Tesla Cybertruck covered with solar panels can generate up to 1.5 kW of electricity

Elon Musk mainly promotes the idea of ​​using tile roofs as solar panels, but he has not previously ruled out the use of this energy source in Tesla vehicles. Branded developments in this area were somewhat ahead of Sunflare Solars, which at CES 2025 demonstrated a Cybertruck pickup truck completely covered with solar panels.

Image source: Electrek

This modification increased the cost of the machine by $10,000, but made it possible to generate up to 1.5 kW of electricity per hour using solar energy. In fact, given sufficient daylight hours and maintaining a relatively clean body surface, these solar panels can increase the range of an electric vehicle by a couple of tens of kilometers. At one time, at the stage of announcing the Cybertruck, Tesla promised that solar panels built into the roof would allow it to accumulate a range of 24 km from solar energy per day. True, such an option never appeared on the list of Cybertrucks available to buyers.

By the way, Elon Musk previously admitted that he tried to force the company’s engineers to equip the Tesla Model 3 with solar panels on the roof, but given the level of technology development in 2017, such an idea did not seem practical to them. The head of the company also suggested that if Tesla were to produce a commercial electric van, solar cells could be built into its roof and folding panels along the sides, which in clear weather would allow up to 48 km of range at no additional cost. If we talk about the Cybertruck prototype with a body surface covered with solar panels, which was presented by Sunflare Solars, it is equipped with a 5 kW inverter that charges the traction battery with electricity generated by solar panels. A pickup truck with such a body coating becomes quite vulnerable to mechanical impact, and inevitable pollution reduces the efficiency of solar cells, so the practical value of such a modification still raises many questions.