Lucid Plans To Beat Tesla At Self-Driving Cars—With Nvidia

Lucid Motors wants to be the first automaker to sell you a Waymo-grade self-driving car. But it’s not going it alone. That audacious bet on what it calls “hands-off, eyes-off, mind-off” autonomy rests on a wide-ranging partnership to use self-driving hardware and software from Nvidia. 

The electric vehicle startup announced today that it will incorporate the chipmaker’s Drive AGX Thor computers, DriveOS operating system and Drive AV autonomous software in its upcoming lineup of midsize EVs, which start launching in late 2026. Lucid says that Nvidia technology should deliver Level 4 autonomous driving—meaning, full autonomy with no interventions—to personal vehicles. That’s a holy grail that car companies have dreamed about for decades but haven’t made a reality. 

“Together with Lucid, we’re accelerating the future of autonomous, AI-powered transportation, built on Nvidia’s full-stack automotive platform,” Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang said in a statement. 

Lucid’s Big Bet On Nvidia

The Nvidia-powered overhaul of Lucid’s driver-assistance tech will start with Level 2 eyes-on, point-to-point driving features, much like what Tesla offers today through its Full Self-Driving (Supervised) suite.

The system should allow drivers to put in a destination and have the car navigate itself there, under full supervision. That will be available in the midsize model at launch and should hit the new Gravity SUV around the end of 2026, a Lucid spokesperson said. 

The Gravity’s hardware will remain as is. It’s just getting new Nvidia software.

The midsize lineup, however, will benefit from two Drive AGX Thor computers and Nvidia’s “multi-sensor suite architecture,” which includes lidar, radar and cameras. Lucid plans to upgrade the midsize model’s capability to Level 4 over “a couple of years” after launch, spokesperson Justin Berkowitz said.

Level 4 technology, as defined by SAE, refers to a car that can drive itself without human supervision under specific conditions. Waymo’s taxis, for example, are Level 4 because they only work in specific places. A theoretical Level 5 car would be able to drive anywhere, anytime, rain or shine. 

Lucid’s lower-cost midsize vehicles were already critical to the company’s growth and survival—the Tesla Model Y moment Lucid needs after launching the dazzling but expensive and low-volume Air and Gravity. Now Lucid’s lofty ambitions around self-driving hinge on the next-generation models too. 

The Nvidia partnership can be seen as a strategic shift. Lucid’s advanced driver-assistance system, DreamDrive, has always been a home-brewed affair. And it was recently upgraded this summer to offer hands-free highway driving. Now the company is leaning on outside hardware and software to take its driver-assistance features to the next level. The decision had to do with quickly getting to higher levels of autonomy, Berkowitz said.

Dude, Where’s My Self-Driving Car?

Many carmakers are working toward the tantalizing goal of a personally owned car that can drive you from your garage to work as you catch up on emails or take a nap. Approaches vary across the industry, but none have fully cracked the code. 

Mercedes-Benz offers the closest thing to a self-driving car you can buy. Its Level 3 Drive Pilot system can automate highway driving without active driver attention. It only works at low speeds, in traffic, at certain times and on certain highways in Nevada and California. 

Ford has a subsidiary called Latitude AI that is working on eyes-off, hands-off systems to build on its BlueCruise system. General Motors this month said that eyes-off Super Cruise, aided by a new lidar sensor, would hit the Cadillac Escalade in 2028, before expanding to off-highway roads. Last year, it announced it would use Nvidia chips for personal autonomous vehicles, but stopped short of saying it would use Nvidia’s full-stack solution like Lucid plans to.

Toyota and Waymo announced a potential partnership this year to develop “a new autonomous vehicle platform,” but we don’t know what exactly that will yield, if anything. Rivian has made in-house autonomous driving development increasingly central to its mission. It now aims to launch eyes-off driving in 2026, eventually taking that to more and more environments. And a new car startup called Tensor came out of basically nowhere in August, claiming to be the first company that will sell you a “robocar.”

Of course, Tesla has promised that its $8,000 Full Self-Driving system would live up to its name for years. It began offering driverless rides through a robotaxi service in Austin in June, a big step forward. 

It’s not yet clear which company will be first here. But the reward for the winner—the company that can navigate the technological, regulatory and legal hurdles and deliver a self-driving car to your driveway—will be huge. 

Got a tip? Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com