September 9, 2026
Why every website suddenly got bigger in your Tesla
The summer update changed the in-car browser's pixel density, and there is no zoom control
If the web in your Tesla suddenly looks bigger, you did not change a setting by mistake. The browser changed, and every website is affected.
What happened
The summer update modernised the in-car browser: a recent Chromium engine, bookmark syncing, full-screen video. Along with it, one invisible value changed, and it explains everything.
A browser tells websites its pixel density, which says how many physical pixels draw one layout point. On the Tesla, it went from 1.0 to 1.53.
In practice the screen still shows the same physical pixels, but it no longer describes itself as 1183 points wide: it now announces 773. Everything drawn on it therefore takes about 53% more room, and every site believes it is rendering on a narrower display.
That is why this is not an iCar problem. A news site drops from four columns to two, a map shows less street, a table overflows. Nobody broke anything: the pages do exactly what they were told, on a screen that now describes itself differently.
And there is no zoom
That is what makes it awkward. On a computer you fix this in a second. The Tesla browser offers no zoom control: no menu, no keyboard shortcut, no pinch. A site that is too big stays too big.
So the fix cannot come from the driver. It has to come from the site.
What we did
Our bookmark tiles were 160 pixels, a value written in stone back when the screen announced 1183 points of width. After the update, the same row showed four of them instead of six.
We changed the method rather than the number. A row in iCar now shows a number of tiles, not tiles of a given size: each tile is derived from the space actually available. The grid adapts on its own to whatever display it is given, today and at Tesla’s next update.
The result on the current screen: six tiles per row, as before, with a tile that physically measures 155 pixels against 160 previously. You get the screen you had back.
And you choose the size
We took the opportunity to add the setting the browser is missing. In Dashboard, below the main colour, a Display size control offers three steps:
| Setting | Tiles per row |
|---|---|
| Small | 7 |
| Normal | 6 |
| Large | 5 |
“Normal” is the default and restores the pre-update screen. “Small” genuinely goes further than what you had, for anyone who wants everything at a glance. “Large” gives bigger targets, which matters while driving.
The setting belongs to the screen, not the account: two Teslas can have two sizes, and it is always the display in front of you that you are correcting. And it is not behind the subscription: readability on a car screen is not something we sell.
What to take away
- Your Tesla did not break anything, it changed how it describes itself to websites.
- Every site is affected, and no zoom control exists to correct it.
- iCar has its six tiles per row back, and lets you ask for seven or five.
If your car screen still feels wrong, the control is two taps away. And if you do not have a home screen in your Tesla yet, geticar.com/app opens in the car’s browser with nothing to install.