Tesla Wrap Not Showing Up

Tesla's wrap loader almost never tells you what went wrong — a rejected file simply is not in the list. This is every known failure mode, ordered by how often it turns out to be the cause. Work down the list and stop when your wrap appears.

Fast triage

Paint Shop missing or greyed out entirely? That is a software version problem — jump to check 8. Paint Shop opens but your wrap is not listed? Start at check 1. Wrap is listed but looks scrambled? Go straight to check 7.

Diagnostic checklist

Eight reasons a Tesla wrap does not appear

1

The folder is not named exactly Wraps
Most common

It must be Wraps — capital W, lowercase rest, no trailing space, no plural variations. wraps, WRAPS, Wrap and Tesla Wraps are all ignored. It must also sit at the root of the drive, not inside another folder, and your PNGs must sit directly inside it with no subfolders of their own.
2

The drive is formatted NTFS
Very common on Windows

NTFS is not supported and the car will not read the drive at all. Reformat as exFAT, FAT32, MS-DOS FAT, ext3 or ext4. exFAT is the sane default because it handles large drives and works on both Windows and macOS. Reformatting erases the drive, so copy anything you need off it first.
3

The drive also holds map or firmware update files
Easy to miss

A USB drive carrying map data or a firmware update package is treated as being for that purpose, and your Wraps folder gets ignored. Use a dedicated stick, or delete those files. Old TeslaCam and dashcam recordings on the same drive are also worth clearing while you are there.
4

You used the wrong USB port
Physical

Try the port inside the glovebox first — on most models that is the data port used for dashcam and Sentry storage, and it is the one owners most often report working. Tesla does not document which port reads wraps, so if the glovebox port does nothing, try the others in the console before assuming the file is at fault. Plug the drive in before you go looking in Paint Shop, and give the car a few seconds to read it.
5

The file breaks one of the four file rules
Silent failure

A wrap must be a PNG, no larger than 1 MB, 512x512 to 1024x1024 pixels, with a filename of 30 characters or fewer using only letters, numbers, underscores, dashes and spaces. Break any one of those and the file is skipped with no message. A .jpg renamed to .png is still a JPG and still fails.
6

An illegal character in the filename
Silent failure

Apostrophes, accented letters, emoji, brackets, commas, hashes, plus signs and slashes are all rejected. This one catches people constantly because the filename looks completely reasonable — My Car's Wrap.png fails on the apostrophe alone. Rename to My Cars Wrap.png and it appears.
7

You used the template for a different model year
Shows up, looks wrong

Tesla publishes separate templates for pre- and post-refresh Model 3 and Model Y, for Performance trims, and for Model S and Model X from 2021 onward. A wrap built on the wrong template still loads, but the UV layout does not match your car, so panels land in the wrong places. If the wrap appears but looks scrambled, this is almost always why.
8

The car or the app is not new enough
Nothing to fix but wait

Paint Shop wraps require vehicle software 2026.26, the 2026 Summer Update, which started rolling out in late July 2026. In-app upload additionally requires Tesla mobile app v4.59.0 or later. If Toybox has no Paint Shop entry, or the app has no Creations section, you are waiting on a release, not doing anything wrong.

Why the failures are silent

Tesla's loader validates the file, and if validation fails it stops. There is no error toast, no log you can read on the touchscreen, and no indication of which rule was broken. From the driver's seat, a 1.2 MB PNG, a JPG with the wrong extension, and a filename with an apostrophe in it all produce the same symptom: nothing.

That is why the order above matters. Rather than guessing, change one thing, re-insert the drive, and re-open the list. If you change three things at once and it works, you have learned nothing for next time.

A known-good test file

When you are several changes deep and unsure whether the problem is the transfer or the artwork, take the variable out. Put a single file on a freshly formatted exFAT drive:

The official template for your model, unmodified, or a flat block of colour at the template's exact dimensions.
Named Test Wrap.png — nine characters, all legal.
In a folder called Wraps at the root, and nothing else on the drive.

