In June, Tesla is set to roll out its robotaxi service in Austin, going bumper to bumper with Waymo.
Austin is the first city where Tesla plans to test its tech with consumers. Alphabet-backed Waymo launched its robotaxi service in the city in March after already rolling out the service in three other cities over the past five years.
Ahead of the launch, Elon Musk has taken several digs at Waymo, including joking during the carmaker’s earnings call earlier this month that Waymo costs “‘way mo’ money.”
“I don’t see anyone being able to compete with Tesla at present,” Musk said.
Meanwhile, Waymo’s former CEO, John Krafcik, accused Tesla of being all talk and no action.
“Although Tesla hopes to compete with Waymo someday, they’ve failed utterly and completely at this for each of the 10 years they’ve been talking about it,” he said in an emailed statement to Business Insider.
Tesla’s Austin launch will mark a crucial chapter in a yearslong debate over the best self-driving training methods and whether success will come from Tesla’s big swings or Waymo’s gradual deployment.
Take a look at how Tesla and Waymo compare when it comes to autonomous driving technology.
Tesla did not respond to a request for comment. A Waymo spokesperson referred BI to previous blog posts on the company’s early rides and continued testing in cities across the US.
Training
Tesla and Waymo have taken radically different approaches to training their AI systems for self-driving. Tesla has relied on a vision-based approach that uses a suite of eight cameras and minimal reliance on external sensors.
Musk has said that Tesla began removing lidar sensors from its test vehicles in 2021, calling the technology an expensive “crutch.” The carmaker has a lidar- and radar-equipped vehicle called the Ground Truth Machine that it uses for training purposes, but only for edge cases of rare or unusual driving scenarios, BI previously reported.
Waymo’s Jaguar I-PACE robotaxis are outfitted with five lidar sensors, six radars, and 29 cameras that help its AI software navigate its environment, a company spokesperson said. The company says its next-generation Waymo Driver will have a reduced and cheaper sensor suite.
Before Waymo robotaxis are deployed for public rides, Waymo uses safety drivers to map out a city like San Francisco or Tokyo, creating highly detailed maps.
Autonomy level
The Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) ranks self-driving vehicles on a scale from zero to five — five being the holy grail of autonomous driving in which a driverless vehicle can go anywhere under any environmental conditions, according to SAE. Tesla has said it operates as a Level 2 vehicle, meaning that it operates as a driver-assist software with a human driver still behind the wheel.
In California, where Tesla does much of its in-house testing, the carmaker is required to secure a permit for Level 3 and above testing. Tesla has not reported using the permit, which allows the self-driving software to operate with a safety driver but even more autonomy, since 2019. The company told the California DMV in December that it was currently operating as a Level 2 vehicle in the state, according to documents viewed by BI.
Waymo, along with Zoox and Nuro, is one of the few companies that has deployed Level 4 autonomous driving in the real world, which means the vehicle does not require a driver behind the wheel and is fully autonomous.
Waymo robotaxis have limitations. The vehicles cannot travel beyond areas programmed into their system, and the company hasn’t yet offered robotaxi service in cities that experience more extreme weather, such as snow. A Waymo spokesperson said the company has invested in weather testing.
Business models
Tesla has a more consumer-focused business model. The company sells beta versions of its Full Self-Driving software for $8,000, or $99 a month. The software requires a licensed driver to supervise the vehicle, but it can switch lanes, recognize stop lights, and enter and exit highways.
While the company is also working on building up a commercial robotaxi fleet, Musk has said Tesla owners will one day be able to rent out their cars as a self-driving service, akin to Uber or Airbnb.
Waymo’s business is primarily focused on delivering an autonomous rideshare service through Waymo One or through its partnership with rideshare platforms such as Uber.
Unlike Tesla, Waymo does not manufacture cars in-house and instead relies on partnerships with OEMs to build out its robotaxi fleet, partnering with Jaguar, Chrysler, Hyundai, and Toyota.
Waymo has signaled interest in bringing its autonomous technology to personally owned vehicles. On April 29, Waymo revealed that it was in early talks with Toyota to explore bringing autonomy to consumer cars.
Geographic deployment
Tesla has said it aims to roll out the service in Austin in June and in other US cities within the year. The company is still getting regulatory approval in California, but has several in-house test drivers operating in cities across the country, including Phoenix, Dallas, New York, and Miami.
During the carmaker’s earnings call in April, Musk said that Tesla owners would be able to drive their vehicles autonomously within the year. Musk has said that Tesla will eventually deploy its services globally.
Waymo has chosen to gradually roll out its service in select cities. As of April, Waymo’s robotaxis are offering fully driverless rides to the public in limited parts of the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Austin.
The company is currently testing in Atlanta, Washington, DC, Las Vegas, Miami, San Diego, and Tokyo.
Miles driven autonomously
It’s difficult to compare Tesla and Waymo’s mileage reports.
Tesla has not released any information on how often humans need to take control of its self-driving systems or how many miles its cars have driven without intervention. In its most recent earnings report, the company said users of its beta FSD software have driven a cumulative 3.6 billion miles. The company also released an update in April that Tesla engineers had driven about 15,000 miles using an internal version of its robotaxi app.
Waymo has said that its robotaxis have traveled 56.7 million miles as of January, miles driven without human supervision. The company said it provides over 250,000 rides a week as of April.
Cost of a robotaxi ride
Tesla has not said how much the service will cost, but has said the price will be comparable to booking an Uber. Right now, Tesla owners pay a $8,000 flat fee or $99 a month to use the beta version of FSD.
As with Uber and Lyft, Waymo’s price can vary depending on the city and demand.
One study conducted last year by Evercore ISI of 1,000 trips offered by Waymo, Uber, and Lyft found that Waymo’s price point had essentially reached parity with existing rideshare platforms by the fourth quarter of 2024.
While Waymo was more expensive at about $24 per ride in mid-2024, Waymo’s average fare dropped nearly 10% to around $22 by the end of 2024.
This brought Waymo in line with traditional rideshare options, with UberX at about $21 and Lyft at roughly $22 during the same period. The analysts noted that the Uber and Lyft prices didn’t include driver tips, unlike the all-inclusive Waymo fare.
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