Image: Tesla
Elon Musk says Tesla’s next-generation AI chips are progressing quickly, with AI6 and AI7 expected to follow soon after the upcoming AI5 processor.
In a post on X over the weekend, Musk wrote: “Just finished a long AI5 design review with the Tesla California and Texas chip engineers. It’s going to be great. And AI6 and AI7 will follow in fast succession. AI8 will be out of this world.” In a follow-up tweet, he added: “Chip design review continues tomorrow, followed by Optimus demo review.”
Musk’s comments suggest Tesla is pushing forward at full speed with its in-house AI chip roadmap, drawing up plans all the way up to the next four generations. The company scrapped its ambitious Dojo supercomputer project earlier this year, choosing instead to redirect all of those resources toward developing the AI-series chips. The move reflects Musk’s belief that Tesla’s future dominance in self-driving, robotics, and AI training will hinge on vertically integrated hardware optimized for its specific workloads.
Back in September, Musk said AI5 will be “the best inference chip of any kind,” adding that AI6 has a real shot at being “the best AI chip by far.” During Tesla’s Q3 2025 earnings call last week, Musk claimed that AI5 will be “40X better than AI4” and deliver the best performance per dollar by a factor of ten.
Tesla is co-developing AI5 with Samsung and TSMC. The company also signed a $16.5 billion deal with Samsung to produce AI6 at the South Korean tech giant’s upcoming semiconductor fab in Taylor, Texas — a partnership Musk has said could eventually be worth significantly more.
The accelerated timeline outlined by Musk underscores Tesla’s growing ambition to become a major force in chip design, not just for its vehicles and Optimus humanoid robot, but also for AI infrastructure more broadly. With AI6, AI7, and even AI8 now on the horizon, Tesla’s AI chip roadmap appears to be moving faster than anyone expected.
