Tesla Hikes The Cybertruck's Price Up By $5,000, So More People Will Buy Them Now, Right?

Everything from gas to groceries to Playstations is getting more expensive, and apparently that includes politically divisive electric pickup trucks. As of Tuesday, two variants of the Tesla Cybertruck are getting price hikes of $5,000. Specifically, the base dual-motor, all-wheel-drive Cybertruck goes from a starting price of $69,990 to $74,990 while the Premium model with a nicer interior, bed, and air suspension goes from $79,990 to $84,990.

I'm not an economist, but usually when something gets more expensive, less people can afford to buy it. This is great for the Cybertruck specifically since sales have been so hot — wait, no, that's not right. According to Cox Automotive's EV Sales Report, Tesla sold 3,519 Cybertrucks in the first quarter of 2026, down 45.1% year-over-year. This is after Cybertruck sales already fell hard from '24 to '25, and a recent report alleges that about one out of every five Cybertrucks registered is actually just being snapped up by Elon Musk's other company, SpaceX. And if you look at the data, Tesla's stainless pickup is turning out to be a bigger sales flop than the Edsel.

Under normal economic principles and rules, you'd think Cybertruck prices would go down, not up. But perhaps Tesla knows something we don't. Perhaps treating housing as an investment and a general culture of rent-seeking has destroyed any semblance of affordability among anything else downstream. Perhaps normal economic principles have always actually been made up nonsense. Or perhaps Tesla simply does not play by normal economic rules. For legal reasons, that last one is a joke, not an allegation.

Cybertruck pricing is all over the place. Back in February, the controversial pickup could be had for just $62,235 in AWD form, but that only lasted 10 days. Then in April, Tesla released a stripped out, rear-drive model for 72 grand including destination that felt like a pretty bad deal considering the much better equipped AWD one was just 10 grand more. At this point, you might as well count Tesla as one of those tech companies that employs "dynamic pricing" — it's like the weather in literally where you are right now: if you don't like it, wait five minutes.