- Tesla has officially launched Full Self-Driving in Europe.
- Before drivers can activate FSD, they will have to complete a quick quiz.
- This quiz tests to make sure that owners understand when FSD is active and that they are accountable for their car's actions even when FSD is enabled.
Tesla's Full Self-Driving (Supervised) software is finally available in Europe for the first time. The Netherlands recently gave Tesla the green light to deploy FSD to its citizens, but in order to activate it, there's a catch: You now have to pass a quiz before you use it for the first time.
Tesla calls this the "FSD (Supervised) Activation Tutorial." Owners attempting to switch on FSD for the first time are presented with the mandatory in-car safety training and must pass a quiz before activating the driver-assistance feature.
Essentially, the tutorial is meant to explain FSD's controls and interface. It explains what each button does and how to identify when FSD is active. At the end of the tutorial is a short two-question quiz that tests the driver's knowledge of accountability and the UI:
- Question 1: Select the image where FSD (Supervised) is active.
- Question 2: Are you responsible for safe vehicle operation while FSD (Supervised) is active?
These questions might be simple, but it helps to bridge an important distinction that Tesla has had some trouble with in the past.
Despite what the names might suggest, both Autopilot and Full Self-Driving have always been Level 2 driver assistance systems. This means that the person behind the wheel is always accountable for what the vehicle does, even if the car is assisting with the steering, accelerating, and braking. In fact, Tesla has even renamed its Autopilot and Full Self-Driving features in certain markets to avoid regulatory trouble.
One of the ways that Tesla received approval for FSD in the Netherlands, it had to meet UN-R171 standards. This requires a driver to be educated on the performance of a driver-assistance system to avoid potential "misinterpretation, overestimation, or difficulty" of the software. This tutorial and quiz helps to meet this requirement and button up confusion by immediately disclosing accountability to the driver so they don't treat the car like some sort of robotic chauffeur.
So far, the Netherlands has been the first European country to actually roll out a regulator-backed version of FSD to the masses. But because Tesla is meeting the UN-R171 requirements, it should be fairly easy for the automaker to seek regulatory approval in other EU countries that have adopted the same standards. It's a key step in Tesla's ambitions to take FSD global.
