Korean Tesla owners paid $6,700 for FSD their China-built cars can’t legally use

Tesla’s Full Self-Driving package works on only a minority of the Teslas on South Korean roads, yet the company has charged Korean buyers thousands of dollars for it for years. A Korean consumer group now says Tesla knew most of those cars could never legally switch it on, and it is asking the country’s competition and consumer regulator to stop Tesla from selling it to them.

The dividing line is the factory. Teslas built in the United States enter Korea under the free trade agreement between the two countries, which recognizes American safety standards, so they can run FSD (Supervised). Its mass-market models, which make up most of what Tesla sells in Korea, come from its Shanghai plant, and no such arrangement covers cars made in China. Those cars need a Korean approval that FSD does not have. For their owners, that means a paid feature in the menu that the law says they cannot use.

Those mass-market cars are the Model 3 and Model Y, and Tesla’s own figures show how lopsided the split is. Seo Young-deuk, who runs Tesla Korea, told lawmakers last month that FSD works on about 20% of the Teslas registered in the country. Data the company handed to the National Assembly shows it has sold more than 170,000 China-made cars in Korea since 2023, and that 99% of the new Teslas it sold there last year could not legally use FSD. Electrek, which detailed the eligibility split, notes that sales of the Shanghai-built cars grew more than fivefold between 2023 and 2025, and that Tesla passed BMW this year as Korea’s top imported car brand.

The complaint comes from Citizens United for Consumer Sovereignty, according to Reuters, which reviewed it before filing. The group points to Tesla’s “coming soon” promotion of FSD last year and a demo video filmed on Korean roads, and argues that neither made clear the software would only run on a small slice of the cars Tesla was selling. “Tesla generated substantial revenue by selling an expensive driver-assistance system to mass-market buyers who cannot use it for even a single day,” Choi Young-suk, who leads the group’s work on automotive issues, told Reuters.

The sums are not small. For years Tesla charged Korean buyers a one-time fee of 9.043 million won, about $6,700, for FSD. In August it moved to a monthly subscription of 150,000 won, about $112. The subscription lowers the upfront cost, but it does not change which cars the law allows to use the software.

The group wants the Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) to order Tesla to temporarily stop marketing FSD for ineligible cars, to fine the company and to refer the case to state investigators. The regulator is not starting from zero. A KFTC official told Reuters the agency opened an investigation into Tesla’s FSD advertising this year and has already received written responses from the company. Tesla did not respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.

None of this guarantees that owners get their money back. A KFTC complaint can lead to a halt order or a fine, but it is not a refund process, and Korean courts have so far sided with Tesla. Last month a Seoul court dismissed a refund lawsuit from Tesla owners who had paid for FSD, finding that the company had not contractually promised fully autonomous driving and pointing to Korean regulations, not Tesla, as the reason more features never arrived. The name does not help either: despite “Full Self-Driving,” the system still needs a driver watching the road, in Korea and everywhere else Tesla sells it.

Approval is not around the corner. At a parliamentary hearing on October 8, Seo testified that Tesla had never formally asked the transport ministry to test FSD, and the company filed for certification about two weeks later. The ministry has told a lawmaker that FSD does not comply with local safety rules, including the requirement that drivers keep their hands on the wheel. Current FSD versions let drivers go hands-free as long as the cabin camera sees them watching the road.

Some owners have not waited for the paperwork. Korean police referred 80 Tesla drivers to prosecutors last month for using unauthorized devices to unlock FSD, a crackdown that shows how much demand the restriction has left unmet.

The dispute is specific to Korea, where US-built Model S, Model X and Cybertruck owners got FSD (Supervised) when Tesla switched it on late last year. The pattern behind it is not: whether FSD is legal depends on where a car was built and where it is driven, and Tesla is still seeking approval in Europe. The consumer group plans to file its complaint with the KFTC on Thursday, November 5. The transport ministry’s answer to Tesla’s certification request will decide whether the other four in five Teslas in Korea ever run the software their owners were sold.

Tags: South Korea, tesla, electric vehicles, Tesla Model Y, driver assistance, Full Self-Driving