Waymo begins operations in four new cities in the United States

For several months now, Waymo has been showing its intention to reach many more cities as soon as possible, both in the United States and in other countries. Following this new strategy, the company has just begun operations with its autonomous robotaxis in four new cities in the United States.

Residents and visitors in Dallas, San Antonio, Houston and Orlando can now request that one of Waymo’s vehicles come pick them up to take a ride around these cities. With this addition, Waymo now operates in a total of ten metropolitan areas across the country.

This simultaneous rollout in four major cities across the country marks a new milestone for the company, since until now it had typically introduced its service in one or two cities, with considerable gaps of time between launches. For example, almost four years passed from Waymo’s debut in Phoenix in 2020 until the deployment of its autonomous vehicles in San Francisco was completed in 2024. This pace has accelerated considerably in recent months, with the recent arrival of Waymo’s robotaxis in Los Angeles, Austin, Atlanta and, last month, Miami as well.

“At Waymo, we are serving more riders than ever and are on track to surpass one million weekly rides by the end of the year. The new Texas cities, and Orlando as well, are extremely important to our strategy, as they will help us pave the way for launches in more than 20 additional cities. Each city has its own particularities in terms of traffic and mobility needs. This is important to keep in mind, since our goal is to offer an experience that is safe, reliable and appealing for both residents and visitors.”

Step by step

It is important to note, however, that as of today the service in these four cities we have mentioned is not yet open to the general public. As already happened in other cities, in this first phase selected users who already have the Waymo app installed on their mobile devices have received invitations to take their first trips. The company plans to gradually expand access until it finally offers the service without restrictions to the entire public before the end of the year. This gradual strategy makes it possible to manage initial demand and the limited capacity of the fleet available in each area.

Waymo’s rapid rollout over the past few months is the result of significant advances in the company’s autonomous driving technology. Waymo has developed a new system that uses a base model applicable to any city, on which improvements are subsequently applied. Previously, it was necessary to thoroughly train and validate the system for each new city, which took a long time.

Waymo claims that its robotaxis have already driven more than 200 million miles in fully autonomous mode and, according to its studies, the number of serious accidents and incidents recorded is lower than that of vehicles driven by humans, thereby contributing to an improvement in road safety in the cities where they operate.