Tesla Cybercab riders spot hidden virtual joystick for staff use

The virtual controls appeared to show up accidentally during the first couple of weeks of the Cybercab’s public launch. In at least two videos posted on X, riders encounter a square-shaped panel in the lower left corner of the central display, with a toggle in the middle for manual driving. The on-screen labels include “forward” at the top and “reverse” at the bottom, along with buttons to stop the vehicle, sound the horn, and manually open the doors. To the right of the joystick are live camera views, though in one video the image appeared frozen on a Tesla Supercharger from a previous location.

Since the Cybercab has no steering wheel or pedals, the virtual joystick likely gives fleet workers a way to nudge the vehicle into tight spaces at low speeds. Tesla needed a workaround for tasks such as rearranging cars in a parking lot, so that employees would not have to call the Cybercab control center or use a remote operator. The controls might also be used by law enforcement or emergency responders who need to move a Cybercab off the road. Tesla has briefed Austin’s police department on the service, although it is unclear whether these manual controls were part of that briefing.

Riders who noticed the virtual joystick tried to use it to control the vehicle, but their attempts were unsuccessful. The presence of the controls during customer rides may be an early bug that Tesla can fix before wider release.

The Cybercab was designed as a fully autonomous vehicle with no manual controls, a deliberate statement that such controls are relics of the past. Even so, Tesla has apparently built in a virtual manual mode for the vehicle of the future.