Tesla has officially begun internal testing of its awaited virtual queueing system for Superchargers. The news was shared by Tesla’s Director of Charging, Max de Zegher on X.
The Tesla Charging team has begun pressure testing the new feature and is planning for public pilots as their next step. While most users won’t experience heavy congestion at Superchargers, for those who do, it could be a real pain point. Virtual queues are designed to make it easier to charge at congested Superchargers by having a digital queue, rather than relying on owners to remain in line with their vehicles.
Pressure testing virtual queuing with the awesome @TeslaCharging teams, including for corner cases & bad actors. Public pilots next. If we get this right, it will be a big improvement for those rare cases with a wait. https://t.co/mxpFarYgJi pic.twitter.com/IgVVH2wiOe
- Max (@MdeZegher) June 26, 2025
Virtual Queues
When we originally delved into Tesla’s plans to introduce a virtual queue system, it seemed obvious that the virtual queue would replace the current “Wild West” first-come, first-served system of vehicles trying to get pulled into a stall. This process will likely have two key integrations.
First up is integration directly into the vehicle software for Tesla vehicles. This means that when you’re navigating to a Supercharger that’s busy and virtual queuing is enabled, you will be automatically placed into the virtual queue upon arrival.
Then, your position in line is displayed on-screen and provides an estimated wait time, allowing you to relax, eat, or take a bathroom break without worrying about your place in line. Finally, once a stall becomes available and it’s your turn, you will receive a notification on your vehicle’s screen, as well as on the Tesla app, directing you to the open stall that will presumably only allow your vehicle to charge. We imagine that there will be a grace period for owners to pull up with their car. If that doesn’t happen within a certain period, the next car will likely be offered the charger.
Similar to the Supercharger live activity that Tesla recently added, we imagine Tesla will also include a live activity for Virtual Queues, allowing users to monitor their place in line on their lock screen.
The second integration is in the Tesla app for non-Tesla drivers. As Tesla continues to install Magic Docks and open Superchargers to non-Tesla EVs, more and more traffic comes to the world’s most reliable fast charging network. That means that Tesla also needs to manage expectations and queue times for non-Tesla vehicles, likely through a similar process, but done over the Tesla app instead.
The Devil’s in the Details
A simple “first-in, first-out” queue sounds great, but Max noted that it is easy to exploit things with bad actors. What prevents a driver from joining a queue remotely to reserve a spot, ignoring a notification, or trying to hop into an unreserved spot?
Well, Tesla should be able to manage these fairly easily, but they still require technical effort to implement. That means GPS geofencing for those attempting to join a queue, a short countdown timer for those late to take their spot, and a lockout for those who try to skip the queue are all needed.
What’s Next?
As Tesla has just started internal testing of this feature, it likely means that public-facing user interfaces and flows aren’t quite ready yet, but the underlying functionality is. It also means that Tesla is working to refine the little details to make the process as smooth and as easily accessible as possible.
While no pilot locations have been announced yet, it seems likely that Tesla will launch the pilot at some of the most notoriously busy Supercharger sites to gather testing data in the near future, once internal testing is complete. That means holiday travel routes or major highways, likely in California first, before rolling out elsewhere.
Virtual Queuing is a fantastic tech-first solution for the Supercharger network that helps transform that experience into a more calm and orderly process. Additionally, establishing a fair system that allows both Tesla and non-Tesla EVs to access will likely improve the overall experience. Along with the pilot program for dynamic Supercharger pricing that incentivizes people to use less-congested Superchargers, these changes should improve the Supercharger experience.
While Max mentioned it was designed for “those rare cases with a wait”, that tends to be the experience in larger cities further North, especially in New York, Michigan, or within Canada, where the few smaller Supercharger sites in big cities tend to be heavily congested. These queues will make the experience smoother for everyone involved, so we’re looking forward to seeing this come to fruition.
