Tesla Camping - Everything You Need to Know

Camping in your Tesla can be different than camping in any other car, for example a Prius or a truck. There are many luxuries when using a Tesla such as setting the AC at the exact temperature that you like and maintaining it throughout the night without any harmful carbon monoxide emissions. Also, it has its own security system and cameras to monitor the surrounding area while you sleep. If you’re thinking about camping with your Tesla, read on to learn some useful tips on how you can do so effectively.

Charging

It's highly advised to camp at a site with electric hookups. Instead of range loss from running the HVAC system all night, you can wake up to a full charge. RV sites, state parks, and national parks with 50 amp or 30 amp hookups should work with your Tesla if you have the proper adapter. Use the official Tesla website to check out what exact adapters you would need. To connect to a 240 V/50 amp outlet, you will need a 14-50 adapter. A 14-50 outlet looks like this:

To connect to a 120 V/30 amp outlet, you also need a 10-30 AKA a TT30P adapter (Tesla doesn’t make this adapter so you would have to buy a third party product that specifically says it’s for Teslas). A TT30P compatible outlet looks like this:

Be aware that you may have to set your Tesla charging limit to 24 amps when utilizing these adapters and outlets.

If you plan a trip that will rely on charging at an RV park, call ahead to reserve a spot. When calling an RV park, confirm they have a spare space with 50 amp service you can use and make sure their outlets are compatible with your adapter.

Be very careful if you are arriving at your camping destination after dark. While Teslas are smaller than RVs, there can still be dirt roads, rocks, hills, tight spaces, trees, fences that may take some careful maneuvering around. Be careful of ground clearance and protect your battery packs.

An excellent resource to find not just campsite/park charging locations but all charging locations is plugshare.com.

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Sleeping in Your Tesla

Here's the cornerstone when it comes to camping in your Tesla: Sleep.

Set a “Camping” profile so that your seat positions and temperature can be situated for the best sleeping conditions. Moving the front seats up will free up some extra space for you taller folk.

Remove all the contents in your trunk and back seat and fold the back seats all the way down. When the back seats are folded down, there will be a downward slope towards the trunk as the folded back seats will not be completely parallel with the floor.

Get a twin-size camping pad to serve as the foundation to your bed. A Tescamp mattress is a good choice. This will definitely feel better than an air mattress and will fit much better as well.

Tesmat makes a privacy screen that you can use to cover the windows while you sleep.

In all the models, a twin-sized mattress will fit in the back and can sleep 2 people although somewhat snuggly. Apparently, Model S and X vehicles can also fit a queen size mattress pad. YMMV. People that are about 5 feet 9 inches tall will fit with no problem in the Model 3 and Y. Many people have reviewed sleeping in their Teslas and have claimed it to have sufficient space so unless you're built like an NFL linebacker or NBA basketball player, you'll have no problem.

A few things to remember:

• Remember to turn on the lower vents for when you're sleeping, you don't want it blowing down your neck at night (unless you do).
• If you aren’t plugged in overnight, expect to get 10-30% reduction in your range depending on your AC settings and other usage.
• If you have more than 2 people trying to camp, people have attached tents to the back of the car with the trunk open. That way the climate control can condition the tent as well as the car while 2 people sleep in the Tesla and the rest in the tent.
• A great resource to find free camping spots is freecampsites.net.

Camp Mode

You’ll find this mode in your HVAC settings. It does a lot more than just keeping your AC on depending if someone is in the vehicle or not. It disables auto-lock so you can get in and out of your vehicle more easily so when you’re back inside ready to sleep, be sure to lock your vehicle manually with the Tesla app. Camp mode also disables sentry mode so you’re not constantly triggering it when walking around the car (you actually can’t turn it on manually either in camp mode). And it keeps all of your USB ports powered so you can charge your mobile devices while you sleep. Camp mode also turns the car off if the charge gets to 20%.

The software release for Camp mode states: “Your car can now maintain airflow, temperature, interior lighting, as well as play music, and power devices when Camp Mode is enabled. To enable Camp Mode, tap the fan icon at the bottom of the touchscreen and set Keep Climate On to CAMP while your car is in PARK. Big batteries rock.”

Camp Mode was released with the 2019.40.50 Software Update in late December 2019.

Benefits

Camping in your Tesla will give you the freedom to move around whenever you want and not have to be subject to hotel reservations.

Car camping in general saves you money. It doesn’t have to be in a Tesla. Not paying for a place to sleep means more money in your pocket that you can use to travel with.

If you’ve chosen a campsite with charging available, you’ll wake up with more range than you went to sleep with.

Tesla Camping Destinations

A great way to figure out what parks or campgrounds are suitable for charging your Tesla is to utilize plugshare.com. Filter the search results using only the “Nema 14-50” charging plug.

This will show you where RV compatible outlets are and with your 14-50 adapter, you can charge here as well.

A good resource for finding RV campgrounds is RVParky.com. Although you can’t specifically filter by 14-50 outlets, there’s a “50 Amp” label in the search results that can help you crosscheck with plugshare.com.

While, theoretically, all RV campgrounds with the 14-50 outlets can accommodate Tesla vehicles, here are some locations people from the Tesla camping community and Tesla forums have actually visited and charged:

• Mount Shasta, Lake Siskiyou Camp-Resort
• Carlsbad, New Mexico Kampgrounds of America
• Disney’s Fort Wilderness, Orlando, FL.

If you don't need an RV hookup and are looking to camp where ever possible, check out the "Where to Park and Sleep" section of our Prius camping blog post.

Conclusion

Hopefully this article was helpful for you in figuring out the details to camping in your Tesla. With the amenities that come with owning a Tesla vehicle, you can do some pre-planning to find electric hookups and prepare your sleeping area to maximize your camping comfort.

If you are looking to plan future vacations (camping or not), do try out the Blue Planit tool! Let us know what you think. Thanks.

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