How does FSD actually work?

[nicksp]

I've never driven a tesla with FSD. So how does it really work? Say I navigate to work. Does it start driving or take control even on unnamed roads? Where would it end? At my office parking lot?
I have an idea how it'll work on streets and freeways but I don't know where it'll start and end.

 

[mgs333]

You can look up videos on YouTube to get a sense much better than we could explain using words on here.

 

[Tronguy]

Simple. You’re in your driveway. Hit the right scroll wheel and say the words, “Navigate to work”.

The NAV will display a path on the right side of the screen showing the path to work. Assuming you’ve got the work location set up in the car’s NAV and, well, actually have a job.

At this point, start driving the car to work. Like you normally would. Reverse out of your parking spot or driveway or your place on the street, whatever. At some point, sooner or later, you’ll be on the road with the car in Drive. (I don’t want to hear about you driving to work in reverse.)

Keep an eye on the top left corner of the screen. A little steering wheel icon will appear. When it does, give the shift lever One Press Down. The steering wheel icon will turn blue and the car will start driving. Unless you’re at a stop sign or stop light, in which case the car will handle that, then keep on going.

You hang onto the wheel, but generally let the car do what it wants. You generally keep your feet off the pedals. Pay attention to your surrounds. If the car does something stupid or some other maniac driver does something that scares you, you take over by, variously, hitting the brakes, turning the wheel and overriding the car, or by swiping the shift lever up.

The car will navigate itself to your place of work, local roads, highways, lights, stop signs, traffic circles, lane changes and all. Did I say Pay Attention? Yes, yes. I did. No reading War and Peace, playing with your phone or tablet: just keep your eyes out there and hang onto the wheel. No cheating. Be prepared to take over at any time. It’s Level 2 Beta, not 3.

If your place of work has a parking lot, it’ll go in there. Or to whatever you’ve marked as Work, so it could be the front door. Some people claim that they’ve seen the car park itself. I haven’t.

Don’t follow the advice of watching a YouTuber video. To an idiot, they all keep their hands on their laps instead of on the wheel, the better to show their credulous fans that, “The Car Is Driving Itself!!!!!”, then shove the wheel a bit with their thighs to defeat the car’s built-in hands detector.

Your job is to supervise and take over if something wrong happens. Which won’t be often, but, in principle, could happen at any time. Generally, once you get used to the process and gain some trust in what the car’s doing, it’s all a bit boring. On long trips down interstate highways I find it less stressful than actually driving oneself, since the car takes care of the minutia of staying in lane, driving at the rough right speed (including stop and go traffic jams), and handling lane changes.

That last is the real fun. With all those unblinking cameras, the car refuses to switch lanes and bang into other cars either in one’s blind spot or on their way there. Worth the price of admission, that.

 

[TheDocBox]

Simple. You’re in your driveway. Hit the right scroll wheel and say the words, “Navigate to work”.

The NAV will display a path on the right side of the screen showing the path to work. Assuming you’ve got the work location set up in the car’s NAV and, well, actually have a job.

At this point, start driving the car to work. Like you normally would. Reverse out of your parking spot or driveway or your place on the street, whatever. At some point, sooner or later, you’ll be on the road with the car in Drive. (I don’t want to hear about you driving to work in reverse.)

Keep an eye on the top left corner of the screen. A little steering wheel icon will appear. When it does, give the shift lever One Press Down. The steering wheel icon will turn blue and the car will start driving. Unless you’re at a stop sign or stop light, in which case the car will handle that, then keep on going.

You hang onto the wheel, but generally let the car do what it wants. You generally keep your feet off the pedals. Pay attention to your surrounds. If the car does something stupid or some other maniac driver does something that scares you, you take over by, variously, hitting the brakes, turning the wheel and overriding the car, or by swiping the shift lever up.

The car will navigate itself to your place of work, local roads, highways, lights, stop signs, traffic circles, lane changes and all. Did I say Pay Attention? Yes, yes. I did. No reading War and Peace, playing with your phone or tablet: just keep your eyes out there and hang onto the wheel. No cheating. Be prepared to take over at any time. It’s Level 2 Beta, not 3.

If your place of work has a parking lot, it’ll go in there. Or to whatever you’ve marked as Work, so it could be the front door. Some people claim that they’ve seen the car park itself. I haven’t.

Don’t follow the advice of watching a YouTuber video. To an idiot, they all keep their hands on their laps instead of on the wheel, the better to show their credulous fans that, “The Car Is Driving Itself!!!!!”, then shove the wheel a bit with their thighs to defeat the car’s built-in hands detector.

Your job is to supervise and take over if something wrong happens. Which won’t be often, but, in principle, could happen at any time. Generally, once you get used to the process and gain some trust in what the car’s doing, it’s all a bit boring. On long trips down interstate highways I find it less stressful than actually driving oneself, since the car takes care of the minutia of staying in lane, driving at the rough right speed (including stop and go traffic jams), and handling lane changes.

That last is the real fun. With all those unblinking cameras, the car refuses to switch lanes and bang into other cars either in one’s blind spot or on their way there. Worth the price of admission, that.

Agreed with most of this. You MUST pay attention. The easiest will be interstates (which interestingly are not part of the most recent update) as the car is really good at those. I did start switching on "minimal lane changes", because it is really early on moving to the left lane for a pass at 1 mph faster, but then doesn't move back despite being followed by multiple cars and completing the pass a long time ago. I preferred making the choices of changes for passing. The city streets are much more questionable, and seem to change with every update.