On Saturday, Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) lowered the price of its Full Self-Driving (FSD) driving assistance software in the United States from $12,000 to $8,000, with CEO Elon Musk reaffirming his commitment to autonomous driving technology.

He is betting on this technology to become a major source of revenue for the world's most valuable car manufacturer. However, despite years of striving, the technology has yet to achieve its goal of fully autonomous driving and is instead facing increasing regulatory and legal scrutiny.

Earlier this month, Musk announced that Tesla would launch its robotaxi service on August 8th, abandoning the previously reported low-cost mass-market car model in favor of supporting robotaxi services, as reported by Reuters. Subsequently, Tesla reduced the monthly subscription price for this feature in the United States from $199 to $99.

In 2023, Musk stated that the price of FSD, which was priced at $15,000 at the time, was very low, indicating that its value would increase significantly if cars achieved autonomous driving.

Tesla refers to its driving assistance features as Autopilot or FSD, but states that these features do not make its vehicles fully autonomous and still require active supervision by the driver.

Tesla has also reduced the prices of its car lineup in major markets. Faced with challenges of declining sales and intensifying price wars in the electric vehicle market, Tesla has lowered prices by nearly $2,000 on its entire product range in China, echoing adjustments made in the United States.