Before you put real miles on a new Model 3 or Model Y, a handful of setup steps make the first week noticeably smoother — most take only a few minutes each.
Get your phone key working first
Start with the Tesla app and your phone key, and keep the physical key card with you until you’ve tested the phone key a few times, according to a new-owner setup guide. The phone key is what unlocks and starts the car day to day, but it depends on Bluetooth and background app permissions being set correctly — worth confirming before you’re standing in a parking lot relying on it.
Set up a driver profile
A driver profile saves your seat position, mirrors, steering wheel, and climate and display preferences, then links to your phone key or key card so the car loads them automatically. It matters more the moment a second person — a partner, a housemate — starts driving the same car regularly, since profiles switch automatically based on whichever key walks up.
Pair Bluetooth separately for calls and media
Phone key and media pairing are two different things. Getting your phone recognized as a key doesn’t automatically connect it for calls, contacts, or audio streaming — that’s a separate Bluetooth pairing in the car’s settings, and it’s easy to assume one covers the other.
Sort out home charging before you need it
Check your outlet type, your electrical panel’s spare capacity, and how far your parking spot is from an outlet before you assume you’ll just plug in and go. Whether a Mobile Connector on a regular household outlet is enough, or you need a dedicated Level 2 charger, comes down to how many miles you actually drive each day.
Ryan Shaw walks through his own approach to setting up a new Model 3 or Model Y in a recent video on his channel:
Shaw’s video reflects one owner’s personal setup routine and preferences, not an official Tesla checklist — treat the general order of steps as a useful starting point, and confirm anything specific to your situation, like charging equipment or current app features, against Tesla’s own app and support pages.
Photo by Antoni Shkraba.
Tags