If that appears, the transfer path is fine and the problem is in your file. If it does not, the problem is the drive, the folder or the port, and nothing you do to the artwork will help. The Tesla wrap maker exports exactly this kind of known-good file — right dimensions, PNG, filename already sanitised to Tesla's character rules.

"Greyed out" is a different problem

People search for "Tesla wrap greyed out" and get file-format advice, which never helps. A greyed-out or entirely absent Paint Shop entry means the vehicle does not have the feature enabled, not that your file is malformed. Check Controls → Software for 2026.26 or later, and make sure the car is in Park — Tesla gates a lot of Toybox interactions on the vehicle being stationary. Vehicles on older builds have nothing to fix; they are waiting for the update.

When the wrap loads but looks wrong

This is not a detection failure at all, and it is worth separating out. If your artwork appears in the list and applies, but the design lands across the wrong panels, is mirrored where you did not expect, or gets cut off, you built on a template that does not match your car. Tesla ships separate templates for the pre-refresh and post-refresh Model 3 and Model Y, for Performance trims, and for the Cybertruck — whose template is 1024x768 rather than square. The full dimension table lists all 12, and the template guide explains how the UV layout works so you can predict where a design will land before you upload it.

Still stuck

Two last things worth trying. Re-seat the drive: pull it out, wait a few seconds, plug it back into the glovebox port, then re-open Toybox → Paint Shop → Wraps. And if the list looks stale rather than empty, perform a touchscreen reset — hold both scroll wheels on the steering wheel until the display goes black, with the car in Park. Neither is a fix so much as a way to rule out a stale read before you go back to changing files. The full upload procedure, in both directions, is in how to upload a Tesla wrap.

Keep going

Related guides & tools

How to Upload a Tesla Wrap The app flow start to finish, plus the full USB procedure. Tesla Wrap Size & Dimensions The exact file rules a silent failure is usually breaking. Tesla Wrap Maker Rebuild on the correct template and export a valid PNG. Tesla Wrap Template Guide What the UV atlas looks like, and why the wrong template scrambles panels. Which Teslas Support Custom Wraps Hardware and software requirements, and the models with no official template. Tesla Paint Shop Where wraps live on the touchscreen, and why the menu is greyed out.

FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is my Tesla wrap not showing up in Paint Shop?

In order of likelihood: the USB folder is not named exactly Wraps at the drive root; the drive is formatted NTFS, which Tesla does not support; the drive also contains map or firmware files; you used a port other than the glovebox one; or the PNG breaks the size, format, or filename rules and was skipped silently.

Why is the Wraps folder not detected?

Two causes account for nearly all of it. The folder name must be exactly Wraps with a capital W and must sit at the root of the drive. And the drive must be exFAT, FAT32, MS-DOS FAT, ext3 or ext4 — NTFS drives are not read at all, which is what usually bites Windows users.

Why is Paint Shop greyed out or missing?

A greyed-out or absent Paint Shop entry is a software-version problem, not a file problem. The feature needs vehicle software 2026.26 or later. Check Controls → Software on the touchscreen. It also has to be safe to change: park the car and put it in Park before expecting the option to be selectable.

My wrap loads but looks stretched or lands on the wrong panels. Why?

You built it on the wrong template. Each model and refresh has its own UV layout, and the Cybertruck template is 1024x768 rather than square. Rebuild on the exact template for your vehicle at its native dimensions.

Do I need to restart the car after adding wraps?

Usually not — plug the drive into the glovebox port and open Toybox → Paint Shop → Wraps. If the list still looks stale after re-inserting the drive, a touchscreen reset (hold both scroll wheels until the screen goes black, with the car in Park) is the standard next step.

Does deleting a wrap from USB remove it from the car?

USB wraps are read from the drive, so removing the file and re-inserting the drive removes it from that list. Wraps uploaded from the mobile app live in the car's own pool of 10 and are managed from the app, independently of anything on USB.

WhatsMyTools is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Tesla, Inc. Tesla, Model 3, Model S, Model X, Model Y and Cybertruck are trademarks of Tesla, Inc.