Tesla FSD Europe: EU approval, 10% speed rule and Assisted Driving name
Germany backs EU-wide approval of Tesla FSD Supervised, with a proposed 10% speed tolerance and a possible rename to Tesla Assisted Driving.
Germany has publicly backed a swift rollout of Tesla FSD Supervised across the European Union. Federal Transport Minister Steffen Bilger said that after talks with Tesla in September, the sides found a common approach to disputed technical issues and driver responsibility. Tesla itself proposed replacing the controversial Full Self-Driving Supervised name with Tesla Assisted Driving.
There is also a more specific agreement. The system would be allowed to exceed the posted speed limit by no more than 10%: with a 50 km/h limit, the upper threshold would be 55 km/h. Germany is prepared to support this approach in the European procedure, arguing that it could help maintain a smoother traffic flow in some situations. FSD would still remain a driver-assistance system: the driver must watch the road and retains full responsibility for driving.
Speed has been one of Tesla's most difficult issues. An independent Johanna.be study published on September 24 after test drives in Brussels found that FSD exceeded the limit on 55% of the checked sections with a 30 km/h restriction. Where the system drove faster than permitted, the average speed reached 44 km/h. Germany's proposed 10% ceiling therefore looks less like a cosmetic detail and more like an attempt to formalize acceptable system behavior.
Berlin's support still does not equal approval. At the EU technical committee meeting on October 6, discussions continued without a vote. Under the published timetable, the next opportunity for an EU-wide decision is not expected before December.
The procedure is based on the Dutch RDW approval of April 10. The regulator tested the system for more than a year and a half. In a later explanation, RDW cited more than 3000 hours of testing, over 1000 test drives and data from 1.8 million km of European driving. RDW stresses that the European FSD Supervised is not a self-driving system, the driver remains responsible, and the software and functions differ from the US version.
National approvals have already expanded the system's reach: by the end of September, FSD Supervised had been cleared in eight EU countries — the Netherlands, Lithuania, Estonia, Denmark, Belgium, Slovenia, the Czech Republic and Croatia. Germany carries far greater weight in the EU than the smaller markets, so its move to public support strengthens Tesla's position ahead of a future decision.