Uber is one step closer to letting customers hail a self-driving vehicle in Austin, Texas, through its app. The company on Wednesday opened up its interest list so that curious riders can declare their interest in potentially being matched with a Waymo robotaxi, once that partnership launches “soon” in Austin.
In September, Uber and Waymo, the self-driving arm of Google’s parent company Alphabet, announced the expansion of their partnership into Austin and Atlanta, after having already teamed up in Phoenix the year before.
In October, Waymo began allowing a “limited number of early riders” in Austin to hail a robotaxi via its own Waymo One app, noting this was a stepping stone to its commercial launch with Uber in early 2025.
Now it appears Waymo and Uber are one step closer to that official launch. As part of the partnership, Uber will manage tasks like vehicle cleaning and repair, while “Waymo will continue to be responsible for the testing and operation of the Waymo Driver, including roadside assistance and certain rider support functions,” the companies said in a previous statement. (In Atlanta, Waymo has said public riders can catch a driverless ride via the Uber app starting sometime this year.)
See also: Waymo Expands to More Cities: Everything to Know About the Growing Robotaxi Service
To join the interest list, Uber riders in Atlanta should first update the app, then tap Account > Settings, and find Autonomous vehicles under the Ride Preferences menu. Then, hit Join interest list.
When the partnership launches, riders will be able to travel across 37 square miles of Austin, with plans for future expansions. Perhaps most importantly, Uber says customers will pay the same rate for a Waymo robotaxi as they would for an UberX, Uber Green, Uber Comfort or Uber Comfort Electric ride, and will see upfront pricing in the app.
This could be a critical step toward getting more people to buy into the idea of hailing an autonomous ride. In other cities in which Waymo operates like San Francisco and Los Angeles, customers need to download the separate Waymo One app to hail a ride (in Phoenix, you have the option to use Waymo One or Uber). And in my personal experience, Waymo is oftentimes a bit pricier than a standard Uber or Lyft ride. But if people have the option to simply hail a robotaxi from an app they regularly use, and the prices are consistently comparable to standard human-driven options, they may be more enticed to give it a shot — and step outside of their comfort zone.
Self-driving vehicles are still a nascent technology but have seen relatively stable growth in recent years. Waymo is undoubtedly the biggest player, but companies like Amazon-owned Zoox are also vying for a piece of the lucrative pie, with plans to launch commercially this year too. Startups like Avride and May Mobility also have expansions in the works. Tesla’s Elon Musk last week said the company plans to launch its own self-driving service as early as June, starting in Austin, ahead of the slated rollout of its Cybercab in 2027.
In December, General Motors said it would no longer fund its Cruise robotaxi venture, highlighting the difficulty — and costliness — of building and scaling autonomous driving technology.
There are, unsurprisingly, safety concerns when it comes to vehicles without a driver behind the wheel, and companies like Waymo, Zoox and Cruise have all been involved in a range of incidents over the years. Still, these companies have maintained the safety of their respective vehicles and technology — especially compared to human drivers. A Waymo data hub published in September states that after driving over 22 million miles, its self-driving tech was involved in “73% fewer injury-causing crashes and 48% fewer police-reported crashes compared to human drivers.”
For its part, Uber says riders in Waymo vehicles will have access to human support 24/7 via both the Uber app and from inside the Waymo vehicle (there are screens in the front and back that let you quickly summon customer support). That could help to assuage some riders’ hesitancy about taking a robotaxi for a spin.
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