received a four-star rating. While the Cybertruck did not roll over during dynamic testing, the NHTSA rated it as having a 12.4 percent risk of rolling over.

In the US, government agencies set safety standards for everything from side mirrors to airbags to automatic emergency braking, but automakers don't 'pre-certify' that their vehicles meet these safety standards before they sell them. Instead, automakers 'self-certify' that their vehicles comply with safety standards through their own testing, and regulators like NHTSA perform crash safety evaluations after the vehicles are sold.

Tesla also conducts its own internal crash tests on the Cybertruck before it goes on sale, but this is the first time the Cybertruck has been subjected to crash safety evaluation testing by an independent regulator. All of Tesla's other models have also received the highest five-star rating.

Safety experts have pointed out the dangers of the Cybertruck, saying that 'the sharp edges of the stainless steel body of the vehicle may pose a special risk to pedestrians and other road users.' The crash safety evaluation released by NHTSA this time does not include a pedestrian safety evaluation, but NCAP has added a program to evaluate a vehicle's 'ability to reduce pedestrian injury or death' in the event of a collision between a pedestrian and a vehicle, so it is expected that an evaluation of pedestrian safety will be released in the future.

Tesla's fourth quarter 2024 (October-December) production and delivery report does not detail the Cybertruck's production and delivery numbers, but lists the Cybertruck's production and delivery numbers together with the Model S and Model X under the heading 'Other Models.' Tesla produced 94,105 vehicles in this category in 2024 and delivered 85,133.

According to Kevin Roberts, director of economic and market intelligence at CarGurus, an online car sales platform, 35,000 to 50,000 of the 'other models' are Cybertrucks. Roberts said, 'How you view the Cybertruck depends on what you expected before you bought it. If you thought it was going to be a mass-produced vehicle to rival Ford's F-150, that's not the case. But compared to lifestyle pickups like the F-150 Lightning, I think it's doing pretty well.'