After a highly anticipated multi-steps reservation process starting with Tesla and SpaceX employees, followed by in-store reservations, which created long queues at Tesla’s retail locations, and finally online reservations just an hour before the unveiling, Tesla finally launched the Model 3 – its first mass market electric vehicle.

All those reservations were sight-unseen and yet, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that the company already had a staggering 115,000 Model 3 reservations with deposits and they are still coming in. At a base price of $35,000, it represent a future backlog of orders worth over $4 billion.

Update: now up to 129,000 132,000 150,000 reservations after the unveil. Tesla had about 100,000 reservations sight-unseen and 50,000 mores by the end of the event in Hawthorne./

In comparison, it took the company years to get just 20,000 reservations for the Model S and X. It shows how much credibility the automaker gained over the past few years. Of course, the deposit amount is also a lot smaller than it was first Tesla’s second generation cars – $1,000 vs $5,000.

The fact that so many reservations came in without the car being unveiled proves the incredible demand for a long-range all-electric and relatively affordable car.

Now that the Model 3 has been unveiled, there’s no telling how many more reservations it will get until it finally hit the market in late-2017. Especially since it looks bad-ass. Full post with a gallery and specs coming.

Update: Tesla Model 3: everything we know after the unveil, safety, range, charging [Gallery + Video]

Model 3 prototype interior

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