Waymo’s Autonomous Taxis Are Coming To Five More U.S. Cities

• Alphabet-owned Waymo said it will remove safety operators from its robotaxis in five American cities.
• The move has already happened in Miami, with four more cities to follow in the coming weeks.
• After it’s all said and done, Waymo will offer paid autonomous rides next year.

Waymo will expand its driverless taxi service in five more American cities starting next year, the company said in a blog post.

The Alphabet-owned robotaxi operator–the largest in the United States–has already removed safety operators from its cars in Miami and is now giving rides to employees. Over the following weeks, the same will happen in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Orlando, ahead of rolling out paid rides in vehicles with nobody inside in 2026.

Waymo taxi in Atlanta

Photo by: Uber

Waymo already operates in the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Atlanta and Austin, but the company’s expansion plans don’t end here, as it plans to add another 12 cities under its belt, including the United Kingdom’s capital, London.

The expansion plans come after a big milestone for the Alphabet-owned entity: offering paid rides on highways in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Phoenix.

Waymo claims its autonomous driving suite has over 100 million miles of real-world driving experience through all sorts of situations. In its blog post, the robotaxi operator sounds very confident in the technology it has developed: “We haven’t just built the technology; we’ve developed the definitive playbook for operating autonomous fleets, across dozens of sites, and industry-leading end-to-end rider support.”

There’s no denying that Waymo has the high ground here, and it knows it, but the American autonomous taxi space has changed dramatically in the last decade. Alphabet’s robotaxi company is facing increasing competition from Amazon-owned Zoox, which recently announced it will offer free rides in its purpose-built pods in San Francisco, in addition to Las Vegas. (Zoox also has the country’s first bespoke AV factory.)

Zoox robotaxi in San Francisco

Photo by: Zoox

Tesla is also gearing up to expand its Robotaxi service. After debuting in Austin earlier this year, the Elon Musk-led robotics and AI company received a ride-hailing permit from the state of Arizona, which allows it to offer paid rides in driverless cars. (Tesla also has a small-scale service in San Francisco, where Tesla employees drive Model Y EVs.)

What’s more, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) opened an investigation last month, after a Waymo robotaxi was spotted driving around a school bus that had its red lights flashing. The federal body’s Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) said it will investigate the performance of Waymo’s self-driving software around stopped school buses.

We want your opinion!

What would you like to see on Insideevs.com?

Take our 3 minute survey.

– The InsideEVs team