Tesla Updates Car Safety Tracker: Can Speeding At Night Hurt Your Score? Yes It Can

Tesla TSLA has a new version of its safety system that's designed to evaluate driving behavior.

The Safety Score Beta aims to provide drivers with feedback, while also encouraging safer driving habits and lower insurance costs. Among the updates:

• Excessive Speeding: More time spent driving over 85 mph results in a lower Safety Score.
• Unbuckled Driving: Drivers are penalized for spending time driving over 10 mph without fastening their seat belt.
• Late Night Driving: This has been updated to be risk-weighted based on the time spent driving between 10 PM and 4 AM, with the impact on the Safety Score reduced earlier in the night and increased later in the night.
• The Hard Braking Safety Factor: Revised to exclude braking events that occur when the vehicle detects a yellow traffic light.

The Safety Factors are measured directly by Tesla vehicles, utilizing the onboard sensors and Autopilot software. These factors are Forward Collision Warning, Hard Braking, Aggressive Turning, Unsafe Following, Excessive Speeding, Late Night Driving, Forced Autopilot Disengagement, and Unbuckled Driving. Each factor contributes to the overall Safety Score, which is calculated on a scale from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating safer driving.

Tesla's launch of the Safety Score 2.0 allows drivers to make the necessary adjustments to improve their Safety Scores and, in turn, reduce the risk of collisions. As Tesla gathers more customer data and insights, the company expects to make further refinements to the formula in the future.

Photo courtesy of Tesla