OWNER GUIDE · TIPS & TRICKS
Tesla Model 3 and Model Y tips and tricks: the settings, shortcuts, and hidden features worth knowing
A Tesla has a lot of features and gets more over time. The hard part is keeping track of them, because almost everything runs on screen, and things end up buried in menus. These are my top tips for Tesla's latest vehicles, including the refreshed Model 3 and Model Y. Some of them are essential to know, some of them are just little bonuses, and some of them are fun. Everything here is demoed in the full video, filmed across both cars.
Start here: the first settings to change
One of the first things I would do in your Tesla is switch the battery display from miles to percentage (the why is below). Then make the screen yours: press and hold an icon in the dock and it works just like a phone, so you can drag icons down, delete the ones you never open, and swap in something you use, like the dash cam icon. The side slots take quick toggles like seat heaters and the heated steering wheel.
Then learn search settings. Type in anything and it both adjusts the setting in place and shows you where it is located for the future, highlighting the real menu path. There is a mic in the box too, so you can say "scroll wheel" and land on it. If a menu path in this guide has moved since the video, search settings finds the new home in seconds.
Trunk tricks: 4 ways to open, height saved by location
Both the Model 3 and Model Y include a powered trunk, and there are actually 4 ways to open it: the trunk button, tapping open on screen, the Tesla app, or hands-free. Hands-free uses ultra wideband: with your phone in your pocket, stand close to the trunk in a steady position for a few seconds, it beeps a few times, and the trunk opens automatically. Enable it on screen under lock settings.
If you park somewhere low, lower the hatch to a safe height, then press and hold the button until you get 2 beeps in rapid succession. From now on, in that location specifically, it only opens to that height; the saved-by-location part is new for the 3 and Y. To reset, raise it fully and press and hold again until it confirms. The 17 mistakes guide has the garage-door story that makes this one essential.
Frunk etiquette
The frunk is entirely manual, but it releases from a control: the app or the screen. There is no hands-free unlock or anything. Closing is the part people get wrong. Bring it down slowly until it is touching, then put 1 hand on each side of the Tesla logo and push down until you get 2 clicks.
Door releases and the hidden emergency tabs
Normal exit is the electronic button: press it and the door releases. The front doors also have a visible manual release for an emergency where the car entirely loses power; Tesla only wants that used in emergencies, though new passengers tend to grab it first.
The rear doors are the ones to know about. There is no extra release next to the button; Tesla hid the emergency backups down in the door pocket, under a little tab, and that yellow tab is your manual release. I do not really know why Tesla did it this way, and door-pocket inserts or cups cover it up and make it that much harder to reach in an emergency. Now you know where it is, so you can tell people if they need to get out.
Battery percentage vs. miles, and the Energy app
Switch the mileage readout to percentage by simply tapping on it. The miles number is actually probably the most inaccurate way to track what range you have left, because it is Tesla's prediction based on the EPA estimated range, not on how you drive. It is just going to be better to keep it in percentage and get used to that.
When you want the detailed view, open the Energy app: consumed energy and what has been consuming it, rated versus since-last-charge, consumption in park, and watt hours per mile over 10, 100, or 200 miles. My rule of thumb: look either very detailed or not detailed at all.
Climate shortcuts and Bioweapon Defense Mode
Press and hold the temperature readout and the entire climate system turns off. I prefer to keep it on auto and just change the temperature up and down; manual mode exposes fan speeds up to 10, and the rear vents are aimed and adjusted from the front screen too. One Model Y exclusive: Bioweapon Defense Mode, the full HEPA filtration system. That is not an included feature for the Model 3, which has standard filters.
Every way to shift, including no screen at all
There is no stalk on the right side, so you shift on screen: swipe down for reverse, swipe up for drive, right about where that stalk would have been. For park, tap it, press and hold in hold mode, or just open the door in drive and it shifts to park automatically.
Auto Shift, a beta under Settings > Dynamics at the time of the video, predicts which direction you need out of park. In my demo it auto shifted me into reverse and threw up the rear cameras. It is not 100 percent perfect yet, but when it works it is faster than swiping and faster than even using a stalk. There is also a no-screen method between drive and reverse: the car prompts you to turn the wheel toward the direction you need and press the brake, and it shifts.
For car washes, Tesla goes one step past neutral with Car Wash Mode: it locks everything, keeps the charge port closed, adds a screen clean mode, and free rolls after a brake press. Plain neutral lives right under it: press and hold with your foot on the brake.
Hidden settings worth turning on
Keep Accessory Power On, under Charging, keeps phone chargers, USB ports, and low voltage outlets powered after you exit while the battery is above 20 percent, so a laptop or cooler keeps running while you are away; it is off by default because it consumes energy even with nothing connected. The green traffic light chime dings when the light turns green, for the zone-out moments. Fold mirrors by location handles a tight garage: click save location and they fold themselves every time you arrive. Adaptive headlights dim individual pixels of the high beams to cut glare and adjust for curves, finally enabled even on recent cars that are not the latest.
In Locks, walk-away door lock can exclude home. In Safety, set Sentry Mode to auto-enable in park but exclude locations like home, so it is not just draining your battery, and set the dash cam to save on auto and on honk, which is how I keep mine. Joe Mode reduces the volume of the car's chimes. Navigation gained avoid highways, and Full Self-Driving will drive that way. And Schedule handles off-peak charging and preconditioning if you leave at the same time every morning.
