- An artist has imagined Tesla’s Model 3 with the facelifted Model Y Juniper’s new look.
- Full-width front and rear light bars make the sedan look wider, lower and more modern.
- Tesla facelifted the Model 3 in late 2023 but that didn’t stop sales falling during 2024.
The Tesla Model Y is far and away America’s most popular electric vehicle and at the start of this year the automaker unveiled a facelifted Model Y, codenamed ‘Juniper’ with a very different look and some important changes on the inside. Most people seem to think the update was a success, so should Tesla roll out the same changes to the Model 3 sedan?
We’re helped in answering that question by a series of renders from independent artist Sugar Design that show how the four-door EV would look with its SUV brother’s new nose and tail.
Related: At $59,990, New 2025 Tesla Model Y Juniper Launch Series Is $4K Cheaper Than The Old One
Tesla already facelifted the Model 3 in late 2023, giving the sedan slimmer headlights and a sleeker, more rounded, nose. The Model 3 had been on sale for six years by this point, so it was ripe for some botox, but the tweaks couldn’t prevent sales falling. The ‘Highland’ Model 3 went on sale in the US midway through 2024 (it debuted earlier in China and Europe), but America deliveries for the year dropped 17.4 percent to 189,903.
There are plenty of reasons for that, including the late arrival of the updated car (and public knowledge that it was coming), a general decline in the popularity of sedans and more competition from legacy automakers. But you have to wonder whether potential customers weren’t left disappointed by the minimal changes Tesla made to the interior and exterior design, and alarmed by one specific interior ‘advance.’
You’ll have your own opinion about the Highland front end, but ours is that it made the Model 3 look sleeker, but blander. True, transverse front light bars are everywhere these days, but we think Sugar Design’s renderings prove applying the Juniper look to the front end of the sedan would be a big improvement. In fact, the design works better on the 3 than on the Y. We like the new rear-end design too, which makes the Model 3 look wider, lower and sportier.
There is also one big Juniper feature that you can’t see in these renders, but which Tesla urgently needs to introduce to the Model 3 regardless of what it decides to do with the head- and taillights. That’s the turn signal control, which was relocated to the steering wheel during the Highland update. Having listened to criticism Tesla has retained an old-fashioned turn-signal stalk for the Model Y.
Based on these images do you think Tesla should use the Model Y’s tricks on the Model 3? Drop a comment below and let us know.
