Tesla Model S Deliveries Start One Month Early

Arguably the most successful startup company to build and sell electric vehicles, Tesla is beginning delivery of its second car today: the Model S sedan.

Official confirmation by the automaker has yet to be released, but Ward’s Auto tweeted that delivery is beginning today to customers out of its Fremont, Calif. factory. According to the company’s website, delivery of the EV isn’t slated to start until a month from now, but for at least a few people that date seems to have been ignored.

With its latest entrant, the brand offers a more practical and easier-to-sell car that costs less and competes more directly with luxury cars like the Audi A6 and BMW 5 Series. Priced between $50,000 and $60,000, it costs roughly half as much as the Roadster, which while offering a unique experience, is entirely impractical.

The Model S, on the other hand, offers better range than anything else on the market today. Recently released charts from Tesla show that drivers will probably enjoy somewhere between 250 and 350 miles on a full charge, which shames the 100-mile industry average set by cars like the Nissan Leaf.

If you can forget about the widely different price tags, the closest competitor would be the Ford Focus EV because it’s also a sedan. That being said, Ford’s EV only gets about 75 miles per charge, so it’s really not much of a comparison.

If it manages to get a positive reception from the public, the Model S could be a good example of how Tesla is pushing technological boundaries ahead of the industry. It’s not so surprising, though, when you realize that today marks the launch of CEO Elon Musk’s SpaceX commercial cargo space craft. If the man behind the Tesla Roadster and Model S can successfully orchestrate a space delivery, what’s a few electric cars?