By Sean McLain

After nearly a decadelong cycle of hype, disappointment and then renewed hype, self-driving taxis are starting to roll onto streets in a rapidly growing number of cities across the U.S.

Today, driverless vehicles from Waymo, Tesla, Zoox and a small army of lesser-known companies are trundling the streets of California, Texas and several other states.

A boom in the 2010s saw the creation of dozens of hyped startups promising to eliminate car ownership. But the high cost of developing the technology, the technical challenges of navigating crowded streets autonomously and the complex regulatory environment meant many went out of business. High-profile accidents also drew increased scrutiny on the safety of driverless vehicles.

Morgan Stanley estimates roughly half of the American population will have access to a robotaxi service within the next three years.

The number of autonomous rides being conducted in the U.S. is expected to rise rapidly, from around 15 million in 2025 to about 36 million this year, according to Morgan Stanley estimates. By 2030, the figure is expected to hit nearly 750 million rides.

Some companies are going it alone, while others are seeking deep-pocketed partners or planning to offer services through existing services such as Uber.

Here are the current U.S. operations and expansion plans of some of the competitors in the robotaxi race.

Waymo is the current leader in the robotaxi industry, operating more vehicles in more markets than its competitors. In some markets, Waymo's autonomous vehicles are starting to navigate freeways and airports.

Most of Waymo's fleet are Jaguar EVs, although the company is testing its latest vehicle, an electric van called the Ojai.

In 2023, during the first month of offering paid rides in San Francisco, Waymo vehicles made 10,000 trips. In March, Waymo said its fleet of vehicles had made 500,000 trips during the month.

Tesla is one of the most closely watched among the robotaxi competitors.

Chief Executive Elon Musk has made bold pronouncements about the ability of driverless vehicles to transform society, and his company's fortunes, by deploying millions of self-driving Teslas across the U.S.

Robotaxis are central to Tesla's strategy to transform from a carmaker to an AI and robotics company worth trillions of dollars.

Tesla hasn't disclosed how many vehicles are in its robotaxi fleet, but Robotaxi Tracker, a crowdsourced robotaxi data company, found nearly 600 Tesla vehicles offering rides in the past 30 days.

Currently, the company is only offering paid rides in Texas. Musk says the company is being cautious with the rollout of the service out of safety concerns. The Tesla chief said the company aims to expand to at least a dozen states this year.

Zoox was founded in 2014, one of several self-driving startups founded around the same time. Amazon.com acquired the company in 2020 for around $1.2 billion, after Zoox struggled to raise funds.

Unlike Waymo and Tesla, Zoox isn't using conventional cars for its robotaxi service. The company's box-shaped vehicles have sliding doors and seats more reminiscent of subway trains than automobiles. They also have no steering wheels, meaning they need a special exemption from federal vehicle standards to operate.

Zoox is currently awaiting approval to offer paid rides.

Since selling its self-driving arm in 2020, Uber has pivoted from trying to develop its own robotic cars to joining up with outside companies, sometimes by buying stakes in those companies or agreeing to purchase vehicles outright. The strategy marks a departure for a company that built itself on being an asset-light aggregator of private vehicles.

Uber recently signed deals to buy tens of thousands of vehicles from EV makers Rivian and Lucid.

Today, Uber has more than two dozen partnerships with carmakers and other robotaxi providers, including Waymo, Zoox and smaller players such as Moia and Motional.

Moia is the robotaxi subsidiary of German carmaker Volkswagen Group, which was established in 2016 as a way to fend off threats from tech upstarts that predicted an end to personal car ownership.

The company's vehicles are based on the ID. Buzz electric van, which itself is inspired by one of German company's most distinctive machines, the Volkswagen bus.

Moia has been testing vehicles and says it aims to launch services in Los Angeles through the Uber app and in Orlando through Beep in 2026. The company has said it is targeting a fleet of around 100 vehicles by early next year.

Motional is the robotaxi arm of South Korea's Hyundai Motor Group. The company has been testing autonomous vehicles in Las Vegas since 2021.

In March, Motional launched a paid robotaxi service in Las Vegas, offering rides through the Uber app. The vehicles currently use a safety driver, but Motional aims to deploy driverless vehicles by the end of 2026. Motional is also testing vehicles in Pittsburgh, but has yet to say whether it plans to launch a commercial service.

Motional's robotaxis are modified Hyundai Ioniq 5 electric vehicles assembled at a Singapore plant owned by the Korean carmaker.

Nuro was founded in 2016 by two former engineers from Google's self-driving project. The company's first vehicle was a small, toaster-shaped machine designed to deliver groceries and parcels autonomously. Nuro raised about $2.3 billion from investors, including Uber and SoftBank, before signing a deal in 2025 to develop robotaxis with Uber and EV maker Lucid. As part of the agreement, Uber said it would purchase 35,000 Lucid vehicles equipped with Nuro hardware and software, aiming to deploy them in dozens of cities around the world through 2032.

The companies have been conducting road tests of the vehicle ahead of an expected launch of their first service in and around San Francisco this year.

Sources: the companies; Robotaxi Tracker (Tesla)

Write to Sean McLain at sean.mclain@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

May 01, 2026 12:01 ET (16:01 GMT)

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