While I think Tesla was/is an important pioneer in the EV business (cars and charging network), I would not consider buying a Tesla. Mostly, I think Tesla promises features that don't work well an don't work safely. While there are plenty of great technical innovations, are the products ready for general deployment? FSD being a good example. Tesla's build-quality is generally poor.
A decade ago, I couldn't imagine my next car not being a Tesla. More recently, I didn't think it was likely that I would buy one. For now, they fill in holes that are not met by competitors still getting their lineups up to speed. Lucid will have compelling competition across the board, but for someone who wants something today, it's fine if they want a sedan.
I didn't find their build quality to be worse than Lucid's. I got cars from both with little things that needed to be fixed, and nothing that was a major inconvenience. Tesla tended to take cars that should have been sent for rework and delivered them to customers to meet delivery numbers. Other companies fix those sorts of things before the cars go out. In both cases they likely come off the assembly line with a similar number of problems but Tesla muddied its reputation. I haven't had long terms with any Tesla after the warranty ran out.
In contrast, Lucid is more "conservative". Lucid's ADAS/DDPro vision promised a lot of capabilities, charged a lot of $$ for the features, and is/was way behind the industry baseline in delivering. Until 2.4.2 update, Lucid's ADSD features were about the same as my 2017 Lexus RX450H.
It was nice getting ADAS features that worked off the bat rather than needing refining over time, but it would have been nice to have started off with the features in this latest update at minimum. Lucid has lost sales because of it. With Tesla, I got a lot of features that were shaky when they came out, but the alternative would have been not to get them at all and to have needed to trade in my car for a later model year, if they had done what the competition had been doing.
All in all, it meant having features that I didn't have to use if I didn't want to, or could use as is and watch them get refined. FSD/Enhanced Autopilot was an exception, in that with other features, I got things that hadn't been promised in the first place. The EA features came at a pace that I considered reasonable. FSD wasn't even close. Lucid didn't promise specifics although people reasonably expected what's in the latest software release, with more to come. And Lucid isn't missing deadlines because they don't give aspirational dates in the first place.
Aside from ADAS, Lucid generally suffers from a lack of quality control on their SW and even worse, lack of communication in their bug fixes and new features deployment. More than 2 years after introducing the Lucid Air, it is still unclear to me when/if Lidar will benefit the Lucid. It appears to be a systemic issue at Lucid.
Lidar is there, and I've seen the effects of it not working, and of getting functionality back after they replaced faulty Lidar. In terms of benefits, I can't say, because what I have currently can be done without it. But it's definitely being used.
When my friends ask my opinion on my Lucid, I'd say, it is a great mechanical car but the SW is sub-par.
It's a work in progress. Seeing Tesla getting things wrong with the drop down for Homelink, watching them refine it over a decade, and then getting a Lucid that goes back to square one even though the competition solved it is disappointing.
I had a 2006 car with a navigator that saved previous addresses, but didn't let me give names to entries in the address book, which was frustrating. Going back to that 18 years later is more frustrating. I have addresses in my history, don't necessarily know what's at the addresses, and it wasn't a problem a decade ago.
On the other hand, Lucid got a lot more right than wrong, including things that other companies get wrong.
I am waiting with baited-breath on Tesla's upcoming mega event in October RE: robo-taxi. This is supposed to be a game changer for Tesla and for the industry. I hope it is not just FSD without an operator.
I'm not expecting anything to be announced that's production ready.