Camera mastery: blind spot, rear, front, and dash cam
On blinker you get your blind spot view, and there are 3 different positions for it on screen; it saves whatever your last position was. The rear camera comes up 3 ways: the dock icon, a button on the wheel itself on the latest cars, or shifting into reverse. Swipe down to focus on the rear angle, swipe up to bring the side angles back. In the new Model Y, swipe up again for a front view, because that car has a front bumper camera; at the time of the video, the Model 3 did not have it yet.
Update, July 2026: it does now. A front bumper camera is built into the 2026 Model 3 across the board, so the front view is no longer a Model Y exclusive.
Screen and media power moves
The EQ hides behind the 3-lines button on the media card: turn up the sub, turn up the bass, or turn on immersive sound, plus balance. Under sources, uncheck the services you do not use; I have Amazon Music and YouTube Music unchecked. My hi-fi trick is Tidal: once on Wi-Fi, download an album in hi-fi, and it is the best sound quality I have achieved in a Tesla. Disney Plus was removed as a base app over a dispute; as of the video, browsing to disneyplus.com restored it to Theater. The Colorizer under Toy Box matches the on-screen car to your wrap, with matte and metallic options.
The rear screen is controllable from the front: Apps > Rear brings it up, tap to wake, and you are fully controlling that display, with the option to lock it if the kids are misbehaving. Everything runs through these screens, which is why the screen protector from the video description earns its spot; the rest of the gear lives in the accessories guide.
Scroll wheels: custom controls and the reset everyone should know
As filmed, the Model 3 had blinker buttons while the refreshed Model Y had a blinker stalk. The rest of the wheel: buttons for the rear camera, wipers, voice commands, and headlights, with the right scroll wheel entirely dedicated to Autopilot and the left dedicated to media.
Update, July 2026: Tesla has since put a blinker stalk back on the Model 3, by popular demand, so current cars from both lines have one.
The left wheel does volume, track skip, and pause, and press-and-hold brings up an extra function you can customize under Display: temperature, fan speed, fold mirrors, brightness, save dash cam, acceleration mode, steering wheel heat, defrost, dome lights, glove box, or ask each time. Voice commands can control almost anything on screen, and they can sometimes be dicey; you need a great connection, so just play around with them.
Now the reset everyone should know: press and hold both scroll wheels until the car beeps at you, and keep going until the screen goes black. The infotainment reboots, and critically, the car is not stopping: the overhead backup shifters light up and work, it still drives completely fine, and I can still engage Autopilot or Full Self-Driving. My own use case: my latest cars would not join my home Wi-Fi for updates, and a restart fixes it, so I actually find myself doing this quite often.
Autopilot and FSD settings
With FSD on the car you get 3 autonomy tiers on screen: Full Self-Driving, Autosteer, and traffic-aware cruise control. FSD has chill, standard, and hurry modes, a max speed offset, and start FSD supervised from park, which is my favorite: press and hold on screen to navigate to your destination and you never even touch the wheel or the brake if all goes well. In my demo it realized it needed to reverse out of the spot. You always need to be supervising, and parking lots are maybe where you want to pay attention the most.
The right scroll wheel sets the top speed, with a quick flick moving it in 5 mph increments, clicking left or right moves between the modes, and hitting the accelerator tells it to keep a faster speed. Disengage 3 ways: tap the brake, press the scroll wheel once, or steer out, the way I like least because it is a little jagged. FSD is binary: all the way on or all the way off. A lane change request works from the blinker control, and the car keeps making its own decisions after that.
On basic Autopilot, single click activation goes straight to full Autopilot; double click mode splits it, 1 click for cruise control and 2 for Autopilot, with steering out only dropping Autosteer. I think it is just easiest to be all or nothing on this system. One gotcha: after certain deactivations you cannot re-engage the more involved systems until you park again and re-agree to the terms.
Update, July 2026: the buying side changed after this video. Tesla stopped selling FSD outright in February 2026, so it is subscription-only at $99 per month, new orders come with a 30-day trial, and a referral link stretches that trial to 3 months.
Tesla app hidden features
The Tesla app is definitely the best companion app you can have for a vehicle. Sentry live streaming and dash cam clips stream straight to your phone. Climate hides extras: cooled and heated seats, cabin overheat protection, camp mode, dog mode, and vent, which rolls all the windows down about an inch. The location tab does full trip planning: every Supercharger stop planned on your phone in advance and sent to the vehicle.
Summon is really 2 features. A lot of people do not know you can simply have the car creep forward or backward, which helps in tight parking spots. Smart Summon picks a target and drives to you while you press and hold the whole time, basically using the Full Self-Driving system. Security holds valet mode with a pin, invite another driver, and Pin to Drive: even if someone gets your key, they need the pin.
The shortcut icons are customizable (you can add a fifth), syncing to the iOS widget. From any maps app, hit share, pick the Tesla app, and the destination pops up on the car's screen. The controls corner shows tire PSI, and the Apple Watch app works as your phone key, opens the trunk or frunk, starts climate, and locks or unlocks.
Watch the video
A lot of these tips apply to older cars as well, since they run that same updated software. If something helpful got left off, the video comments are open. For the gear side of new-owner setup, the accessories guide; for what to avoid, the 17 mistakes guide.
From Ryan's May 2025 video. Some links on this site are affiliate links that earn a commission at no cost to you, which supports the channel. Menu paths and software behavior are as demoed in the video (May 2025 software) with July 2026 updates marked in place; Tesla moves settings between versions, and search settings finds the new location.