Tesla starts Megapack 3 production at 50 GWh Brookshire plant
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- Tesla started Megapack 3 production at its new Brookshire, Texas Megafactory, reaching first units 16 months after groundbreaking with 50 GWh/year designed capacity dedicated to the new product.
- Megapack 3 stores roughly 5 MWh per unit — about 28% more than the 3.9 MWh Megapack 2 XL — in the same footprint, achieved via larger 2.8-liter cells and a 78% reduction in thermal-system connection points.
- The Megablock bundles up to four Megapack 3 units (about 20 MWh) with the transformer and switchgear pre-wired at the factory, enabling 248 MWh per acre and 1 GWh deployment in 20 business days, roughly 23% faster than current approaches.
- Tesla signed a $5 billion, 25 GWh Megapack deal with NatPower in Europe, with data-center operators buying storage as fast as Tesla can build it.
- Brookshire is Tesla's third Megafactory after Lathrop, California and Shanghai, built specifically to add capacity against intensifying competition from CATL, Fluence, and BYD.
- Tesla's energy business is already reporting lower gross margins from high tariffs on imported LFP cells, and the company's own cell production falls well short of the 50 GWh Brookshire target.
Why it matters: The Megablock's factory-pre-wired design attacks the real bottleneck in grid storage — slow, expensive on-site interconnection and wiring — rather than just chasing bigger cells. But Tesla's tariff-driven margin squeeze on LFP imports and a still-insufficient domestic cell supply leave the 50 GWh Brookshire output running through suppliers and trade policy Tesla doesn't fully control.
