Tesla's Flying Roadster: Rocket Trim Reportedly Invite-Only

Tesla’s long-delayed Roadster is back in the headlines, and this time the focus is on the wildest version of the car. According to Tesla’s own reservation page, the top-tier “Rocket” trim is listed as invite-only, meaning buyers can’t simply walk in and order one. That model is the only Roadster that carries all ten of the cold-gas thrusters Elon Musk has promised, hardware he says will recharge themselves via compressors. Without an invitation, the flying demonstrations shown during the reveal event remain out of reach.

Below the flagship sits a “Thrust” variant, which keeps the rear-facing boosters but is described on Tesla’s order form as having limited availability. That version is the one tied to the eye-catching acceleration claims from the event — a 0-60 mph sprint of 0.81 seconds — and Musk has suggested the production car could go quicker still. Most buyers, however, will end up with the base or Performance trims. Those skip the thrusters entirely, though every Roadster is said to include a fan-based suction system that Tesla claims generates 2Gs of downforce.

There are practical reasons the thruster cars may stay rare. Musk noted that the gases exit the thrusters well above the speed of sound, which helps explain why the demonstration happened outdoors with spectators kept at a distance. Questions also linger over whether a Roadster equipped this way could ever be street legal, and any version cleared for public roads would likely have to shed the boosters.

The timeline deserves skepticism. Musk says the Roadster will arrive in 2028 “for real,” but the car was first promised roughly nine years ago and has slipped repeatedly. Tesla is nonetheless collecting deposits now: all three trims can be pre-ordered with a $50,000 reservation fee, split into $5,000 at the time of order and $45,000 within ten days. Notably, Tesla is not publishing prices for any trim, so reservation holders must pick a version without knowing what it costs — a change from the earlier $200,000 figure attached to the original 2020 Roadster plan.