10 Tesla Features Most Owners Have Never Turned On

You've had the car for months. Maybe years. You know how to drive it, charge it, and impress your friends with Autopilot. But there's a whole layer of stuff sitting inside your Tesla that most owners never find — not because it's hidden exactly, but because Tesla doesn't exactly hand you a pamphlet.

Here are 10 features worth knowing about.

1. Scheduled Departure

Most people set a charge timer. Scheduled Departure is smarter.

Instead of telling your car when to charge, you tell it when you need to leave — and it figures out the rest. It'll time the charge to finish right before departure, pre-condition the cabin & battery for the temperature outside, and make sure everything's ready when you walk out the door.

Find it in the charging settings. Swap your charge timer for this.

You'll wonder why you didn't do it sooner.

2. Exclude Home & Work from Sentry Mode

Sentry Mode is great. Running it in your own garage all night - not so great for your battery.

Go to Controls → Safety → Sentry Mode and turn on "Exclude Home," "Exclude Work," and "Exclude Favourites." Your car stays awake & recording everywhere else, but stops burning energy watching the inside of your garage at 3am. Easy win. Do this today.

3. Valet Mode

Handing your keys to a parking attendant? A mechanic? Your teenager?

Valet Mode restricts the car to a set speed, locks out personal data, disables the glovebox, and limits access to settings. It's a PIN-protected lockdown — so whoever's driving can drive, but can't snoop or mash the accelerator into the stratosphere.

Controls → Safety → Valet Mode. Set your PIN & hand them the keys without the anxiety.

4. Trunk Height Memory

This one blew a lot of people's minds when they found it.

If you park in a garage with a low ceiling, your Tesla will remember that location & automatically stop the trunk from opening all the way — so it doesn't slam into your roof rack or ceiling every single time.

You don't configure this. It just... learns (?) Open the trunk, lower it to a safe height manually, and the car saves it for that GPS location. That's it.

5. Camp Mode

Planning a road trip with an overnight stop? Or just taking a nap in a parking lot like a road trip veteran?

Camp Mode keeps your climate system running, the lights on at a low level, and the outlets powered — all while you're parked. It won't lock you in or trigger alerts. The car just stays on, comfortably, while you sleep.

Climate → Fan icon → Camp Mode. Pair it with a decent blanket & you'll never pay for a motel between Toronto & Halifax again.

6. Dog Mode

If you've ever left your dog in the car & come back to someone leaving you a passive-aggressive note on the windshield, Dog Mode is for you.

It keeps the cabin at a comfortable temperature & displays a big message on the screen: "My owner will be back soon. Don't worry — I'm comfortable." The current temperature is also shown. No frantic bystanders. No broken windows.

Climate → Fan icon → Dog Mode. Works the same way as Camp Mode, just with better PR lol.

7. Energy App — The Good Parts

Most people glance at the energy meter when they're curious about range (or mad about how fast its running out!!).

But the Energy app actually tells you why your range looks the way it does.

Tap the graph & it breaks down energy use by category — climate, speed, hills, driving style. It'll show you what you're spending your kilowatts on in real time. On a long drive, this is incredibly useful for making small adjustments that actually matter.

Worth opening at least once just to understand what's costing you the most range.

8. Autopilot Visualization Settings

Autopilot shows you what the car "sees" on the main display.

But you can expand that view significantly.

Go to Controls → Autopilot → Autopilot Visualizations and turn on "Full Visualization." You'll see lane lines, detected objects, traffic cones, and more — not just the road ahead, but the full picture the car is building around you. It's genuinely interesting to watch, and gives you a much better sense of what Autopilot is actually doing.

9. Remote Cabin Preconditioning

You knew you could pre-heat or pre-cool the car from the app. But did you know you can schedule it?

In the Tesla app, go to Climate → Schedule and set a time. Your car will start warming up or cooling down automatically — no phone interaction needed. For Canadian winters especially, walking into a pre-warmed car at -15°C feels like a superpower.

Set it. Forget it. Never sit in a freezing car again.

10. Glovebox PIN Protection

The glovebox on a Tesla is electronically locked. Most people don't realize you can add a separate PIN to it — independent from Valet Mode.

This means if someone gets into your car (Sentry Mode footage, valet, anyone), they still can't open the glovebox without the PIN. Great for keeping documents, a spare key card, or anything else you'd rather keep private.

Controls → Safety → Glovebox PIN. Set it up in about 30 seconds.

Bonus: The Toybox

Not exactly a secret - but if you've never opened Controls → Toybox, do it now. You'll find things like a fully working Atari game emulator, a sketch pad, fart sounds, a "romance mode" with a crackling fireplace, & a few other things that make you wonder what the Tesla software team is doing on Friday afternoons.

It's useless. It's delightful. You're welcome.

Know a feature that didn't make the list? Submit it!

If enough owners haven't heard of it, we'll add it to the next update.